CNN Exposes "Battle Against Internet Privacy"

On April 9, CNN printed virtually verbatim, the contents of a press release by Jay Berman, representing the IFPI, which is merely the global version of the RIAA and is preaching equally distorted facts. For some reason, their data is accepted by the press as accurate with no question whatsoever. Either that or they simply choose not to question it.

Or did they? Once you get past the first paragraph, the real truth DOES appear in the story.

...even as the industry intensifies its fight against privacy...

The slump has cut into the profits at the big five music companies -- Universal Music, Warner Music, Sony, BMG and EMI -- forcing them to cut costs, axe B-list artists and develop new technology to battle online privacy and unauthorized copying on CDs.

...Japan continues to suffer from Internet privacy ...

...In other parts of Europe, Spain was the hardest hit by CD privacy...

My initial response to Mr. Berman, an actual e-mail I sent to the IFPI after reading the original version on the IFPI site, is now posted on boycott-riaa.com, in its entirety.

CNN offers a "Contact Us" page, which allows users to report factual errors on their web site and stories in which the facts are incomplete. I pasted the entire contents of my letter to Mr. Berman into CNN's form. I need about 2000 other people to do exactly the same thing, or at least point them this way. They have to know it's not just me. -- GDZ

Followup -- CNN changed the story. The date on the original story was April 9, 2003. Now it says it was posted on April 15. But in the Entertainment index, it is listed as being posted on April 9. There is no acknowledgement that the story ever said anything different than the changed version. There is also not an acknowledgement that there is not one bit of empirical data to support the story.

Fortunately, we have a copy of the original available for any serious journalists to review, as CNN will not respond to our queries. Neither will Jay Berman, Hilary Rosen, the Recording Artists Coalition, SoundScan or any members of the U.S. Senate to which I have written, so it's no big surprise.

But I have brought this story to the attention of Fox News and, specifically, Bill O'Reilly, since he's attacking CNN anyway. We've got your No-Spin Zone right here, Bill.

I reported, you decide.

April 16 -- No word from CNN or Fox yet. CNN has much more important things to cover -- like someone selling Paul McCartney's flu virus on eBay. Selling a virus on eBay is allowed, but selling CD-Rs requires a note from the U.S. Copyright Office and one from my mommy.

But CNN won't talk about that. either. Neither will Fox or NBC or CBS or ABC or the Washington Post or the Arizona Republic. Or any other "journalist" in the country. O'Reilly's "No-Spin Zone" appears to only intersect with the entertainment world if someone speaks out against the war.

The media is as bad as the RIAA. Because the RIAA owns the media, too. Literally.