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2005 Archives
2002
December, 2002 -- RIAA Statistics
Don't Add Up to Piracy
Predictions
from 2002
Fiction
Ghost
Story
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News Archive -- 2005
January 26, 2005 -- As the battle lines are drawn in
the Supreme Court over MGM Studios Inc., et al v. Grokster
Ltd., et al, No. 04-480, it appears as if anyone that could
afford a lawyer has filed a brief, including some who evidently
decided that this was the biggest game in town this spring and
they'd like to use the opportunity to spread the fruit of their
limited intellect.
March 1, 2005 -- For everyone who has lived under
a rock for the last five years, the recording and movie industries
are trying to shut down peer-to-peer file trading, despite the
reality that it is exactly how the entire Internet works. The
two lobbying groups which represent these industries are the
RIAA (Recording Industry Ass. of America) and the MPAA (Motion
Picture Ass. of America). Verbal arguments are scheduled for
March 29 and amicus (friend of the court) briefs have appeared
from numerous sources whose relevance to the case is slim at
best.
A Matter
of Trust
March 13, 2003 -- In our last chapter, we discovered
that mp3s, file sharing and the Internet, far from being the
demon at the door, really offered the recording industry an opportunity
to save billions of dollars in marketing and promotion. Instead
of continuing in the normal greedy, predatory and opportunistic
practices the labels have been employing for decades, and absorb
it faster than a Bounty paper towel, they decide that free promotion
is a bad idea.
28 Mar. 2005 -- The peer-to-peer crowd has decided
to take drastic action against the music and movie industries.
The good news is that they are finally going to boycott the entertainment
industries. The bad news is that they're only going to do it
for a week. And they can't
even agree on which week.
April 6, 2005 -- James
Doyle, Duke Law School -- "I
thought it would be a zero sum game. We were going to lose whatever
happened. We lose if Napster won, we lost if Napster lost.
What I missed was the importance
of 38 million people -- Napster's users. And you wouldn't have
gotten Senator Hatch up here two years ago. You wouldn't have
gotten Senator Hatch up here without 38 million people."
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.
April 12, 2005 -- Yahoo
now offers a specialized search
for Creative Commons files. While this includes a ton of
Indie music, it also contains thousands of authorized
bootlegs of live performances by major acts. The RIAA does not
own the sound recording copyrights for these bootlegs.
May 13, 2005
-- I've been trying to mentally
take a step back from the current scene in the music biz, looking
backward in time for a clue as to what is inherently different
about the industry right now and, more importantly, what's going
to have to happen before it stops sucking big time. I think I've
got it narrowed down to one of three possibilities: a miracle,
a complete accident or a nuclear strike on Clear Channel, which
would be considered all three.
All
Music is Not Created Equal
May 16, 2005
-- Wouldn't you think it was odd
if you went to the grocery store and all the eggs were the same
price? Large, small, extra-large, Grade A, AA, AAA -- 10 cents
per egg. And the boxes are sealed so you can't look to see what
size you're getting, much less if any are broken or rotten. Shampoo,
dish soap, cheese, frozen pizzas, beer, bread, toothpaste, soft
drinks, disposable diapers, aspirin -- all brands, all sizes,
one price. That's how they sell music. Toilet paper pricing is
more competitive.
Cover
Songs and Ethics
May 17, 2005
-- Derek Stivers over at CDBaby
is extolling the virtues
of the cover song, pointing out that artists with cover songs
sell more CDs, at least on the DRM-laced, consumer unfriendly
online music outlets.
The
Philosophy of Bullshit
May 19, 2005 -- CBS's 60 Minutes had a great
story this past weekend, featuring Harry Frankfurt, a Distinguished
Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at Princeton, who has recently
unveiled his latest work, titled "On
Bullshit."
Creative
Commons Worries Ethically Challenged
May 21, 2005
-- Found
this at Yahoo, but it comes from Billboard, which does not
seem to have a real strong grasp of the topic it discusses. It
starts out describing Creative
Commons as "little-known in the music industry,"
then goes on to point exactly how well-known it really is, which
is the entire perceived problem.
"My concern is that many
who support Creative Commons also support a point of view that
would take away people's choices about what to do with their
own property," says David Israelite, president/CEO of the
National Music Publishers' Assn. and former chairman of the Department
of Justice's Intellectual Property Task Force.
June 18, 2005
-- The Washington Post
is running a Reuters story which was lifted from Billboard, so
I'm assuming this is something Billboard wants to talk about:
Shawn Fanning's new enterprise, SnoCap.
June 27, 2005
-- No matter what media you get
your information from, today it is all bustling with the news
of the entertainment industries' victory in the Supreme Court.
Hilary Rosen is all aflutter, pissing her pants because she's
so happy. She's so happy because she's so stupid, but she's certainly
not alone in her delusion. MGM/RIAA/MPAA
did not win anything in today's decision. Neither did Grokster.
Anyone who tells you otherwise is either lying or stupid.
July 24, 2005
-- This is one of the simplest
and best examples of the lengths to which the record industry
is fabricating their data. You won't even need a calculator.
September 10, 2005
-- From time to time, I receive
criticism from people who don't exactly understand my position
in regards to the music industry, but think they do. Frankly,
I don't care about their misplaced notions except for the fact
that, in some circumstances, this has become a ploy to misdirect
an online debate away from the issue at hand.
September 18, 2005
-- Got an e-mail from ASCAP, descriptively
titled, "Message from ASCAP - Important Legislation".
I could tell it was personal and important, as it was addressed
to "undisclosed recipients." That's me.
September 18, 2005
-- It's one thing for the RIAA
to sue whomever happened to be at the computer associated with
an IP address and have it turn out to be a child. But to intentionally
try to litigate against a 13-year-old illustrates exactly how
overtly hostile and petulant the recording industry has become.
October 25, 2005
-- There is an AP
story at Yahoo, obviously a press release, informing us that
iMesh has introduced new "legal" file-sharing software.
The service offers access to 17 million music files. About 15
million will be available for free because copyright holders
have not asked iMesh to block them. Another two million "protected
releases will be sold for 99 cents per song or a $6.95 monthly
fee.
"Most people, I think, don't
even know what a rootkit is,
so why should they care about it?"
-- Thomas Hesse, Sony's president of Global Digital
Business
November 4, 2005
Nov. 11, 2005 -- The story begins on Halloween, when
Mark Russinovich posted a very detailed description of how Sony's
DRM had installed potentially dangerous software in his computer
and traces it back to First 4 Internet, a UK partner of Sony.
The next day, November 1, a
class action suit was filed in Los Angeles Superior Court,
asking the court to stop Sony from selling any more CDs containing
the DRM and seeking monetary damages for California consumers
who already bought any of them.
Dec. 1, 2005
-- You've gotta hand it to Sony.
Who would have expected it?
The most recent act was an
award-winning stunt -- a stroke of marketing genius. They poisoned
the product they were supposed to be selling in the first place.
The only thing I can compare it to is the plot of the first Batman
movie because I've never seen anything like it in real life.
On the other hand, the Joker used a product that people would
actually need, like shampoo or something. I think his plan actually
worked better, too.
Dec. 3, 2005
-- F-Secure, a "Finland-based
antivirus company that prides itself on being the first to spot
new malware outbreaks" told Sony about the problem with
their "DRM" software on October 4, almost an entire
month before the public found out. They had learned of it from
John Guarino, "owner of TecAngels.com, a two-person PC-repair
outfit in midtown Manhattan," who reported it to F-Secure
because he found it using their software. Sony says that they
didn't get the e-mail until Oct. 7.
Dec. 12, 2005
-- With the record labels having
tainted radio with payola and poisoned the CD marketplace with
spyware in their quest to make people stop listening to music
for free, the Music Publishers' Association (MPA), which represents
US sheet music companies, will begin its campaign to discourage
performance of music they own in 2006, by taking legal action
against websites offering unlicensed song scores and lyrics.
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