Quote:
Originally posted by Millie
I'm not suggesting that stealing is 'right' or 'wrong,' but that record companies know what they must do if they want to reduce the rate of piracy. And yes, I believe that CDs sold closer to cost would be purchased with a lot greater frequency. If people were out there buying CDs again, then it wouldn't matter what they were downloading -- the effects of piracy on album sales would be next to nil. |
Ultimately though it becomes a Catch-22. Record companies are public companies which must increase profits/revenues each quarter to keep the stock price going up. If they lower the price by 50% they need to sell 50% more CD’s to just to keep pace. The main reason for the decay in CD sales in my opinion is 90% of the stuff they are trying to sell is absolute shit (I am not sure this related to me becoming older or what but music really sucks today for the most part I can’t think of more then a dozen CD’s I would want to buy released this year).
I do disagree that lowered CD prices will in anyway reduce piracy by a substantial amount. P2P has made it so easy to get whatever you want whenever you want it. Look at movies (you cite DVD’s and VHS tapes as being reasonable in price) the piracy on the Internet of them is just as bad as music. The only thing really holding it back are cheap DVD burners that will allow you to view on a TV as opposed to a computer. If anything movie piracy is really going to take off in the near future.
Really don’t know what the solution is (not sure there is one). But I think however it gets sliced CD prices won’t be going down much as they need to make up for lost sales to piracy, and piracy won’t go away because who doesn’t like a free lunch.
