Pirating MP3's

[Merauk]

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.

[Tarissa DR]

To a record company, a band is venture capital. You can't start the argument of how record companies and bands are treated on a contract until you take a look at all of the bands that they have sunk money into a costly album that didn't recoupe its profit.

So, you may be spending a lot on a certain band, but some of that is going towards the fact that there were 3 others that lost money.

Think of it like a badly managed game company *cough* with one very profitable product, and a few that are just money pits. It's a business, after all.

[Bristlebane]

Yeah, oops.

[Millie]

Originally posted by Merauk_EOD
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...

90% of music has ALWAYS been shit. This fact hasn't affected sales in the least (in fact, traditionally the 'worst' music has sold the best -- as evidenced by the fact that pre-fab, commercialized pop always tops sales charts). One could argue, in fact, that such crap bands as N'Sync, Backstreet Boys, and O-Town have, if anything, increased average record sales for their labels compared to the years before them. But the companies are still losing money, so obviously some X-factor is to blame. Cite whatever you will, but I still maintain that artificial, inflated CD market prices are the cause of the problem.

All entertainment technology follows the same pattern on the chart from release to obsolescence. Prices are stratospheric when the medium is brand new. They level out when the medium becomes mainstream. They fall gradually as the medium ages, eventually reaching a price floor -- which, in essence, is the lowest price at which you can sell a product and still turn a reasonable profit. Customers expect this, and market trends both reflect and give rise to it.

CDs, however, have remained at the same price for decades now. This is unheard of in the entertainment industry, let alone the music industry. And labels have been reaping the benefits. That is, until P2P software was introduced. It is THE problem that has been plaguing record labels since its introduction, and for one reason alone: it highlights the ridiculous prices at which CDs sell.

Think about it this way: a bag of M&Ms sells for about $1. Would you go out of your way to steal that bag, knowing its cost is so trivial? Of course not. The analogy may not be the best one in the world (I'm tired), but the principle works the same for CDs, more or less. If CDs cost $20, you're going to be more inclined to steal the music. If CDs cost, say, $5 - $10 a pop, you still might download the songs -- but you'd be much more inclined to go purchase the CDs afterward (for quality, continuity, or loyalty reasons). And CDs would start selling again.

Obviously we can't put the piracy genie back in the bottle (as seen in the spectacular failure to cap the phenomenon by attacking Napster). The only thing companies can do is accept P2P's existence, and work with it or around it. Working around it would be lowering CD prices. Working with it would be finding a way to control the P2P software, to co-opt it into a subscription service. Since companies can't realistically find a way to make P2P work for them, they need to work around it.

There may be no 'right' solution; there is only the 'best available' one. And for now, the best available solution is to put CD prices back on the natural market pricing track.

[Reefah]

Labels want ppl to start buying cds again? sign bands that can play, and write 12-15 "good" songs per cd. Theres so many shitty bands out there now with nothing, some with 1 or 2 good songs and thats it.

I buy the cds of the bands i support, i still dl tons of new songs trying to find new good bands, if i like there album from start to finish i will go buy it.

12-20$ per cd imo is fine if its a good cd :P

[Tarissa DR]

Thing is, the bands that are out there are out there because they make money. Shitty by someones opinion or not, they wouldn't be out there, on a major label at least, if they didn't represent a profit. These labels, at least the big ones, are usually there because the bands they promote make them money.

-tari

[Xequecal]

Another big reason so much crap gets downloaded and not bought is because downloading is actually easier than buying. There are a lot of teenagers with rich parents as well as the upper middle class/rich people group who's time is massively more important to them than their money. If you have broadband, you can fire up Kazaa and get the song you want in 2-3 minutes. If you were going to buy it, you'd have to get in your car, drive 15 minutes to Wal-Mart, find the damn thing amidst the other 100,000 CDs, hope they're not sold out, etc. Trust me, this is a lot of effort to a lot of people. I know this from personal experience. I have enough money where I could go to a steakhouse every day and blow $50 on stuffing myself. Do I do it? No. I don't want to bother taking the time to put on nice clothes then drive down there then wait 20 minutes for my food then drive home when I can just fill up on crap here. Same principle. Anything you can get right in your own home will always be popular. Hell, if downloading an album cost $20 and Wal-Mart gave them away for free, I'm willing to bet there would still be a very large amount of people downloading.

[Sueven]

Millie said:

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
The record labels know precisely why they're losing money to MP3 piracy, and we consumers are not to blame. Nor are the developers of the Peer-To-Peer (P2P) file sharing programs. The fault lies squarely in the hands of the labels.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

I disagree completely. This is like saying that women who get raped are "asking for it." The fault is always always always on the shoulders of the people who are commiting the crime, in this case, the consumers. Now, whether or not this crime is justified is a different story entirely, and I agree completely with your explanation of motivation.

Let's say you have a band who gets signed to a major record label. They produce a CD, which sells a quarter million copies. Taking your average contract and expenses, each band member (4 person band) will have made slightly more than $4,000 in this entire process- a terrible salary.

One important issue is the idea of binding memos. A band will meet with an A&R guy, and sign a memo saying that they will sign with a record label as soon as a contract can be agreed upon. The problem is that the memo is legally binding, and prevents the artists from producing any music unless it is through the label in question. Thus, the record label can offer any contract it cares too. If the band does not accept it, they cannot make music without the label taking legal action against them. Thus they must either accept the labels terms of dissipate. The terms offered are never particularly favorable to the band.

As for what I do: I download the CD, and if I like it, I burn it. Then, I mail $10 cash to the band, along with a letter thanking them for producing the music. While this doesn't inflate their sales numbers, and it doesn't improve their standing with their label, it does put more money in the bands pocket than they would have received from a purchase of their CD, it does save me between $5-10, and it does allow me to avoid supporting the record labels. In the end, bands would probably prefer that I just buy their CD, but I'm not going to do that, and sending them money is the next best thing.

[Kaylum]

Originally posted by Sueven

I disagree completely. This is like saying that women who get raped are "asking for it." The fault is always always always on the shoulders of the people who are commiting the crime

i think your missing the point: regardless of who is to blame; can that same woman not minimize her risks by acknowledging the fact that rapists exist and finding ways to avoid said rapist?

its not an issue of placeing blame; its an issue of dealing with reality. a woman who walks down a dark alley in skimpy clothes may not be to blame when she gets raped but she sure is fucking stupid. and theres plenty of other scenerios where the women has put herself in avoidable jeaporady. (obviously im not talking about all cases of rape here - nor am i trying to say the attacker is any less responsible for their actions - but ill be talking in circles trying to explain it further)

by the same token there has always been music piracy (even if it was just taping it off the radio). the issue is that yes its become easier and easier to get music in such a way.

deal with reality for a moment and forget placing blame: how do you reduce this loss? you dont walk down the dark alley in skimpy clothes alone at night.

music companys are facing that now; it doesnt matter whos to blame, they need to stop flaunting their power, flaunting their over priced shit and come to terms with what they need to due to encourage people to buy more music.

[Kaylum]

Originally posted by Sueven
As for what I do: I download the CD, and if I like it, I burn it. Then, I mail $10 cash to the band, along with a letter thanking them for producing the music. While this doesn't inflate their sales numbers, and it doesn't improve their standing with their label, it does put more money in the bands pocket than they would have received from a purchase of their CD, it does save me between $5-10, and it does allow me to avoid supporting the record labels. In the end, bands would probably prefer that I just buy their CD, but I'm not going to do that, and sending them money is the next best thing. [/b]

and you do realize that if you actually do this; its most likely the record company or their manager that ends up with the cash anyway: unless you somehow happen to have every band members "real" address; the only thing publicly available is usually a "fan box" thats run by either the record company or the bands manager to filter fan mail sent to the band: ie the band never sees a single letter written unless they request it and even than they dont know if they are getting all of them.

[Merauk]

Originally posted by Millie
There may be no 'right' solution; there is only the 'best available' one. And for now, the best available solution is to put CD prices back on the natural market pricing track.

Not to get to far off track but why hasn't this worked with the DVD/Movie market? The price of movies has gone from $70 for a big name movie in the early 80's to $15 or less for some new releases today. DVD's bring a lot more added content as well.

Yet piracy of movies is becoming more and more mainstream. The fact you cannot easily burn the movies onto a medium like you can with MP3's has stemmed the flow somewhat. But do you honestly believe when such medium is available the piracy rate won't increase, even given the fact that DVD's have steadily dropped in price while improving in quality (i.e. added features).

Originally posted by Millie
90% of music has ALWAYS been shit.

I think music comes and goes in waves. Maybe it is just my personal taste, maybe its age, or maybe your right. But I always seem to see a couple of years where I can’t find any bad records, I go to tons of shows, and everything is good. Then comes a dry spell of a couple years where I buy maybe a dozen CD’s in a year and basically catch old shows, no new bands. Lately I don’t know there just doesn’t seem to be anything out to grab my interest. I think this has something to do with sales being off as well. Just my thought anyways.

Originally posted by Tarissa
To a record company, a band is venture capital. You can't start the argument of how record companies and bands are treated on a contract until you take a look at all of the bands that they have sunk money into a costly album that didn't recoupe its profit.

So, you may be spending a lot on a certain band, but some of that is going towards the fact that there were 3 others that lost money.

Good point as well.

[Narayen Annihilation]

I've only purchased 1 CD in my entire life.

[Millie]

Originally posted by Merauk_EOD


Not to get to far off track but why hasn't this worked with the DVD/Movie market? The price of movies has gone from $70 for a big name movie in the early 80's to $15 or less for some new releases today. DVD's bring a lot more added content as well.

Yet piracy of movies is becoming more and more mainstream.

My argument here has never been about stemming the rise of piracy. In fact, I've been arguing quite the opposite -- piracy is unavoidable, and it will only get worse as technology gets better.

That said, I'm talking about finding ways to minimize the sales loss suffered through piracy. DVDs have dropped in price and increased in quality -- and they're still selling like crazy. There may be DVD pirates out there in greater numbers than there used to be, but DVD sales aren't generally affected by them.

CDs, on the other hand, have taken a disproportionately large hit from piracy. Part of that may be the fact that it's easier to steal and burn MP3s; I won't argue there. But it's also very much because CDs have been, and still are, ridiculously overpriced (and, for the most part, shoddily produced).

Lowering CD prices won't stop the pirates, but it'll sure help reduce the bite they take out of sales.

[Alamando]

Originally posted by Xequecal
If you have broadband, you can fire up Kazaa and get the song you want in 2-3 minutes. If you were going to buy it, you'd have to get in your car, drive 15 minutes to Wal-Mart, find the damn thing amidst the other 100,000 CDs, hope they're not sold out, etc. Trust me, this is a lot of effort to a lot of people.

Which is probably balanced out by those of us waddling through the internet at 56kb/s, taking 10-20 minutes to download one song. That adds up to roughly 1 1/2 hours per album, possibly more. This does assume good download rates and finding all the songs. If I had $15, I would prefer to run to a store and buy it.

Music piracy isn't always about "getting the record companies back" or "supporting the artists", I think. It's about how much money your time is worth. To me, if $15 dollars will save me 2 or 3 hours, I'll consider it. The kid with broadband that mommy and daddy bought will be more than happy to spend 20 minutes to save $15.

I still buy CDs when inspired, although I haven't been inspired to buy anything since... An acoustic compilation that a local radio station puts out every Christmas (Dammit, I gotta shell out another $15 soon) that I bought last year, IIRC.

Random thought - Does "music piracy" apply to music played on the radio?

[Eomer]

Yes, if you are to record the music off the radio onto another medium, I am pretty sure that is covered under copyright laws. The radio stations have licenses or agreements (however it works) with the record companies to play that music, not distribute it.

I have been meaning to write a long post in response to this, and maybe I will get around to it sooner or later. But basically, my view on piracy (or at least why so many people do it) is that with P2P programs and high speed access, it's easy. That's the only real reason, IMO.

There are plenty of things that are overpriced, like clothes, cars, various entertainment (DVD's, music, books, live entertainment like sports and concerts), hell different types of food. Very little of that gets stolen. Why? Because you have to physically steal it from a store. So it adds both risk of being caught, as well as the guilt of personalizing the theft; you don't feel bad pirating music because it doesn't "feel" like theft because there is no apparent direct victim, whereas stealing a CD you are taking it from a physical store with people working in it.

Pirating MP3's is very easy to do, so people do it. There wasn't that horrific of a problem prior to Napster. But it blew up then because suddenly any jackass with a computer and a little knowledge suddenly had access to every piece of music they could dream of.

I honestly think it has nothing to do with CD's supposedly being over priced. If they were to lower CD prices by 4 bucks a CD, sales increases would not even come close to making up for the lost revenue, because the people not buying CD's and pirating instead will just continue on doing it.

And honestly, I think a good quality CD is well worth the 15 bucks or whatever it costs (also, keep in mind that I am Canadian and CD's are actually a fair amount cheaper here, about 14-15 for a new one in our currency, so boom, Americans pay 50% more essentially). Yes there is a ton of bad shit out there, but that's buyer beware. There are very few CD's in my collection of 250 that I honestly feel were not worth the price.

However, I do agree that record companies also do share part of the blame. BUT! I don' think it has anything to do with their prices. They were originally offered the chance to have some sort of fileprotection/copyright stuff embedded into the mp3 standard when it was first being proposed years ago. I think it was Diamond multimedia that approached them about it. The RIAA, instead of jumping on the digital revolution bandwagon, instantly pulled out the lawyers and threatened a law suit if they were to release the new file format. Sure enough they did, and the RIAA sued. Of course, they didn't have a damn leg to stand on, and the judge tossed it out quite fast. Now the cat is out of the bag and the record companies aren't sure WTF to do about it.

Oh yeah, one thing I forgot to mention: I like how some bands are now actively trying to encourage people to buy their CD's as opposed to downloading them. For example The Tragically Hip included a Hip Club Card with their last album release. Basically you go to their website and register the number on it in your name, and you become a member of their club. What it does for you is give you earlier notice of concerts (you can buy tickets a day or two before everyone else can, they have it set up with Ticketmaster), special merchandise, a newsletter from the band sent out pretty often, etc etc. It's actually a pretty good idea, and even though the album itself sucked ass, it was well worth it because I got front row tickets to one of their recent shows that sold out instantly (well actually they sold out three shows for Edmonton, so obviously it was handy to have).

Other bands bundle in DVD, like QOTSA, Eminem, System Of A Down, and others. Some just include bonus content on the CD itself. Overall it's good for the fans, obviously.