http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122966038836021137.html

zomg?

i love how they still gripe about low CD sales and still blame piracy when so few good albums are being made

all the good music can be found used for much cheaper

This is probably going to effect people on the Gnutella and Kazaa networks the most.

WE WIN

*downlodes paper trail LOL*

What did they use to track people downloading illegal music anyway??

internet hax

Yeah.. this is far from a victory. Instead of the RIAA doing the lawsuits themselves, they're going to harp on cable / dsl companies to monitor the content going through their tubes, and blackmail them into giving over our personal information and who's doing what, so they can shut off service completely to the offenders.

This is not a victory, it's just them realizing that this is an ineffective strategy, and stepping up their game.

Yeah. The ISPs are going to join right in, since the file-sharers are probably their high-bandwidth users anyways.

Yep. Had a friend get his internet shut off for Torrenting seasons of Fox shows. He was using Time Warner cable though.

Probably hit the cap on 'unlimited bandwidth'

Not necessarily, thanks things like Youtube and BBC IPlayer there are increasingly legitimate uses to use lots of bandwidth.

I wonder if they watch business accounts any more closer than residential.. hmm

darts and a phone book

This reminds me of the War On Drugs. Each time they develop a strategy, the opposition is a few steps ahead. Except in this case, I find myself cheering for the opposition.

So, you're against drugs or you're for the RIAA?

This needs to happen. ISPs are cashing in big on illegal downloads - people pay their monthly internet fees and get unlimited access to all kinds of content.



It's actually nothing like the war on drugs. Why would you cheer for people who illegally download music/movies/games/etc? (I assume that's what you mean with that statement).



This is retarded. "Good" is a relative term, and P2P file sharing is directly responsible for the decline in record sales over the last decade.

I mostly torrent pornography. It's a horrible habit. I think I'm approaching the 200GB range...

I've probably uploaded a dozen terabytes through bit torrent by now.

Yes but, record companies are more interested in hot, busty pop artists who can attract young teenagers than they are in making good music. Additionally, the indie scene is increasingly popular, and big record companies go contrary to that nature.


I'm sure is a large part of it, but don't fool yourself into thinking it's the only reason.

Sorry, I call shenanigans. Define "indie scene", define "good music". Are you saying that accessible music is bad? Or that music targeted towards a specific demographic is bad?



No they're not? Like, can you back this statement up at all? Every performing artist/recording artist will market themselves and their product towards the people they want to sell to and cultivate a specific image. There's nothing wrong with that.

Tracer that is a damn lie.
you aren't sorry for calling shenanigans

hammmmmmmmmm

Tracer, have you listened to the radio lately?

Vegiemaster, Tracer is basically just pointing out your opinion is not fact, no matter how strongly you feel about said opinion.

I see this argument like this. It is wrong to freely distribute, let alone the mass distribution of, material for which you do not hold the rights to distribute. Anti-drm advocates can rarely, if ever, successfully argue that people should rightfully offer their music collections to the masses when they only hold the license to personally use the media. I really have no problem with prosecuting people that do do that.

I hate DRM because, as many people routinely point out, it most adversely affects the person trying to enjoy what he legally purschased. But just because DRM is a pain that doesn't excuse pirating the entire media. Freely available tools crack most DRM and allow individuals to rip virtually any media for a DRM free experience. I personally don't reward Apple or iTunes for gimping its service or products with DRM. And with regards to software, I won't buy a product that requires internet access to use it when I know I'm going to want to use it when I don't have internet access.

As a musician who is in a local band, I encourage people to rip my CD and put it out on torrent sites, and if we get signed to a major label, I'll still feel the same way. I think the RIAA is and the whole concept of charging for mp3s (drm etc) is pure BS.

If I like a band enough, I buy their album, one because I like to support bands I like, and two because the CD is a collector item, along with the insert etc. If I want to see what a band is like, I see nothing wrong with downloading their album -for free- and giving it a listen for a few weeks to see if it grows on me or not. If it doesn't chances are I'm not going to listen to it enough to justify the price of buying the CD physicially or digitally, if it does, then I'm probably going to go and purchase the CD to support the band. Simple as that. Personally I think its a great way to give alot of unheard of bands some great and well deserved exposure. I can't tell you how many new bands I've found because of giant genre lists people seed. And out of those new bands, I've purchased many of their CD's.

People really need to stop whining just because it has been deemed "illegal".

Heres an excerpt from Wikipedia quoting Disturbed's frontman David Draiman. I couldn't agree more with him:

I stay pretty aware of what's on it. I generally listen to the local jazz station, not top 40 stuff but I more or less keep track of what's getting airplay and what's selling.

I'm not trying to be a douchnozzle here but what do you mean by that radio comment anyways? Radio stations have nothing to do with the actual creation of music.



This I don't get. As a band, selling merch is one of your main revenue streams. I know if I played a show for, say, 500 people a big part of my business would be selling my CD. If I could even sell CDs to 10% of that audience at $20 each that would go a long way towards the band breaking even.

The guy you quoted makes a lot of sense. Is suing your customers stupid? Yes. Is clinging to a dead technology (CDs) and not embracing the future (mp3s, etc.) stupid? Yes. But that doesn't make it a good idea to illegally download files - that just hurts the artists.



I doubt it. That might seem like a good way to get a bunch of free publicity when you're a young band, but when you start to have some success (and you really start to crunch the numbers and plan your business) you'll see that it's just hurting you.

last I checked, income from digital sales didn't amount to **** anyway.

Is using Usenet services considered "piracy?"

Just curious, and I wonder if they can sue, or cut of internet, if one does get content from Usenet.

That would just force is to use more encryption for such things. Wouldn't be hard.

Does the RIAA have any idea how many people download music illegally? Going after the ISP's will have a short term effect, when the ISP's that don't cooperate become known, everyone will jump towards those, and guess what? You just made an ISP very rich.

Tracer I think the biggest problem is how the money is distributed. For example if you buy a cd at the store, most of that money will go to the record label. If you had bought the CD at a show most of that money would go to the band.

Unfortunately most bigger labels are just in it for the money, so they end up not giving bands the support they need.

I suppose that I wasn't as clear as I could've been. I was referring to the similarity between the concept of a War On Drugs & a War On Piracy. Neither can be won & the methods that are being used in both cases are illogical. It's inevitable that people will use drugs & it's inevitable that people will pirate &/or download things illegally. This doesn't necessarily mean that the government in the case of drugs or the RIAA/MPAA in the case of piracy should completely give up, but it's quite obvious that their methodology is ridiculous. I can't fathom why anyone wouldn't see the similarities without me pointing them out, but apologies if that was indeed the case...

...and for whoever asked me why I would cheer for people that are pirating & downloading things illegally, I would have to point out that it's for 2 reasons. They make my entertainment both inexpensive & more accessible. If the RIAA/MPAA would've embraced the internet with an ounce of innovation in the beginning, this would've been much better for them in the end. The fact that they didn't just goes to show that in the spirit of capitalism, they don't have the right to survive. Maybe we'll just bail them out...

Well, first of all all musicians (pros, I mean) are in it for the money. Not in the sense of "let's start aband and get filthy rich!" but at the end of the day you have to get paid. You always have to get paid because that's how you're able to keep doing art for a living. It's never just pure art - it's a comvination of art and business.

Record labels exist for a reason: they give your band much-needed marketing power and provide you with start-up capital, and in the old days got you distribution. These are all really important to a record being successful (by which I mean 'at least breaks even').

Sure, aband can do all that stuff on its own but then they're also assuming all the risk.

Apparently not all ISPs want to go along with the RIAA's new plans...

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-10127841-93.html