The RIAA shows its true colors

The Recording Industry Association of America, the trade group that represents the U.S. recording industry, is full of crap.
There, I said it.
For years, the RIAA has been suing people for illegally downloading music, saying recently that peer-to-peer sharing “is illegal, it can have consequences and it undermines the creative future of music itself.”
That’s a nice little song and dance, but is it true? Studies say no. And this week, after dozen’s of soapbox speeches, the RIAA showed its true colors. The millions of dollars they are suing music fans for is not going to the musicians at all. The organization is keeping the cash.
A recent AP story about a girl from Nebraska being sued by the RIAA for downloading music through Ares (a p2p music sharing program), an RIAA spokeswoman, Jenni Engebretsen, said the money from the lawsuits is: “reinvested in educational programs schools and other groups can use to spread the word that song sharing can have severe consequences.”
WHAT!!!!!!
WHAT!!!!!!
WHAT!!!!!!
I AM SHOCKED!
The RIAA has always maintained that it has been going after these illegal downloaders because they are stealing music and money from the artists who write those songs.
In fact, the RIAA’s mission (according to its Web site) is, “to foster a business and legal climate that supports and promotes our members’ creative and financial vitality.”
So, let me connect the dots.
Your “members” pay you to protect their copyright interests because they are losing money. In turn you sue people who are “stealing” their music. But instead of giving your “members” their “money,” you keep it to fund educational programs? Who is developing those programs? The RIAA?
So the RIAA is taking money from the people who are stealing music, and it is keeping it for itself. It is stealing from its members.
Holy crap? This isn’t enough for an investigation? The group paid to protect music copyright is not paying the copyright holders ... the exact same thing it says illegal music downloaders are doing.
Now, I’m not going to say that peer-to-peer sharing is right, because it isn’t. But suing people for money they stole from musicians and then not giving it to the same artists you represent is so much more wrong. That money belongs to the musicians, and the RIAA should give it to them.

RIAA vs AllofMP3: Testing the limits of globalization

Two weeks ago, the Recording Industry Association of America filed a lawsuit in a New York court against AllofMP3, a music download site that operates out of Russia, saying the Web site owes it $1.65 trillion as the result of 11 million downloads since Oct. 2006.
AllofMP3 has maintained, and still maintains, that it is a legal download site that operates under Russian law and pays royalties to Russian Multimedia and Internet Society, (and said record companies have refused all attempted payments from ROMS) and the prices on its site, low as 10-cents a download, reflect the actual cost of a CD in Russia.
What a clusterbuff.
This is one of those situations where no one is right and just about everyone is the bad guy. First, AllofMP3, while operating under Russian law, is not paying the musicians who spend their lives creating art as a career. An accurate system must be put in place to reward these artists for a job well done.
That said; If AllofMP3 is operating under Russian law, which it says it is, it’s the law that is not protecting the artists, not commerce.
Russia is not part of the World Trade Organization, and thus — technically, according to my understanding—does not have to comply with its rules and regulations.
Think of it as diplomatic copyright immunity.
This has to be worked out on the global playing field, not in a New York courtroom that may or may not have jurisdiction in Russia.
The RIAA is not the good guy in the scenario either.
And one could easily argue that the RIAA is a dinosaur that spends its time and money fighting to get theirs while disregarding the integrity and livelihood of the artists it was originally formed to protect.
Take for instance the RIAA’s math skills.
The RIAA apparently feels a single downloaded song has a price tag of $150,000. Wait, that can’t be right. $1.65 trillion divided by $11 million is $150,000. So, yeah, I guess that seems right. You pay a buck a track at iTunes, under Russian pricing it would be about $150,000 a song.
Wrong.
Realistically, it costs around $2-$3 for a legally purchased, physical CD in Russia, as opposed to $10-$20 in the U.S. So AllofMP3 is, like it has been argued before, selling downloads at comparable price points. The company also said it pays 15 percent of its sales to ROMS. So, based on more accurate math, AllofMP3 has socked away $165,000 since October, which would be a more accurate lawsuit total—not 10 million times that amount. In fact, the RIAA could probably just ask ROMS for that money and get it cash in hand—according to AllofMP3.
I have a feeling the RIAA is going to regret this lawsuit in the long run. Eventually, any US governmental organization that investigates this will as the question: Why does a download cost $0.99? They asked a similar question in the 1990s when the RIAA was sued for price fixing.
The cost of recording and distributing music has dropped significantly with the invention of the Internet. Recording studios have been reduced to computer programs like ProTools and distribution on the Net has grown exponentially.
In the next year or so, the physical CD will die (a bold prediction, but that’s where it’s going), and distributing music over the net, which costs virtually nothing, will be the way of the world.
At that time, the RIAA will have to justify why a physical CD (which needs to be pressed, printed, sealed, stored and shipped) has the same pricing structure as a downloaded CD (which is hosted on a server, eliminating all of the printing, shipping and storage costs).
It will be determined that the RIAA has fixed prices, again, and the cost of a download in the US will drop, probably to around $0.50.
The worst part is, during all of the struggles between the players in this fight for global commerce domination, the artists are the ones who will ultimately suffer—whether its at the hands of a faceless international corporation or under the thumb of a fossil bent on protecting itself not its clients.

For more, read HERE.

Photo courtesy of Digital Music Weblog.

Editorial: Allofmp3: Too legit to quit?

“Of course, we will survive. The music industry is rapidly changing and we will change with it.”

That line was issued in a virtual press conference today by the bargain-basement Internet music store, allofmp3.com.
In the press conference, the Russian-based website that sells full CD downloads for around $2 to customers worldwide vehemently denied accusations by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), the British Phonographic Industry and music labels including Universal Music Group, Warner Music Inc., SonyBMG Music Entertainment and EMI Group PLC, that the site is selling copyrighted material illegally.
“AllofMP3 is a legitimate business that is incorporated in Russia, pays taxes in Russia and pays royalties to the iTunes).
The company says it pays 15% of its sales to the Russian-based society ROMS, the Russian Multimedia and Internet Society, as royalties for the artists (the record companies have allegedly refused all attempted payments from ROMS) and the prices on its site reflect the actual cost of a CD in Russia.
So what is the truth? Good luck on this one. International copyright law is about as complicated as putting together an internal combustion engine without instructions or a working knowledge of mechanics.
Length of copyright protection varies from country to country, as does the level of enforcement.
In the US, the RIAA has lead a charge against illegal file sharing — sharing music on services like Napster — suing companies and users for copyright infringement. And, not to side with an organization that has been successfully sued for price fixing, but they are right about file sharing — it is stealing.
But allofmp3 represents a fascinating gray area. It does appear to be a legitimate company, they do appear to comply with Russian law (no matter how lax anyone says it is), they do appear to be attempting to pay artists for the legitimate sale of their music, and (without any advertising at all) have attracted a worldwide customer base.
I am in no way going to claim that I am an expert on media law — in fact, I would bet that most people who are experts in media law couldn’t say whether allofmp3 if this is breaking the law or merely bending it. I am also NOT going to recommend shopping there until they get their legal issues settled.
My opinion though is that allofmp3 may be the future business model for all legitimate music download sites. It at least raises some rather obvious concerns about the current state of the music industry:
Why do music downloads cost the same as (or more than) the cost of purchasing a physical CD — even after you strip away the expensive packaging, distribution, losses due to breakage during shipping, credit for theft, and other pricing points that cause CDs to cost between $8 and $15?
Why does it cost $2 for a CD in Russia and $15 for the same CD here?
Does international copyright law allow all countries to participate in the sale and distribution of digital music on a level playing field or is this once again an intricate international music price-fixing scheme?There is a great myth that we are moving toward an international marketplace. If this is true, businesses like allofmp3 are going to exist — legitimately, and the copyright governing agencies and online music stores are all going to have to suck it up and compete.