music_news 91 posts

What a load of crap. Students, who are at the point in their lives when they're MOST strapped for cash, should not be able to use a service that allows them to save money? This is like punishing the village that was flodded for living under the old, leaky dam in the first place!
Here's an age-old question that has gone unanswered (and yet the industry hasn't suffered)... If I were to record songs off the radio and give the recording to a friend, is that illegal?
The recording industry are a bunch of leeches who need to accept another wave of change brought on by consumers who are fed up with their "you will eat what we feed you and like it" drivel.
There is so much that comes into play here... Some artists are only concerned about wealth as opposed to fame (ruining it for the people who are actually passionate about their music). It's getting easier every year for the "average joe" to create their own music and get it distributed... which is great; The bands and artists who are serious about it being a career should be relying on touring to make their keep. Unfortunately, this leads into outrageous ticket prices (which is another issue). The question arises: What comes first, the CD that helps sell concert tickets, or the concert show that helps sell CDs?
You know what this ultimately reminds me of? The U.S. dependence on foreign oil. We as music consumers need to make a stand against an industry who makes demands on us in a world in which WE ARE THE CUSTOMERS! They're providing an entertainment service and trying to regulate it. Copyright laws should be for ownership and royalties, but the distribution options should be up to the individual artist... not left up to money-grubbing, third-party vultures.
Perhaps I've gotten way off track on this rant, but if we can create a better world for music lovers, there's nothing that can stop us.

I am a senior and enjoy downloading music. Most of what I have downloaded I have in either old 45's or on albums. Why should I pay twice?

One day, those they target now will eventually rule the political platforms of the future. And they will have a rather bad taste in their mouth for the RIAA. Their lack of vision for future ruling parties will be their undoing. On second thought, their lack of vision on the future of digital music a decade ago already is their undoing.

See sand, stick head.

Only 15,000 students ? They must be mad.

I'd guess that 90% of people who own an MP3 player have copied, or according to the RIAA's definitions, illegally downloaded at least a quarter of their music collection. For kids under fifteen, thats more like three quarters of their music collection.

When are the RIAA going to wake up and recognise that music is very price elastic? And most people don't mind paying for some music, though with the increase in choice, charging Europeans 20 euros an album is only ok for peoples very favourite artists.

It serves the music industry right for ripping people off for the past decades!!

I have to agree with Rose. I'm no student, but I follow the issue fairly closely. I'm 53 years old and in my time I have bought the same music in vynal, 8-track, cassette and cd. I think when you buy it once that should be your licence to own a copy of the recording no matter the format. The recording industry really does have their heads up their as_

If the record labels sold albums for two or three quid then there would be little benefit in any illegal downloading, and they would probably sell far more - even if the packaging were a cardboard sleeve at a petrol station, it would just be a no-brainer purchase like a newspaper.

This is Horsepucky! Seriously, I'm about to graduate from a SUNY college, and I have downloaded music since I first got hold of the original Napster. I, as well as every other American of the 15-35 y.o. bracket, will soon be having the last laugh when get rid of the RIAA and its Stalin-istic practices, what with the FCC about to be disbanded, the MPAA is next on my list of stupid, cruel, and unusual mechanisms in the world of entertainment which should be abolished and never heard from again.

Keep downloading and sharing. The Recording Industry needs to understand that the cost of a CD works out to be about $.99 cents per song (US. Dollar) This covers the recording, Artist fees, Manufacturing and packaging, Advertising, Distribution, Retail overhead costs including employees, sales people, etc etc.

Now tell me where they accrue the same cost by selling a digital download version for the same price??? When the Industry stops trying to screw people by charging inflated prices.... maybe the rst of us would pay a fair price. Maybe $.30 cents a song.

Solution? yes the industry would love that - pay a monthly fee forever and own nothing. Who wouldnt want an infinite revenue stream? I prefer to own rather than lease.

I am absolutely stunned at the responses I have been reading. You people have absolutely NO CLUE what you are talking about. I'm a serious legitimate artist who has sold quite a few thousand CDs. As well I own an indi label. I PAID FOR IT so I know what music actually costs to produce AND MARKET.

The average CD today costs about $25,000 to make. Then you start marketing. THAT"S the expensive part. Major releases cost MUCH more. Who do you think pays for the cost of that? The consumer... duhhhh. If everyone steals, then there is no consumption.... then there is no music.... duhhh.

I am now over 50. I bought every piece of music I ever owned. I (or my parents) also bought every piece of clothing I ever wore. I paid for every movie I saw. I didn't sneak in the back (as I sure all of you must have done - saying "movie starts make a fortune anyway..."). If I didn't have the money I simply didn't go. That you have actually talked yourselves into collectively thinking that the Big-Bad Recording Industry is finally getting what's coming to them is just pathetic.

Theft is theft and Napster will go down in 50 years as the vehicle that destroyed the entire music industry by telling people it's O.K. to steal. "About time" you say? Drop into the local bar and check in on ANY band that has worked their butt off to eek out a living and see how they're doing. The answer is - they're not. They all have second jobs because they're not making any money. We have a nation of musicians that can no longer make a living because every is now stealing their music. Twenty years ago we had a healthy industry with a myriad of "professional musicians" that could devote their full attention to their craft. That is rapidly vanishing from our landscape.

CD sales dropped last year (are you ready for this one...) 76%. That's right 76%. Imagine if you and whatever the heck it is that you do for a living... imagine if they started giving your products away. I bet you would say, "Right On, dude... it's about time!!! Power to the people!!!"

Wake up, morons. Theft is theft. I have worked my entire life to feed my family in an industry that, thanks to you and millions of others that have no problem stealing under the veil of righteousness, has finally collapsed. The industry is in serious peril. Not just the majors, but especially the minors.... all because you steal. $1.71 for a James Taylor CD that cost $350,000 to record, not market, just record. Yeah, that's a good deal for the artist.

Sincerely,

Stunned & Depressed

I would like piracy to stop but I dont like getting ripped off either. The problem with paying 0.79 per download track is that it's roughly the same as taking the cd and dividing the cost by the number of tracks but now the quality is reduced, the use-ability is reduced by digital licenses and if the PC goes pear shaped you've lost your media.

I believe once you've bought the product you have a right to make it useable for yourself in what ever format you have with you, ie convert it to mp3, cd, dvd whatever. If you buy a dvd or cd then the manufacturer should be made responsible for replacing it if it's damaged at cost price only not rrp. Because no one provides this service they can't expect us not to make back-ups.

Mr stunned and depressed has every right to feel the way he does and I agree with him but if we were to be really honest and live without debts, and charge fair prices around the world then we would be living in the perfect world. I dont have a disposable income so I am afraid if everyone without a disposable income went 100% honest the entertainment industry would still suffer....and so long as theres greedy rich there will be crime amongst the poor. I would like to know if there are any legal sites out there that dont charge unfair prices? or do i have to buy original cd's to get the best quality and a load of extra songs i dont want.

What is the answer that will make us all honest and give artists a fair income? who knows? and what does $350,000 get spent on, thats 10 years wages or three houses to the common man? someone is earning too much somewhere.

Rich people need to remember it's the poor that put them there! give back a little

The high cost of music has simply facilited an entire industry in digial formating and coping. Think about it if an album was only $2-$4 USD the world would not have invested in burners, high speed transfer switches, burning software and copy media. The students of today will make policy and laws in the future. Any one that is forced to court by the RIAA should ask for a jury and make if of their peers. A few lost cases will serve as a basis for more lost cases....copy right laws or not.

To El-T: How about making your comment a post in the Journals Section so that people can start discussing this particular topic?
Regards,
AllofMP3

To Daniel: Care to turn your comment into a post in Journals?
Regards,
AllofMP3

Shouldn't musicians have a regular job unless they're quite successful?
And do they really take home very little? In the summer I work in road construction, a very lucrative dawn-to-dusk day before overtime is $195 at $13 per hour, minus about $70 for taxes and some for gas. How much does an aspiring full-time musician take home before expenses? And that probably doesn't consume the entire day unless it's a gig in Butte.

If CDs are too expensive in production, artists will and are finding cheaper distribution. People won't steal if they can get a home-burned disc for the same price at the gig, they're fine with that quality. Total sales will be low, but margin won't.

For major labels, they definitely help put out high-quality music. But they're still middlemen, and they take an inordinate amount of sales revenue that should go to the musician, that's where I would like my purchase money to go.

Hopefully the channels will be reformed to open studios and distribution to more independent labels and individual artists. Artists already invest in home recording studios or have non-label studios to use, I would be very pleased if my $10 from an Amazon CD vendor was earmarked to either the artist or a "mentor" artist/manager and not a huge corporation, THEIR label should grow not sell it to Sony or EMI.

Oh so easy - stealing is stealing. So simple So black and white. I pay for jeans - you should pay for music.

Here is your problem S&D, Everyone here IS paying for music. They are not paying the prices your industry wants them to pay BUT they are PAYING for music. Hmm, whats that tell us? People are willing to purchase a reasonable product at a reasonable price? Given the popularity of ALLOFMP3, im going to say yes to that. The music here is free of the anti-theft device that most stores remove AFTER you purchase the item. You see, in your model - we have to leave the anti-theft device on after we purchase the product. We the people disagree with this. We disagree with your pricing models and your anti-consumer ways. We have chosen to bypass your Best Buy stores and your .99 DRM laced Itunes. We have decided to use your own rules against you: "GLOBALISIM". You use cheap labor in other countries to produce your CDs, import them back and sell them at high prices. We have chose to purchase in another country cheaper and import them ourselves.

CD's are down 76%. Its a brave new digital world S&D. Its a whole new paradigm. Record sales went to crap when CDs came online. Same with Eight Track Tapes. Dont blame PCs - Dont blame ITunes - Dont blame AllOfMP3. Embrace them. Realize you will sell cheaper but you will sell more to more people....

Cds?.... dead! Neidermeyer?...Dead!

Die riaa and mpaa die!

El-T makes some good points & I can respect that. I was in a popular rock band in Baltimore MD during the 1980's, in fact the music can be found on this very site. But it didn't take long for Atlantic to drop us. Now we are all back to doing other work, and the band was never enough to pay the rent even with a major.

El-T forgets how the recording industry is almost impossible to embrace new ideas or allow for new music (quality music) to be introduced. I mean come on if you are Jared Leto & have a cash machine behind you then you can buy anything and the industry will push it based on a market all ready being established by other fame.
As we see wages taking a nose dive in the USA as well as benefits we continue to see no relief in CD prices which have much less appeal than a album vinyl pressing did, in short they are cheap to make. On top of that a concert price reflects steady major increases to view yet the average American's wage is headed the other way thus viewing concerts in really out of the question for a majority of shit bands the industry decides it will promote. Gone are the 1960's & 70's where there was more freedom and less pressure on what would be produced by the industry. There is little choice outside of indie labels, and that is where a great amount of good music is.
It is time for the RIAA to get a grip and realize that the market has changed & bands will get on the band wagon too because we have already seen the power of web based self marketing. U-tube did a great job of wrecking the smug former gov. of Virginia with his monkey comments during the fall 06 elections. Why should bands not use this tool themselves with increasing movement eliminating the middle man and creating a new marketing tool with the bands interest dictating its direction instead of SONY? Why is the RIAA not understanding that their is little investment in production of a mp3 in fact the consumer buys the recording/storage/playback equipment themselves and a file by the way isn't a hard copy CD. Why doesn't El-T not see the middleman is the one who profits almost all of the time? None of my band mates ever made that much through a major label though we weren't a major act our sales were good. If our sales weren't good then we wouldn't have cut 7 albums they would have dropped us, nor would the CD's still being pressed. They realized a profit we never saw and I know who to blame.
Failure to seize the new way music must be marketed will take out more than 76% of the market in a short time the way Toyota has beat down GM & Ford through marketing poor product.
I am a music lover and if I like the music I hear on any site then I will be more likely to buy better quality pressings than a file offers. However, if there is no way I can own a file without forking over a buck each then I can do without. So I care not who is producing what in the way of new music because my few dollars can go elsewhere and what I see on FUSE or MTV/VH-1 will be fine thank you.
The comment above about moving CD plastic pressing plants to 3rd world manufacture is right on. The business that makes the plastic jewel case and CD's have closed shop for the most in the USA and moved out of Country. Because they didn't want to pay $7.50 a hour with piss poor benefits, & why should they when they can keep the CD price very high with a reduction in operating cost. Does the band get the additional savings from the cheaper labor cost saved by closing plants in the USA? Hardly.
El-T you appear to be a moron in many ways and maybe it is your advancing age that blinds you to understand they way technology is changing the entire world for better and often worse. We are a Wal-Mart nation in the USA and that is our biggest private employer (something to be real proud about!!) so the wages for the average JOe are going so is the expendable cash for entertainment. Those dollars are to be spent more wisely even by spoiled fat American well off kids. Where maybe a movie, a nice dinner out, & a couple new CD's could be bought on expendable cash a decade ago now the choice could be a gallon of gas and then maybe just maybe a choice between a movie or a CD. That alone has caused a huge drop in the market, as you state 76%...... it isn't entirely due to file sharing.
If I go to Russia and buy legal music in CD format will I not be allowed to bring it back into the USA? Absurd.

i love messin with the riaa

HAHA. Let's all mess with the RIAA. Let's see what they'll have to do. Perhaps they can't even stop us. It's out there already.

True. The RIAA has to understand the college and university students who are already paying a heck of their money and yet they have to pay extra for CD's.

paying $15-18 for a CD is ridiculous ... i do it for only a few artists that i aboslutely love which are on indie labels or self-produced (andrew bird, sufjan stevens, etc.), but $20 for a CD is just stupid. part of the problem is theft ... people are stealing and that is wrong (i think allofmp3 is not stealing), but the other part is the quality of music has gone down. where are the powerhouse bands that last for a decade? they are gone. we are stuck w/ MTV crap all over the radio that gets shoved down our throats that we don't even like. there ARE quality bands out there, but they are hard to find. if every artist was as talented as the abovementioned andrew bird or sufjan stevens, then $15 for a CD would be a deal, but all these teenage emo-pop-punk hacks are what's killing the industry, not theft. quality would triumph over quantity if the music industry would do a little more R&D into quality artists instead of sticking with "safe bets" like fall out boy and other crappy artists.

also, the "big time" artists are being overpaid. when the music market bottoms-out, so should wages. the prices of CDs/mp3s should be slashed in an effort to sell more product. the music industry should be run like a sports franchise: if ticket sales were down 76%, the team would cut all its high-end players that weren't producing and find a bunch of rookies that could do the job. furthermore, they would cut ticket prices, do promotions, and advertise all over the place. instead of using that business model, the music industry is overpaying crappy artists and keeping prices high. musicians should be satisfied to make "a living" ($75-100K/yr) until the market picks back up. the key for the music industry is finding quality bands. where are our generation's beatles, stones, who, zeppelin? aside from coldplay, there is no band that can command a global audience across all demographics. the music industry needs to do some R&D and find the next set of blockbuster acts that will have staying power.

the music i download illegally is music i wouldn't have otherwise bought. this isn't like stealing a cd. nobody loses any money, it's the potential of money. you can't touch the music you download.

these college students wouldn't have bought the music.

It seems that, regardless of what your stance is regarding the big bad labels, costs of production, or evil middlemen, there is nearly a unanimous appeal to the artist from these posts and many like them. But what many of you fail to realize is that if you wnat artists to get a fair share, and you want to see the emergence "our generation's Beatles", and if you want more than "MTV crap" stuffed down your throat, then you should be finding ways to cooperate with and help artists, instead of finding reasons to fight their labels. Somebody alluded to an important point: shows are more important to most artists' careers (and wallets), and so that is where you should be focusing your attention (and money) if you want to support artists. If your friend's salary gets cut, you can take a shit on his boss' doorstep, but he probably isn't going to see a fat check on his desk the next day. If you want to help your friends in the music industry, then focus energy on them, not their asshole bosses. Suppose, for example, that we asked allofmp3 to create a concert listing system. Then, after paying what the general concensus seems to feel is an appropriate price for music, people could see when the artist behind those tunes will be playing in their hometown. My point is that the energy you use (mostly in vain) to stop labels and the RIAA could be much better used to HELP the artists.

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