Online Music – Less for More?

[Jonathon Watkins]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.wired.com/news/digiwood/0,1412,62995,00.html' target='_blank'>http://www.wired.com/news/digiwood/...2,62995,00.html</a><br /><br /></div><br />Ars Technica (http://arstechnica.com/news/posts/1081526925.html) have an article up titled "Music executives want to see more expensive online music sales". In it, they point to Wired, who have reprinted a Wall Street Journal article. With me so far? :wink: "For months, digital-music services have been touting albums for $9.99 to entice more people to buy online. But Apple's iTunes Music Store has been charging $16.99 for Fly or Die, while Napster sells the 12-song collection for $13.99. Both prices are higher than the $13.49 that Amazon.com charges for the CD itself. The same pricing shifts are showing up on albums by a growing slate of artists, from Shakira to Bob Dylan." So why would I want to pay more for a series of intangible music files, rather than a CD that I can use to encode the music any way I choose? Who's great idea is this?<br /><br />"The music companies are reluctant to talk openly about their wholesale-pricing strategies, but they are quick to blame the retailers for higher prices. A spokeswoman for EMI, for instance, stresses that the retailers, not record companies, ultimately set the prices consumers pay. However, the digital-music services say they base their retail prices directly on the wholesale prices the music companies charge. "Our pricing comes when the fees come in from the labels," said Cathy." So apparently it's no one's and everyone's fault that this is happening. :? <br /><br />As Ars Technica say, "The music industry needs to wake up. A $4 price difference between a lossy, DRM-laden album and its (for now) relatively free, tangible counterpart is going to hurt their online efforts. If anything they should be bending over backwards to legitimize online music services and wean casual pirates off their habits, all the while building on the general enthusiasm experienced by users of services". Quite.<br /><br />So do you guys tend to buy the whole album or would you pick out the singles online? I really don't think I need to ask you what you think of higher online music prices. :wink:

[Aerestis]

I would rather get my tongue stuck in a door than pay higher prices for anything to do with recording artists. I haven't bought music in years, and I don't download it either. It's all becoming so silly, that I'd rather just record jam sessions with friends and make some fun little tunes on my computer. All in all, I spend less on software and equipment than people do on cd's and music. I am fine without buying something I honestly just get tired of anyways. I do listen to the radio while I eat dinner and do dishes and stuff, though. Otherwise I don't have anything to do with recent music.

edited

[rugerx]

I use Itunes and I love it. The price of 99 cents per track is aok.
I refuse to buy any CD from a store, I just wont pay 14$ for an album with 1 or 2 songs I like.

Now if the price went up on Itunes I would definitely purchase less songs.
I have very little concern for the recording industry which has in my opinion overcharged from day one. I remember buying an album 4 years ago and paying 16$, I thought back then, wow I just got ripped off.
I was right... :roll:
With Itunes I never feel ripped off.

[jlp]

As I'm posting this, I'm listening to free MOD music with freeware ModPlug Player. I spent some time looking for free MOD files, sorted them to keep what I like, and this is my main source of music listening.

Unfortunately MOD is a lot less known than MP3, but it's quite different as well.

While MP3 is a compression (and decompression) algorythm of any WAV file, MOD is a crossing between MIDI and wav in which samples of the instruments used are stored in the file along with the partition to play them; the MIDI file is the partition that uses those samples found in your sound card and are limited to them, while any sample can be recorded and stored in a MOD file. MOD files are generally music only with no or little voice samples.

This way the file can be very small regardless of the song length.

Let's say you have 10 instruments sampled in your MOD file and that those instruments are simple, your MOD file can be quite small even if the song lasts 5, 6 or 10 minutes. Most MOD files are in the 10s or 100s of KB, rarely in the few Megs if there are lots of complicated samples.

:nonono:

Anyway back to price of commercial music files.

As usual companies are greedy (it's OK to want to survive and make money, it's NOT OK to want it all) and they want "the butter and the butter money" as we say in French, and they want the dairy shop too. :really mad:

In most of Europe since many years and more recently in Canada as well, the recording industry succeeded to obtain collecting a royalty tax on all recordable blank media: from the old audio tapes to video tapes to the latest flash cards, HDD, CD and DVD. Even if you use removable media to take pix or backup your HDD (on which you already paid this royalty tax in the first place) you have to pay this royalty tax on these recordable media too.

And they dare complain when people download "free" songs off Kaza, etc. while they encourage it with those taxes.

So everybody end up paying those songs multiple times over and over and over.

:2gunfire: :snipersmile: ENOUGH IS ENOUGH D@M!T !!! 0X :evil: :onfire: :splat: :soapbox: :bangin: :devilboy: :armed:

[jizmo]

As I'm posting this, I'm listening to free MOD music with freeware ModPlug Player. I spent some time looking for free MOD files, sorted them to keep what I like, and this is my main source of music listening.
:worried:

/jizmo

[jlp]

As I'm posting this, I'm listening to free MOD music with freeware ModPlug Player. I spent some time looking for free MOD files, sorted them to keep what I like, and this is my main source of music listening.

8O

/jizmo

What's so shocking jizmo?!

[jizmo]

What's so shocking jizmo?!
I find mod listening pretty much as enjoyable as listening to general midi song on my desktop computer.
I can do it occasionally, but not for a longer period. :boohoo:

/jizmo

[jlp]

What's so shocking jizmo?!
I find mod listening pretty much as enjoyable as listening to general midi song on my desktop computer.
I can do it occasionally, but not for a longer period. :boohoo:

/jizmo

It all depends on which MOD you listen to. Some, especially very old ones may sound like MIDI files, but 99% of those I have (a hundred or two) sound a WHOLE LOT better, much like MP3'ed synthesizer songs.

Anyway to each his own, as we say. You can't argue about taste or color... or music :D

[Felix Torres]

I buy CDs.
Not that I'm adverse to buying singles online; I think it is a good idea and a necessary component of the market.
But the thing is, I'm not into TOP-40 music as a rule so I don't have much exposure to "One-hit-wonder syndrome" as your average teenager buyer. Some of my favorites do show up on Top-40 lists from time to time but that's not why I buy them.
That said, my tastes are eclectic enough that most of the stuff I buy isn't carried by the online retailers, who are really focused on the 13-21 crowd anyway.

The thing to consider is that online music sales are now in FAD mode.
Which is why Apple is currently, and temporarily, in the lead.
Everybody wants to get into it because everybody is getting into it.
And for all the players it is a money-losing proposition.
They're just doing the old dot-com speculative market-share buy-in in the hopes of buying their way into the market that emerges *after* the FAD ends.

Look at the existing and announced players and they fall into two categories: the pure online players, like Napster, Rhapsody, and Musicmatch, and the loss-leader retailers, like Apple, Wal-Mart, AOL, and (soon) MSN.

The former are basically dot-coms, looking to build self-sustaining businesses out of selling music online. They're the ones that *need* to see higher online music prices.
Good luck, children!
Cause even selling CDs is not a profitable business in a world of Wal-Marts, Amazons, and Best Buys, for whom selling music is just a way to drive traffic (mostly *young* traffic) to their real businesses.
In the brick-n-mortar world, the loss-leader CD-retailers are just killing the pure music retailers and it is pretty much a given that the same will happen online.
Wal-mart sells online music to drive customers to their online sales portal because they realize their biggest competitor, across the board, these days is AMAZON, not K-Mart or Target.
Apple sells music online to create a completely controlled ecosystem for their hardware, much as they tried to do with the LISA and, to a lesser extent, the Mac.
AOL and MSN sell music as a way to add value to their online portal business, much the same way they provide e-mail and instant messaging; it is an added-value feature to get and retain customers.
And we will see others; COKE, PEPSI, McDonalds, candy vendors, all using downloads to promote brand-awareness among the trendy...

*Anybody* who sells products to the 13-21 crowd will see this as a way to build brand awareness by giving away singles at cost, just like people used to give away all sorts of useful products and services during the dot-com bubble. Nobody will make money off this except the guys in the backrooms setting up the online shops.

And just as we are only now starting to see the real online market emerge, *after* the collapse of the bubble, it will be a while before the real online music market emerges.

My best guess is it will emerge in three forms:

1- loss-leader top-40 singles downloads meant for casual listeners and teens. Low-quality/low-price and limited selection for anything not "hot". Disposable, transient music you'll be ashamed to admit to have listened to twenty years later. Likely price? 69 cents a song. Quality? The same as today, which is to say mediocre. It will *never* get better. And in most cases you won't even be able to get the full album at those prices. Nor will the catalogs get particularly deep. Think of it as the AM radio of online music. Not much money but one or two players (MTV?) might become destinations-of-choice for the kiddies and make a profit out of the penny-sized margins.

2- all-you-can eat-type subscriptions for the dedicated aficionados, with serious listening-habit-tracking providing meaningful reccomendations of likely new performers/songs; essentially personalized online radio, with DRM'ed downloads that you can take offline. There are already efforts in that direction but the model hasn't been fully fleshed out yet; expect to see more of it late this year and next. Think of it as XM radio done right; good quality, no ads, and nice explorability to help you find new acts/songs, at a reasonable price, say $5-10 a month.

3- broadband only-delivery of true CD-quality music at sustainable prices for serious music buyers interested in hard-to-find albums or just plain instant gratification. Price will NOT be the driver here but rather availability and quality. This will be the domain of lossless-quality codecs and vast international corporate catalogs. This is where you'll go looking for a digital copy of THREE JACKS AND A JILL. ;-) And this is where the real money will reside, cause this is what will replace the music stores and mail order CD-clubs...

Notice that Musicmatch is moving in this direction; a lot of their songs (most?) are in higher than 128kbit WMA format. I fully expect the MSN Music store to support the WMA Lossless format when it arrives. Apple may or may not follow suit (probably not) since their corporate needs are met by their existing music-as-loss-leader model. As long as they can make money off the hardware, they'll likely be happy selling lossy music at cost.

When will the dust settle?
Not soon.
The chaos hasn't really gotten started yet.
It'll be a year before all the likely players join in and three years, at a minimum, before we start to see significan differentiation and culling of the players.
In, say 5 years, we'll see the real online music market that will endure.
And it will look nothing like iTunes.
I'm thinking it will look a hell of a lot more like Columbia House with online delivery than iTunes.

Two cents worth; the check's in the mail...

[dugn]

Holy Cow! Felix summed up the whole recording industry and online music purchasing issue in one, fell swoop better than any other author seems to have covered it in mainstream media.

Jeeze - get that guy a job!

[szamot]

On a day like this what can be said other than - thank goodness for Canada where, yes, we have a blank media royalty but downloading music is perfectly legal, as recently rulled by the Supreme Court. :twisted:

[xbalance]

Not sure how I can add to what Felix has said except to comment on how I pay for music.

Primarily, I enjoy MusicMatch's paid subscription (as long as my employer continues to allow it). I can listen to certain types of music, certain artists and I can experiment with new artists without spending any additional money. I have it on all day at work and it is well worth the $6/mo.

I occassionaly will buy a CD but I almost always buy it used from either Amazon or Half.com.

I have never bought a single and that is because of the copyright protection schemes that they employ make it more of a bother to me than it is worth (so far).

I understand that Starbucks is looking to get into the fray by allowing people to build a compliation CD that does not have any of the copyright schemes. What about that model, Felix?

[Jonathan1]

:soapbox:

Greedy SOBs. :evil: :2gunfire:

Go ahead and jack up the prices and watch the rebirth of P2P with a vengeance. Do people actually think these lawsuits the terrorists at the RIAA are pulling is the cause for the drop-off on P2P?!?! BS. People are warming up to iTMS, MusicMatch, and Napster.
Watch that all fall to **** if they keep pulling this crap. :byebye:
The greed of these bastards really does astound me. What does Britney need another Limo to match her ample pushup bra collection? Does the head of the RIAA need another mansion to store her car collection in?

Bite me. If a CD has something like 20 tracks I can see spending greater then $9.99 But otherwise screw them. I will either buy the single track that I really want or if that option isn't available I will find other methods of "obtaining" the track.
What is really pissing me off is that I've been seriously working on exchanging the 6,000 or so pirated tracks for legit iTunes Music Store tracks (I've replaced over $600 worth so far.) but if the RIAA is going to pull this kind of crap then why should I bother? :dilemma:

[Kiki]

I admit, I haven't bought music since the 80's. I'll stick with WinMX, my current favorite. The only problem there is all the basta**s that don't share.

IMO, the musicians should make their money doing live shows; screw the rest of the industry.

[tmulli]

It certainly is uncertain times for the music industry. The business model that has endured for the last 50 +/- years is faultering and the labels/riaa are responding by lashing out at everyone except themselves because surely it is not their fault for resting on their laurels? This new market is still in its infancy and has a long way to go before a new sustainable model is in place. Felix summed it all up very well, but before these options can even be put in place, a universal file standard has to be reached. Fighting over multiple formats is taking energy and time away from fighting about how to best set up an online market to gouge the consumer. Afterall, the physical distribution of music is handled (for the most part) on CD. You can take one anywhere and play it on just about anything. It's ease of use/portability that will define how the online bsuiness is setup and who will dominate it. After that is determined, then we can fight over price...

[Felix Torres]

I understand that Starbucks is looking to get into the fray by allowing people to build a compliation CD that does not have any of the copyright schemes. What about that model, Felix?

What business is Starbucks in?
Restaurant?
Sounds like a loss-leader, no?
Get traffic in the door.
Much like the happy-meal giveaways...

Now, you want a neat use of digital music, there is a rock group out there (I think its the successors to the Grateful Dead) who record every concert and allow fans to buy a CD of the concert they attended on a cleaned-up CD. Or a concert they missed.
Betcha they start selling the concerts online soon, if they aren't already...

A nice business model would be for a bar band to give out coded stubs are their performances allowing fans to download their songs. Anybody who didn't go to see them live would pay.
Long-time supporters get discounts when they hit it big.
Johnny-come-latelies pay full price.

What most folks fail to realize is that there is money to be made in the "community" aspects of online music (and video for that matter).
Simple question: if selling songs at a buck a pop is so profitable, how come Amazon isn't in on it?
I'm guessing they're working on it, but since CDs are one of their big cash cows, they're not about to go killing it willy-nilly on a fad.

Should be interesting to see what approach Amazon takes when they do get in, no?

[Felix Torres]

a universal file standard has to be reached.
.
.
.
After that is determined, then we can fight over price...

Sorry.
You will NOT get a universal file standard any time soon.
Because the only viable contender out there is Microsoft and the ABM crowd would sooner die than sign up to use a Microsoft-standard.

But the fact remains that Windows Media is the only format out there today that has all the bases covered.
See, MS did their homework and correctly read the market and they have literally lapped the competition.

Consider this:

1- Five years ago, MS went to the chip makers (CIRRUS LOGIC and co) and got them to support the WMA codec.
2- Four years ago, MS went to the device makers (Creative, Rio, Thomson, Matsu****a, APEX, you name it) and got them to support WMA.
3- Three years ago, MS got most software developers to support WMA.
4- For the past two years, MS has been convincing content providers that their DRM model was robust enough to release music under it with terms that *they* (the content providers, not MS) could determine. Repeat after me: WMA DRM is optional.
5- Over the last two years, MS has introduced and obtained support for WMA formats for lossless audio as well as 24-bit and surround audio.
6- Over the past 5 years, MS has been refining their DRM tech to the point that it can cover all required usage scenarios in an unobtrusive manner *if the content providers* so choose. The tech is there. Whether they choose to be liberal in its use or not is up to the content providers. They have yet to learn the unobtrusive sells more than restrictive.

Which is to say that any aspiring competitor has all those things to do just to get where MS is today.

So, unless WMA is going to be the universal audio standard, there will be none until the competition can catch up.
And that is years away.

And, to be honest, MS is actually pulling away from competitors, judging from their recent advances in video.

Not a good time to be an ABMer in Digital media...

[Chris Spera]

The RIAA and most of the lables have to be the greediest bunch of "people" I have ever seen in my life.

Living in Nashville, I see this EVERY DAY. I have friends whow are friends with "A List" artists (like Faith and Tim...) who share their friends's frustrations with me occasionally. Artists make very, very little from the sale of their music. They get paid for their performances and concert gigs. That's where they make most of their money.

The problem is, concerts don't sell well if the music doesn't sell or doesn't get radio air time. The artists wouldn't be pissy about pirated music (if they are at all compared to the lables and the RIAA), if the lables would share a little of the wealth.

Bottom line, I truly think the cash cow days that lable execs have been enjoying are gone, or nearing and end; and THAT'S why they don't want to lower prices or are very reluctant to support inexpensive online music sales.

Personally, I have purchased both CD's and online singles. I'd rather have the CD from a B&M store so I can have the liner and other docs, but its not a show stopper. I recently purchased Brad Paisley's latest album, "Mud on the Tires" on line, and burned a CD from the files. While this got me the music, it definitely leaves me with an "incomplete purchase" feeling (even tho I got it for about $4-$5 less than I've seen it in stores...).

I want to be able to purchase the CD and then RIP the files to my HDD and then play them over my home network, on my Pocket PC's, my Palm, or future digital music player purchase (if any).

Greed is getting in the way of my lawful and justified use of the license I purchased when I bought the music in the first place, and THAT shouldn't be permitted...

[Felix Torres]

Just ran into this one:

http://www.connectedhomemag.com/Audio/Articles/Index.cfm?ArticleID=42354

[bjornkeizers]

I've never bought music.
I don't buy music now.
Sure as **** - I won't be buying music in the near future.

Why? 'Cause I don't have to, and they aren't making it attractive for me to do so. Why the hell would I pay 20+ euros for the latest CD? I feel I'm getting ripped off.. I *know* I'm getting ripped off. I bought an MP3 player a few years ago; a ten gigabyte - It was hellishly expensive; cost nearly 500 euros, but I never have to buy a CD and I can carry my music with me.

Someone pointed out the special tax we europeans pay for recordable media? That's just the tip of the iceberg. Sure, people might say it's 'wrong' and I'm 'hurting the recording industry' and 'the law says you can't do it' but honestly - who cares? When I go to any store, and look at MP3 players, they tell you that you can go on kazaa and download the latest stuff for free! And I was watching TV yesterday - there was a commercial for a dutch ISP who advertised with the fact that 'with broadband you can get all the latest songs really fast and totally free!!'

Is it wrong? Well, all you'll get from me is a shrug. I don't pay for music, and I honestly don't give a rats ass about the entire recording industry. They treat people like criminals - well, then I have no reservations about acting like one.

If all of this sounds angry, bitter or antisocial to you - then so be it.

[Zack Mahdavi]

I've never bought music.
I don't buy music now.
Sure as s**t - I won't be buying music in the near future.

Why? 'Cause I don't have to, and they aren't making it attractive for me to do so. Why the hell would I pay 20+ euros for the latest CD?

One thought... it's illegal? :roll:

Come on, sure the artists don't get much out of a CD you buy, but you should still show some support for them. At least send the artist a $5 check when you download a CD or something.. it's the only right thing to do. Any other way is just flat out stealing.


Regarding this topic in general, I'm astonished that online music stores are raising prices like this. Recently, I decided to pay $5 to buy a CD off of half.com rather than pay $14 to get it at the iTunes music store.

These stores can't survive if they keep trying to raise prices. If it's the RIAA's fault, then they just need to stop. They're getting very annoying... :?

[jlp]

Just a quick thought: it's perfectly legal to record the radio and TV; so what about downloading from Kazaa etc. a song or movie you heard on radio or saw on TV? that's in all practicallity exactly the same thing!! 8)

[Felix Torres]

I've never bought music.
I don't buy music now.
Sure as s**t - I won't be buying music in the near future.

Why? 'Cause I don't have to, and they aren't making it attractive for me to do so. .
.
.
.
If all of this sounds angry, bitter or antisocial to you - then so be it.

1- Since you don't buy any music you're not part of the market and if you're not part of the market, the vendors don't have to make it attractive for you; they don't owe you anything, except maybe a lawsuit or a sub-poena... They certainly don't have to pay any attention to your opinion, since you're not a customer and never will be. Enjoy your plunder while you can; it will not last...

2- Fear not; your attitude is not antisocial, merely un-civic...

Now, civic societies work because its people respect the social contract and the laws that spring from it. Historically, if enough people choose to ignore the social contract and look out only for themselves ("I got mine!"), the society simply ceases to be a civil society and shortly afterwards the society ceases to exist as a unit. Think: Rome, Lebanon, Yugoslavia...
The technical term for the process wereby a society becomes un-civil is "decadence" which, btw, many people on this side of the pond consider to be an ongoing process in some of the countries of western europe.

For the sake of your homeland, may you not be representative of the state of its social contract...

[Jonathon Watkins]

Holy Cow! Felix summed up the whole recording industry and online music purchasing issue in one, fell swoop better than any other author seems to have covered it in mainstream media.

Jeeze - get that guy a job!

Darn right! (Just not mine! :worried:) :wink:

If that's two cents worth, I'd love to see a dollar's worth! :lol:

Personally I buy CDs cheaply when I can (visits to the US etc), then rip them myself. I really can't see myself buying online any time in the future, especially when a $1 song costs £1 ($1.80) over in the UK.

So - those distribution cost must really be high in the UK to cause that discrepancy - right? Oh - wait - there are no distribution costs - this is the net! :roll:

[Mark_Venture]

...While MP3 is a compression (and decompression) algorythm of any WAV file, MOD is a crossing between MIDI and wav in which samples of the instruments used are stored in the file along with the partition to play them; the MIDI file is the partition that uses those samples found in your sound card and are limited to them, while any sample can be recorded and stored in a MOD file. MOD files are generally music only with no or little voice samples.: Um, wow. MODs are still around?? I remember them from like back in the '286 and '386 days.

I have a great MOD of Herbie Hancock's Rock It. :) and a few other MODs of dance/techno stuff from back then.

[Felix Torres]

I really can't see myself buying online any time in the future, especially when a $1 song costs £1 ($1.80) over in the UK.

So - those distribution cost must really be high in the UK to cause that discrepancy - right? Oh - wait - there are no distribution costs - this is the net! :roll:

Query: does the VAT apply to downloadable songs?
Or do they price the online files in proportion to CD prices?

[Kiki]

The only online models that have a chance against P2P are those that charge a few dollars every month (US $3-6) for unlimited download AND have a huge database of songs past and present. Kuro is close and I saw another mentioned here, MusicMatch perhaps. Kuro's problem is they don't have a large selection of older songs, just recent songs. Kuro's monthly charge is US $3 for unlimited download and the charge appears on your cellular bill. It's simple and cheap, that's why it's gaining new customers every day. I'd use Kuro if I liked newer music, but IMO most music since the early 80's sucks. Give me the Marshall Tucker Band, the Dead, and the Beatles over the crap people call music nowadays. :)

Why would anyone pay $1 a song when for $3 you can have unlimited legal downloads or free unliited downloads through P2P?

Screw supporting the industry, support the musicians by going to live events and get your online music for free.

[bjornkeizers]

1- Since you don't buy any music you're not part of the market and if you're not part of the market, the vendors don't have to make it attractive for you; they don't owe you anything, except maybe a lawsuit or a sub-poena... They certainly don't have to pay any attention to your opinion, since you're not a customer and never will be. Enjoy your plunder while you can; it will not last...



Chicken and the egg. I don't buy music so they don't make it attractive - or am I not buying music *because* it isn't attractive....

Let me put it this way - I pay for things that are worth paying for. I buy a dozen DVD's each month. I buy all my games, whether it's PC or PS2 or gameboy or whatever. If it's worth paying for, I pay for it just like everyone else. Don't assume that because I do one thing, I automatically do something else as well.

I just don't think it's worth buying music. CD's are too expensive and online stores won't let me use music the way I want/need to...


2- Fear not; your attitude is not antisocial, merely un-civic...


True. I've been called worse though. I'm way past caring.

[jlp]

Hem, no comments on my thoughts above?!

[Zack Mahdavi]

Just a quick thought: it's perfectly legal to record the radio and TV; so what about downloading from Kazaa etc. a song or movie you heard on radio or saw on TV? that's in all practicallity exactly the same thing!! 8)

This is a very hairy topic... the RIAA argues that downloading any kind of copyrighted music via P2P illegal... others argue that it's not illegal.

Back in 1998, when Diamond was readying to unveil the first mp3 player, the Diamond Rio, the RIAA sued Diamond. Diamond argued that they were merely providing a player for music; luckily, the judge agreed.

It's legal to record radio songs or TV shows according to the government since these formats produce lossy quality.

However, is it legal to download radio edits or 128kbps mp3s? That's the hairy part..

[Felix Torres]

[quote="zkmusa
This is a very hairy topic... the RIAA argues that downloading any kind of copyrighted music via P2P illegal... others argue that it's not illegal. [/quote]

The RIAA position is that providing files for download is publishing, and the uploaders are publishing content they do not own copyrights to, hence the act is illegal. They've prevailed on this point in every case that has gotten to court; that is how they broke NAPSTER.

Having established that uploading is illegal, they then make the point that downloading from p2p networks is equivalent to knowingly accepting stolen property. This hasn't, to my knowledge, gotten to court (canadian ruling notwithstanding) because everybody personally charged has settled. Probably wisely, too, since the folks targetted were *massive* downloaders (10000+ songs??!!).

Rio, on the other hand, prevailed because it is *not* illegal to record and/or archive music for *personal* use. The crime comes from transmitting/publishing the songs to "10,000 of your closest friends" as somebody once put it. (I doubt even Kevin Bacon knows that many people personally). This is, after all, the functional equivalent of making 10000 copies of a CD for sale. (In legal terms, the price is irrelevant.)

It doesn't matter *how* the recording is made or what the quality of recording or source (remember those notices during baseball telecasts? Reproduction *and* transmission without authorization?); it is the transmission/publishing that is against the law. It is no less illegal than a pirate radio station or stamping out a zillion counterfeights in a factory in China.

So it doesn't matter if the song came from a CD, LP, 8-track or live concert bootleg, putting it up on the net, *without permission from the copyright holder* is what is at issue. If you're a musician who doesn't mind singing for your supper or giving out free samples, you can post your own songs. As long as you don't have a recording contract.

At that point, the right to publish and distribute the music belongs to the studio, lock, stock and barrel.
And that is why the RIAA sues p2p'ers; they're not customers, but illegal competitors.

Bottom-line, under the betamax ruling you can digitize, for personal use, anything that is not copy-protected.
Under DMCA, however, even that is forbidden.

And, thanks to the p2p'ers, soon pretty much everything *will* be copyprotected.

Thanks a lot, guys!
But at least you got yours, right? ;-)

[Felix Torres]

Just saw this:

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=77&ncid=738&e=7&u=/mc/20040416/tc_mc/appleandrealnetworkstherealstory

Interesting report coming from a Mac-centric reporter: iTunes has 2% penetration of the non-Mac market vs 70% for MS.

Ouch! Steep hill ahead, Mr Jobs...

[Janak Parekh]

Interesting report coming from a Mac-centric reporter: iTunes has 2% penetration of the non-Mac market vs 70% for MS.
Be careful of that report. They're not talking music sales -- they're talking about installation of software. Seeing as how WMP comes with every Windows machine today, this is a skewed number. I'd guess that 99% of those people don't use music stores in the first place. ;)

That said, it is indeed a danger to Jobs if MS integrates full store functionality in the OS...

--janak

[jlp]

This is a very hairy topic... the RIAA argues that downloading any kind of copyrighted music via P2P illegal... others argue that it's not illegal.

The RIAA position is that providing files for download is publishing, and the uploaders are publishing content they do not own copyrights to, hence the act is illegal.

This is where these guys are wrong, confusing storing data, which is passive, with publishing which is active. Merely storing data on a computer is not publishing it, this is where they confuse two very opposite things.

It's push vs. pull technology, entirely different !!

[jlp]

Also, the actual case I have is I own a double CD with a live concert of a favorite artist of mine; but I didn't know it was a live concert; it was second hand and I was so happy to find this for a good price and I was in a hurry I didn't bother to read the whole thing.

But I don't really like live recorded concerts as the sound is not optimal and I get the CDs to hear artists not crazed people who shout and whistle.

So since the artist (and tutti quanti) got paid when the CD was bought, I'm morally entitled to download those songs' studion version without having to buy them again!!

[Tom W.M.]

Just an interesting fact: Apple claims it makes 33¢ for every 99¢ download.

I've looked at online download stores, and come to the conclusion that I won't buy until I can buy lossless songs and burn them to CD; otherwise I don't feel like I'll be acquiring the music permanently because of the quality loss when I re-rip it.

[jlp]

Anybody tried sites like this one below?

I saw it advertized on CNet's Download.com and from what I read on the below listed site and from the fact that it's an official ad on a reputable site this leads me to think it's legal.

http://www.mp3downloadhq.com/

They give unlimited downloads of all media file types with yearly memberships of between $12 to $18 ($24 on a 2 years membership and $18 on a single year membership).

Any comment?

.

[Steven Cedrone]

Anybody tried sites like this one below?

I saw it advertized on CNet's Download.com and from what I read and from the fact that it's an official ad on a reputable site this leads me to think it's legal.

http://www.mp3downloadhq.com/

Any comment?

From their web site:

Aren't MP3s illegal?

Controversial? Sure. Illegal? No way!

MP3 is simply an audio format and as such has no legal standing. While rights owners have concerns about a format that is used to make digital copies of music, it's not the MP3 format itself that is at issue but rather the copying of music - regardless of the particular format used in creating the file. In fact, while the MP3 format is the main music format available on the file-sharing networks, there are a variety of other audio and video formats in use.

Today, there are over 220 million users trading MP3s & videos on these legal file-sharing networks. Rest assured that File-Sharing is 100% legal, MP3s are 100% legal, and your membership to MP3DownloadHQ is 100% legal. (see article below).

MP3DownloadHQ does not condone piracy or breaking copyright laws. The MP3 sharing tools available on our website are powerful search tools & we recommend that you use your discretion when downloading music and movie files.

So they take your money, and tell you where to download a p2p software package. It sounds like it's legal, but I'm not exactly sure what it is you are you paying for!

Steve