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60 Comments
- geekologist, on 10/12/2007, -2/+36The other 91% is from lawsuits.
- jeremymerrill, on 10/12/2007, -2/+33You mean the RIAA is lying and being hypocritical?? wow. total paradigm shift, man. that has definately changed my total worldview.
;-) - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -11/+32Piracy for life.
- elym, on 10/12/2007, -0/+16I sure as heck won't pay a higher rate than .99 each. And WTF is the idea to sell popular tracks for more? These guys just don't get it. The more they whine about sales, the less I EVER want to buy something from them again. Digital distribution is going to be the new way. It's cheaper for them and way more profitable.
- Arcotik, on 10/12/2007, -0/+11Doesn't the RIAA have enough money already as it is? They steal enough from the artist's CDs as it is. People really should go independent labels away from the RIAA. Anyway, if by digital media downloading you mean Pirate Bay - I'm down with that.
- Madh2orat, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8I have an idea, lets all go get cd's that the riaa hasnt taken under their wing, and buy them instead. Boycott them, and see how much their profit will shrink. Even if one person bought them, they would still have a 10 percent increase in profit, purely because of lawsuits.
- Drizzit, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7@koshak
When there's a shortage of goods then prices go up. With digital music there is no such shortage. In fact it's the opposite. More bandwidth actually lowers costs when you buy it in large chunks. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6These bastards have to be stopped somehow. Unfortunatley the vast majority of CD buying people out there are pretty apathetic to the whole issue and will keep buying CDs by artists the RIAA 'represents'.
- deadsenator, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6Have you seen http://www.garageband.com/ ? It is supposed to be an unshackled online portal for musicians. You can also share music that is not licensed to the RIAA. Gotta love the Innard-Net.
- compu73rg33k, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7You mean their new 4th Bentley payment?
- boredzo, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6They'll complain about the increased percentage of songs obtained by piracy instead of purchasing (percentage purchased goes down == percentage pirated goes up). Then there will be more DRM and more anti-digital-freedom legislation and much more general whinging from the RIAA.
It will get worse before it gets better. - Gaines, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6Actually, you can't get away from the RIAA even if you're independent. They still collect royalties on your behalf unless you give explicit permission to each station/company that wants to play your stuff.
For a democracy, the RIAA has sure managed to twist our government around their business model. For the people, by the people? More like for the bullying corporation, by the money we pay them. - skidooer, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6A drop in revenue is to be expected. They don't have to collect as much money to compensate the costs of creation, shipment, etc. of the physical media.
If revenue is only down ~3%, odds are their profit is up! - Zippo, on 10/12/2007, -3/+8Yar har har, a pirate's life for me...
I bought an iPod and tons of blank CDs... I've paid my dues. - Arramol, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6I for one am glad to see ANY decline in their revenue. It's long past time for the end of the Racketeering Industry Association of America. We geeks should do our part by doing what we do best - adopting new technology early, then getting our non-greek friends hooked on it as it becomes user-friendly. This way, artist-friendly Internet services can become large enough and profitable to challenge the depraved RIAA gluttons.
Most people aren't concerned enough about insane lawsuits and DRM to boycott the RIAA. If we want to bring them down, we have to provide people with attractive alternatives (not that this is terribly difficult). Internet distribution is a great alternative, and it's up to us to make it happen.
Oh, and incidentally, please DON'T rely on piracy. It just keeps people convinced that the RIAA has the moral high ground. - jordanrobbins, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6Seriously! Think about who you are stealing from!
They might not even be able to afford their Bentley payment this month! - jordanrobbins, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6Sorry,
I figured that they would forget about the other 3 in the sub-terrainian garage. - Sophren, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5I remember hearing about artists only getting 5% of the total profits from their own music.. is that true?
If so, it kinda goes against their whole spill about "looking out for the artist." Everyone knows artists are being treated like crap--it's the RIAA's fault, not "dwindling sales due to piracy."
Everytime I hear about musicians moving towards other means of distribution, I just sit back and smile. The RIAA better find a way to reorganize the industry, because artists are truly getting the shaft here. - rideagain, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6http://www.boycott-riaa.com/
- typo180, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Is anyone else thinking "Hey, maybe we'd be better off without the RIAA?" I say artists and consumers need to band together and get rid of the middle man. If I had the choice between paying $15 for a CD or $10 for an RIAA endorsed CD, I'd pay the extra $5. Of course I in now way endorse piracy...cough
Artists who get 5% of the total profits from their music are the lucky ones. Most artists are in debt after their first album.
The problem with an RIAA boycott is that a lot of really good music is "represented" by the RIAA.
I should also point out that "piracy" and "theft" are completely inaccurate terms for downloaded music. The possible punishment for shoplifting a CD is much lower than for downloading one. - blacklilyninja, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4interesting numbers in 2004
universal music group
9.1%
thats the sales growth for the year.... meaning there were NO sales losses.
2004 Sales (mil.)
$6,810.5
thats nearly 7 BILLION dollars
Company Type
Public (London: EMI)
Fiscal Year-End
March
2004 Sales (mil.)
$3,872.0
1-Year Sales Growth
13.1% (NO LOSSES)
2004 Net Income (mil.)
($130.7)
2004 Employees
7,996
1-Year Employee Growth
(1.1%)
Company Type
Joint Venture of Sony Corporation of America and Bertelsmann
Fiscal Year-End
March
*2005 Sales (millions.)
$5,000.0 (est.)
2005 Employees
10,000
thats 5 BILLION dollars
when something says GROWTH that means no losses.
Warner time warner was an obsene number of total worth in the trillions.
its stupid... - sharedferret, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5How does one "loose" money, anyway?
- siekosunfire, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Why doesn't someone create a company to compete with the RIAA?
Music should be about music, not about the money. Sure there are musicians, and companies, in the music industry solely for money, but why not garner the support of those who do it for the music and launch a company that not only advocates 'fair use' but also gives back to the artist and the community? Why bother with CDs and records when you can strike a deal with Apple and have your music on iTunes, with the option to download an entire CD for a neighborhood range of seven to ten dollars for ten to fifteen songs?
Of course such a company would need a small amount of capital in order to continue running, handle day-to-day activities, etc., but surely such a company, with a vested interest in spreading the music and keeping it alive, could be managed so that it does not become a ravenous behemoth looking to gorge its stomach with the money from innocent individuals. But aside from that, the said company could run its own research experiments and appeal to the politicians in several countries, arguing that people are willing to pay for 'good' music, not the homogenized hip-hop crap the RIAA tries to protect.
And what can the RIAA do? Cite that the better company, whose philosophy is to spread the music and give back to the artists and community, is in violation of the law and needs to be sued? Surely such a jest would be laughed out of court. And if it's not, I guess we can all learn to live with a fascist music industry, right? - cokebottletuque, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3well "42.6 percent of total unit shipments." make a bit more sense wen you consider that a on-line unit shipment is one song and a CD is ~15 songs.
- Kamatz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Looks like Cd's are going the way of the Vhs's and 8-tracks, the RIAA must be still in denial.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+5complaining about the RIAA (and the MPAA) is like complaining about Exxon. yeah, they are crooks and you can bitch and moan about how bad they suck. but you know what, no one listens or can/will do anything about it.... other than do more illegal downloads..... hey, thats a good idea!! most bands they are putting out these days suck eggs anyway... i mean do we really need another nickelback cd ever again?
- Cyberdactyl, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4It's recycled history that leaders in the music and film industry cry and whine whenever new recording technology is introduced to the masses, only later to learn THAT SAME technology actually INCREASED sales.
The RIAA is merely the current shake down goons doing the age-old knuckle busting for the music industry fatcats for a few extra bucks. - r3zonance, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Is revenue the same as profit?
- kindrobot, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Absolutely the right game plan.
I actually stopped downloading mainstream music and rely on indie (non-RIAA),
CC artists and satellite radio. But mainstream audiences will never do this. At least not on purpose. That part of it needs to be as transparent as the (C) copywrong
symbol.
I think what we need is a Creative Commons channel on Sirius or XM, but name it
without even mentioning the CC aspect.
As an aside, I will NEVER pay 99 cents for a single track. It makes no sense
whatsoever and is not even close to being justified as a price point. If it were .49
cents, I'd be snatching them from itunes like candy already with *almost* no
issues with propriety and DRM. I differ with the RIAA ( O RLY?) in the sense that
I believe upping the prices of select downloads will STILL be suicidal. As long as
people can get it free, the only way to effectively sell to those same people is to
make it cheap, fast and extremely easy. DRM flies in the face of that last one, and makes little sense when you can bypass the DRM by visiting a torrent site anyway. - TaeBoX, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Yeah, on that note... The CD media that you buy has a tax on it that goes directly to the RIAA. They are then supposed to give it to the artists, but that only happens if the artist goes out of his or her way to claim the money. Canadians have to pay a tax as well, only theirs is much higher than it is in the US.
- jerrygofixit, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2music these days blows, get better music, that's why yer profits are goin to *****, dumbasses
- pizzaface200, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3One thing i have to say short and sweet SHOVE IT RIAA you filthy bunch of corporate liars your worse than Enron
- blacklilyninja, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3TIme warner quarterly profit up 21% as of feb 06. THats an INCREASE IN PROFITS from last quarters profits. not total profits. Time Warner's revenue rose 7 percent, to $11.9 billion from $11.1 billion a year earlier, on gains in cable TV, movie and TV production, cable networks and magazine publishing.
Warner said its music profits jumped 92 percent to $69 million, or 46 cents per share, up from $36 million, or 31 cents per share, a year earlier. - kualla, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Someone needs to start an official boycott site if there already isn't one. Then declare a day of the month to completly boycott all RIAA cd's (RIAARADAR.com) by not buying the CD's (hell, never buy the RIAA CD's) but also especially passing the word on by boycotting the CD's outside the CD stores or something.
I say ***** RIAA but don't ***** over the artists, go to their concerts or DL their tracks and then send them a few bucks.
Sound like a good plan??? - randal2k, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2everyone buying digital tracks is the problem, i ams seeing people funding RIAA and there lawsuits... Music is thriving?! Why? it should be dropping like a bad date... but no, keep on chugging your 99 cents into the dragon's mouth.
- r3zonance, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4"As an aside, I will NEVER pay 99 cents for a single track. It makes no sense whatsoever and is not even close to being justified as a price point. If it were .49 cents"
That's kind of playing along the same lines as the RIAA really. Ooh it's cheap, but it's not cheap enough. If it were 49 cents, you'd still want it cheaper.
This is the problem with people in general. They want something for nothing, or almost nothing. - Cerebral, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2What it comes down to is that no Economics model fits what is going on here except for a Monopoly. If you want song X from Artist X, they are the only way to get it. It actually fits other models... for example if you want a Porsche you pay a premium for that car. The problem is that what the music industry is trying to do with things now (DRM) is tell you "Hey you bought that Porsche but you can only drive it in the state you bought it in" or "You may not drive this on Wednesdays."
The sad part is that this is where the Government should step in and protect citizens from things like this... but the government is a Monopoly also being that they sell-out to the highest bidder and since when did we ever ban together and give them millions/billions of dollars?
This is also why people need to VOTE. - jordanrobbins, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1CD buyers need to take their community "into to the internet" classes.
- wonko-the-sane, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1All the albums I buy are chock full of good songs. Maybe that's because I listen to Jazz... :)
- el_taco, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1They're waiting for the college kids to drop out so they can make their lawsuit payments. Those profits are still pending.
- kindrobot, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2"That's kind of playing along the same lines as the RIAA really. Ooh it's cheap, but it's not cheap enough. If it were 49 cents, you'd still want it cheaper.
This is the problem with people in general. They want something for nothing, or almost nothing."
No, actually, paying the same price for one downloaded track as you would if you
purchased it as part of a CD single or CD is not even close to "something for
nothing". It just makes sense. The average CD is 12-13 tracks. Why should we
pay more for a download than a track on physical media? Convenience? Most
downloadable tracks that you pay for have restrictions. That's not convenience.
If they're going to put restrictions on the song, as a consumer I see that as
a crippled product and expect a discount, NOT a mark-up. How exactly is that
"along the same lines as the RIAA"? Honest question, not a flame. - loup, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I would love to see the artists and consumers getting rid of the middle man, there is one problem though, there is a reason for the middle man. Artists generally don't have the money and resources to advertise for themselves on a national or international level, they don't have the connections necessary to reach a wide audience by themselves. This is where the record label comes in, they take care of all of that, and then stiff the artist on the sales of the music.
I think, or at least hope that the need for "major" record labels will fade away as more artists experiment with online distribution, but it's not going to be an overnight thing. - kindrobot, on 10/12/2007, -2/+3"Yeah! What is up with things that are in greater demand costing more! I can't BELIEVE such a business model!"
Double yeah!! Especially when they control the means to manufacture demand!
phhrt! - CaughtThinking, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Wake up artists, you're being screwed way more over the digital music sales than you are over album sales.
- flibbittyjibbit, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Imagine ithat you are out to eat and the waiter brings you a desert tray. On the tray there is a bowl of straw, a rock, a plate of dirt, and a slice of white bread. The waiter informs you that all the deserts are 99 cents. You ask to see another desert tray. Ten minutes later he returns with a similar selection. An hour later, and 5 more trays, and the waiter brings you a tray which includes a nice peice of chocolate cake. Thank you for dining at the RIAA.
- kindrobot, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1.. And they also control the means to reach stores, radio and licensing in nasty, uncompetitive ways. Ever heard of "indies"? (no, not the labels, the promoters) It's
pay for play, and it's accepted. - SpannerX, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Doesn't Nickleback just do the same song over and over again anyway? So really we only needed the one song from them in the first place, not a whole CD.
- jinexile, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Which is amusing since 99% of the music I download has never been commited to a cd-r... I pay a tax to the CRIA for putting games, applications, backups, my pictures, and personal movies on. That's like paying the electric company a tax for using a gas lamp.
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