music_news 91 posts

Nine Inch Nails speak out on record labels continuing to screw the consumer over.

They give an example of “absurd retail pricing” of their recent album Year Zero in Australia. “Shame on you, UMG. Year Zero is selling for $34.99 Australian dollars ($29.10 US). No wonder people steal music. Avril Lavigne's record in the same store was $21.99 ($18.21 US).
By the way, when I asked a label rep about this his response was: "It's because we know you have a real core audience that will pay whatever it costs when you put something out - you know, true fans. It's the pop stuff we have to discount to get people to buy."
So... I guess as a reward for being a "true fan" you get ripped off.”

NIN are critical of marketing tricks used by the labels. “The point is, I am trying my best to make sure the music and items NIN puts in the marketplace have value, substance and are worth you considering... read more

Last week Warner got very displeased with an online store which tried to sell Warner albums without DRM. The site offers albums in MP3 format at a discount compared to a physical CD. Customers get MP3 files plus a CD could be shipped later as an option.

According to Reuters “Warner Music Group on Thursday demanded that online retailer AnywhereCD remove its digital albums from the site, saying the start-up had violated their agreement by selling Warner's music without copy protection software.”

It’s OK by Warner if the store helps customers to rip the CDs into MP3s but it’s not OK if those MP3s are without DRM. This way of selling music "flagrantly violates" the agreement between the label and the store.

Earlier this year Warner Music Chief Executive Edgar Bronfman had expressed his views on DRM. "There is no reason to conclude that music is the one content category that should not or cannot be protected, simply because there is an unprotected legacy product available in the physical world," he... read more

At the beginning of March 23 US colleges and universities received 405 "prelitigation settlement letters" from the RIAA demanding to identify students whose IP addresses were spotted in file-sharing activities. Those students could then conveniently settle with the RIAA with a pre-court discount simply by going to a special web-site. Should the students remain unidentified, then the university could be taken to court instead.

"[Students] no longer buy music like they used to. We're trying to send the right message and encourage them to enjoy music legally," Jonathan Lamy, communications director for the RIAA commented on the problem. Another comment from the RIAA describes the efficient approach: “Our pre-litigation settlement letters are offered as a benefit to university students to allow them to settle claims early, at a substantially discounted sum and off the public record.”

The universities have taken different approach ranging from mockery to full compliance. Some universities asked the RIAA to reimburse the cost of processing those letters... read more

According to a new market research report from Insight Research Corp. DRM related spending will exceed $9 billion by 2012. This will include spending on soft- and hardware “technologies that enable the content owner and distributors to assign and control rights and conditions for viewing, listening, and employing the content present in digital media and applications”.

In 2007 total worldwide DRM spending will reach $1 billion.

Looking back “DRM evolved over the last two decades to serve corporations that needed a means to deal with information piracy, peer-to-peer file sharing, and various regulatory requirements. So in a sense DRM did not arise to meet the needs of end users, and in fact, it may be said to have evolved to spite the end user," says Robert Rosenberg, President of Insight. “… by and large the focus of the DRM industry is to protect the rights of the owner of the content, not the end user," Rosenberg concludes. However, more often than not it is the end user who finally pays the cost of development of DRM... read more

The RIAA’s new agenda is about the future of the nation – the students. According to Associated Press, US universities have recently received thousands of notices regarding student who share and\or download copyrighted content.

The group claims there are as many as 15 000 students in 25 universities who are engaged in such illegal activity. This figure represents a threefold increase compared to the previous year.
The RIAA is concerned with the current widespread illegal downloading on campuses, "We have to let people know that if they engage in this activity, they are not anonymous," RIAA President Cary Sherman said.

The universities’ approach to this varies. For example, at Michigan State University students who are caught twice are forced “to watch an eight-minute anti-piracy DVD produced by the RIAA. A third-time offender can be suspended for a semester.” (Associated Press) Purdue University (1068 copyright complaints from the RIAA) on the other hand rarely goes into trouble of tracking down the offenders. "In... read more

The RIAA tries to optimize its litigation practice. After a recent setback when a district court ruled that the RIAA is to pay the legal fees for the defendant in a dismissed case, the organization came up with a new idea.

According to Digital Music News the RIAA has recently offered ISPs an option for their subscribers. People can avoid costly litigation and even receive a pre-lawsuit discount. "An early notification will give your customer the opportunity to settle any claims before a suit is filed against them at a reduced rate (discounts of $1000 or more)," the letter states.

The ISPs willing to cooperate will have to keep user logs for 180 days. "This timeframe is necessary to allow sufficient time to pursue the Doe lawsuit and subpoena if settlement... read more

The Santangelo kid sued by the RIAA for file-sharing is countersuing the recording industry for “violating antitrust laws, conspiring to defraud the courts and making extortionate threats” (Associated Press).

This story has been going on for a few years now. Robert Santangelo, now 16 years old was 11 when the alleged piracy took place. He denies any wrongdoing and claims it’s impossible to prove anything anyway.

Robert is the son of Patti Santangelo, a mom of 5 sued by the RIAA in 2005. She refused to pay the settlement. The case drew a lot of public attention and the industry finally dropped the case against her. Instead 2 of the Santangelo children are being sued now – 16 year old Robert and his sister Michelle, now 20.

Robert defends himself by claiming that “he never sent copyrighted music to others, that the recording companies promoted file sharing before turning against it, that average computer users were never warned that it was illegal, that the statute of limitations has passed, and that all the music... read more

Piratebay has launched a campaign against a Swedish ISP that had decided to block its customers from accessing AllofMP3.com. In turn Piratebay will block the Perspektiv Bredband ISP from accessing the popular PirateBay BitTorrent tracker.

In a statement at piratbyran.org Piratebay insists that the Perspektiv Bredband ISP acted in the interests of powerful media companies rather then in the interests of the customers. “After dialogues with Swedish and Danish anti-piracy organisations Perspektiv Bredband has blocked access of allofmp3.com for both their Swedish and Danish customers. In Sweden there is no legal reason to do so since allofmp3.com is legal to use. Perspektiv Bredband clearly states in their press release that it is a moral and not legal standpoint.”

"Perspektiv Bredband has every right in the world to block whichever site they want on their own net," the statement goes on. "And their customers have every right in the... read more

Labels try new ways to get the money they believe are getting lost due to piracy and carelessness of consumers. New idea is that it might be easier to tax consumers when they buy an MP3 player rather then hope they will stay away from peering.

News leaked out this week that Universal Music Group tries to negotiate a royalty fee for every iPod sold.

Universal has already succeeded in doing so for Zune players produced by Microsoft. Assumingly the label will receive $1 for every $250 of Zune sales.

Consumers will pay even if they will never listen to Universal’s music on their players. Actually many developed countries do have some kind of copyright levy or a tax on blank media such as CDs or memory devices like MP3 players. Consumers have to pay it even if they are going to use a blank CD to record their own song or home video.


Read more:

Universal... read more

As Christmas holiday season is the most important time for music sales RIAA along with MPAA have launched a Holiday Blitz campaign aimed at “protecting holiday shoppers from purchasing illegal copies of their favorite movies and music and defending movie studios and the recording industry against the loss of crucial holiday sales, especially those from newly released — or even not-yet released — titles”. (www.riaa.com/news)

Significant attention will be devoted to peering as RIAA has much experience in dealing with file-sharers.

At the same time in Europe, German government announced that the fine for illegal music downloads should be limited to maximum of 50 euros (provided the downloading was... read more

What do the Australian ARIA Awards have to do with IFPI? John Kennedy, IFPI’s chairman and CEO visited Australia for the ceremony and used a chance to convey the idea of word wide censorship to the local population.

The Sydney Morning Herald cites the main points of Mr. Kennedy’s message about ultimate control of users. "What we hope is our next step is to engage ISPs in performing a role in dealing with piracy online… If ISPs refuse to co-operate, Mr Kennedy said he would take his requests up to Australian politicians. "We're saying to governments: If the ISPs aren't willing to do this on a voluntary basis, isn't this something you're prepared to regulate? … Mr Kennedy admits that the measures he has taking are "draconian", but said it was the only way to convince users to obtain their music legally."

However, does he talk about forcing people to buy music legally or does it all mean forcing people to buy music for an artificially high cartel price? Is freedom a price high enough for the labels' well-being?
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In this long dispute between the site and IFPI the latter will try everything to push AllofMP3 out of business. The WTO thing did not work. Russia defends its conditions of entery and its negotiators said this week that unless their conditions are accepted, Russia is not interested. (Just to remind, there was a condition from USA lobbyists – that Russia must shut the site to be able to join WTO).

Another recent attack by IFPI is a civil suit in Denmark against one of the ISPs there. And this week the court finally ruled that Tele2 must block its customers from using AllofMP3.com.

“The telecommunications industry in Denmark has expressed outrage and concern over the verdict, as they feel it implies ISPs are now responsible for the activities of their users – not to mention a legal gray area where no verdict has been made against AllofMP3. “I’m shocked about the verdict, and view it as censorship. Tele2 and other Internet service providers provide free access to information on the internet, but now have to sort this... read more

IFPI the body representing major labels like EMI, Warner Music, Sony BMG and Virgin has filed some 8000 lawsuits against users in 17 countries. The organization claims that around 20 billion songs were downloaded illegally last year. (or roughly 3 songs per each person living on the planet).

IFPI sees suing users as the most efficient way to fight illegal peering. Eliminating the networks themselves has proved difficult despite recent settlements, such as the Kazaa case. The latter is now a legal peering service having paid the industry a settlement of $100 mln. However, there’s still plenty of peering networks. “The industry is targeting uploaders using all the major unauthorised P2P services, including BitTorrent, eDonkey, DirectConnect, Gnutella, Limewire, SoulSeek and WinMX.” (IFPI.org) The IFPI campaign is more about people using the illegal p2p networks, than such networks being illegal as some of them turn legal from time to time.

The organization tries to operate without scandals like RIAA’s when it tries to sue... read more