#179191 - 15/09/2003 10:44
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: JeffS]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 13/07/2000
Posts: 4180
Loc: Cambridge, England
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I see that as being counterproductive and definitely NOT the very thing our country was founded on. The US was founded by people who viewed copyrights as just another form of the Crown-bestowed monopolies which so hamstrung the British economy during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The US didn't get copyright protection for literary works until 1891, following much campaigning by the likes of Charles Dickens -- surely the Lars Ulrich of his day.
Peter
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#179192 - 15/09/2003 10:45
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: peter]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 14/01/2002
Posts: 2858
Loc: Atlanta, GA
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Suppose, as a thought experiment, someone invented a machine that could construct replicas of any object out of thin air -- so that grain, for example, could be "copied" at essentially no cost. Would it solve Third World famines for good, or would it be sued out of existence by the Farming Industry Association of America? If the latter, would you be rooting for the farmers to win? What an excellent question! My only answer at this point is to say that I think capitalism is problematic at its core, especially pure-capitalism (as would seem to be implied in your question). However, in the U.S. our capitalism is not "pure" (there are certainly exceptions for the sake of mercy). Even our version of capitalism is problematic, however, so I must say that when I speak of right and wrong, I must be doing so in context of our society. Because the truth is that I think that pure communism is probably a much more "moral" system of economics that capitalism. Unfortunatly it also doesn't work as long as humans are greedy and self serving.
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-Jeff
Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings; they did it by killing all those who opposed them.
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#179193 - 15/09/2003 10:46
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: JeffS]
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Anonymous
Unregistered
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Why do you download music if it isn't worth anything to you? Of course it's worth something, whether you can duplicate it or not.
I mean monetary value. Water is dirt cheap, but it's worth everything you got if you're dying of thirst.
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#179194 - 15/09/2003 10:49
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: peter]
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Anonymous
Unregistered
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Suppose, as a thought experiment, someone invented a machine that could construct replicas of any object out of thin air -- so that grain, for example, could be "copied" at essentially no cost.
Well said.
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#179195 - 15/09/2003 10:49
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: peter]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 14/01/2002
Posts: 2858
Loc: Atlanta, GA
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The US was founded by people who viewed copyrights as just another form of the Crown-bestowed monopolies which so hamstrung the British economy during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Yes, but that wasn't my point. I didn't say that the US was founded on the idea of copyrights, but capitalism. Copyrights are merely a (possible) logical outworking of that principal. What I was referring to as "NOT the very thing our country was founded on" was the idea that people should be expected to contribute to socity regardless of profit.
Edit: Edited out IRregardless. ARRG!
Edited by FerretBoy (15/09/2003 10:51)
_________________________
-Jeff
Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings; they did it by killing all those who opposed them.
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#179196 - 15/09/2003 10:58
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: JeffS]
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Anonymous
Unregistered
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Pure capitalism I believe is freedom. It's the freedom to do with your belongings as you see fit. If you create something with your mind and body, or any machine that belongs to you, whether it is a reproduction of someone else's creation or not, it is still of your making and therefore belongs to you, even if you produced it at basically no cost. In pure capitalism, there wouldn't be any copyrights or patents.
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#179197 - 15/09/2003 11:01
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: ]
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Anonymous
Unregistered
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CD's aren't worth much because anyone can make their own. If that's not capitalism then I don't know what is.
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#179198 - 15/09/2003 11:13
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: ]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 14/01/2002
Posts: 2858
Loc: Atlanta, GA
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I'm not looking at "pure" capitalism as much as the principal. The principal that makes capitalism great (as far as production goes) is that it harnesses human selfishness and turns it into productivity. The underlying principal is that a person is rewarded based on how much "need" there is for that person's product. This benefits society by driving producers to focus on the most important "needs" of society and letting other, less “necessary” products fall by the wayside.
Protecting intellectual property enables this concept to be carried beyond physical production and promote the innovations and ideas that society "needs" the most. While perhaps not "pure" capitalism, this is very consistent with the goals of capitalism.
And my point was that the converse is also true. To not protect IP is to work against the idea of capitalism: it says that intellectual ideas will not be reward on the basis of how much society "needs" them.
There is nothing great about capitalism in and of itself: it is only good as long as it serves society. When I said that the US was based on capitalism I was probably wrong. More likely the idea was that those who give the nation things that the nation “needs” should be rewarded the most, and I mislabeled that concept as capitalism.
_________________________
-Jeff
Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings; they did it by killing all those who opposed them.
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#179199 - 15/09/2003 11:14
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: peter]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 13/07/2000
Posts: 4180
Loc: Cambridge, England
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so that grain, for example, could be "copied" at essentially no cost. I'm reluctant to mention this, as it's a side issue to this thread, but on rereading that post it occurred to me that seedgrain itself can be viewed as a way of copying grain at very low cost. Except, that is, when the "intellectual property" lawyers scent blood in the water.
Peter
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#179200 - 15/09/2003 11:20
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: wfaulk]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 30/04/2000
Posts: 3810
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A friend of mine was using LimeWire and recently removed it, relunctantly, from her computer. She had been paying for the pro version and thus assumed that it must be legal. Now she understands otherwise. The lawsuits scared her into realizing that there was a downside to file sharing. That's entirely the goal of the RIAA: set an example, generate a ton of press, and get through the thick skull of the existing file sharers that their behavior has a downside to it.
Their heavyhanded behavior is a direct result of KaZaA and friends making themselves difficult to sue. Now the RIAA is trying to educate the public. Getting Lars and company up there to do the P.R. mostly resulted in a barrage of articles about how records companies screw the little artist. Their current tactics are instead generating stories of 12-year old girls being sued. This plays nicely into their goals of educating people. If that girl could get sued, what about others? Now parents start paying attention. Somehow, the RIAA will continue to stay in business, despite the negative press (which, I believe, is exactly what they wanted).
Long term, we all know the correct answer is cheap, high quality, legal downloads. I figure the magic price is $10/month for all-you-can-eat with some caps to deal with massive downloaders (precisely what EMusic does for a one-year commitment). At that point, assuming you've got the same breadth of content (not present at all on EMusic), people will prefer the legit service, particularly because they can provide you with consistently high encoding quality and tagging, not to mention collaborative filtering and other fancy tools (likewise, not present in EMusic).
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#179201 - 15/09/2003 11:41
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: peter]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 20/12/1999
Posts: 31604
Loc: Seattle, WA
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Wow, Peter, what a fascinating article!
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#179202 - 15/09/2003 12:00
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: DWallach]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 08/03/2000
Posts: 12344
Loc: Sterling, VA
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I figure the magic price is $10/month for all-you-can-eat Just remember that there are other issues besides price. There has to be a sufficient warehouse of music, the quality must be high (not likely to happen), and what we're able to do with that music is very important. If I am not able to do what I want with it, the service is useless.
A BIG incentive for me to pay for such a service is something that the record companies probably won't bother with: old and out of print material. If there's nothing but what's on TRL at the moment, you won't find me there.
But above all, I'm with Bitt. I want my CD.
_________________________
Matt
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#179203 - 15/09/2003 12:29
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: Dignan]
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enthusiast
Registered: 08/03/2001
Posts: 202
Loc: Denver, CO
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Just remember that there are other issues besides price. There has to be a sufficient warehouse of music, the quality must be high (not likely to happen), and what we're able to do with that music is very important. If I am not able to do what I want with it, the service is useless.
But above all, I'm with Bitt. I want my CD.
I happen to agree with this statement. For me to pay $1.00 per song or $10.00 per album, I was a lossless encoding (ie FLAC) with no DRM on it what so ever. If I don't get that, I'll spend the extra 3.99-5.99 plus tax and get a CD which I can do whatever I want with.
_________________________
- Damien
- Mk2a 24G Blue SN: 120001043
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#179204 - 15/09/2003 12:31
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: xanatos]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 25/12/2000
Posts: 16706
Loc: Raleigh, NC US
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Not to mention that at brick-and-mortar stores, you can often listen to the entire album if you want, which is not likely to happen with online stores, whether mail-order or download.
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Bitt Faulk
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#179205 - 15/09/2003 12:43
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: JeffS]
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addict
Registered: 24/07/2003
Posts: 500
Loc: Colorado, N.A.
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as long as humans are greedy and self serving. Interesting you say this, as I was going to reply to your earlier post and note a problem with "pure capitalism" is its underlying assumption that nobody is ever motivated by anything other than pure self-interest and/or greed. Both its success and its issues in America result from this assumption. I think the problem with the RIAA claiming to represent the artists whose IP is being appropriated is that many/most artists/musicians aren't driven to create by greed.
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-- DLF
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#179206 - 15/09/2003 12:50
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: DLF]
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Anonymous
Unregistered
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This country isn't run by greed. It's run by people who just want to provide for their families. Communist dictatorships are run by the greed of the dictators.
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#179207 - 15/09/2003 12:55
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: ]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 23/08/2000
Posts: 3826
Loc: SLC, UT, USA
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The top tier who run this country are in no way driven by the need to provide for their family on a base level... unless you count private jets, tennis courts, multiple hundred thousand dollar cars, multiple mansions, etc etc as providing for your family. Greed runs the desire for monetary excess.
Now, if you solely define those that run this country as the everyday blue collar worker, then i might buy into that, but it would be a false statement if you think those who just want to provide for their families run this country.
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#179208 - 15/09/2003 12:56
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: DLF]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 14/01/2002
Posts: 2858
Loc: Atlanta, GA
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its underlying assumption that nobody is ever motivated by anything other than pure self-interest and/or greed. That's a really good point. I think the problem with the RIAA claiming to represent the artists whose IP is being appropriated is that many/most artists/musicians aren't driven to create by greed. And so is that.
As an artist myself I totally agree with you. One step further is that the music I create is spiritual in nature and my conviction is that I do it not for the money but that other people might be spiritually blessed. So while I hope to make money someday to support my "ministry", it is certainly not the overriding factor.
So my own situation puts a big fat hole in my theory of IP protection being necessary for music to be created. However, it's still true that a lot of music we have wouldn't have been created if someone hadn't gotten money for it, if for no other reason than to put food on the table while the person makes the music.
_________________________
-Jeff
Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings; they did it by killing all those who opposed them.
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#179209 - 15/09/2003 13:01
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: ]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 14/01/2002
Posts: 2858
Loc: Atlanta, GA
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Communist dictatorships are run by the greed of the dictators. Which is why communism doesn't work. If people were perfectly selfless, however, I believe communism would be far superior to capitalism. Oh, and you'd need a governing body with perfect knowledge to be able to distribute resources as the are needed.
_________________________
-Jeff
Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings; they did it by killing all those who opposed them.
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#179210 - 15/09/2003 13:08
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: JeffS]
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old hand
Registered: 28/04/2002
Posts: 770
Loc: Los Angeles, CA
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a very common misconception is that the artists are losing royalties because of a reduction of cd sales. most artist earn a significant bulk of their earnings thru concerts. i agree with the view that the current course of the recording industry will make it so that songs and cds will serve just as adverstising. the current model sucks because you don't get what you pay for, and p2p to most people seems to be the only viable alternative.
supporting link
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#179211 - 15/09/2003 13:10
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: Dignan]
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pooh-bah
Registered: 12/02/2002
Posts: 2298
Loc: Berkeley, California
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Just remember that there are other issues besides price. There has to be a sufficient warehouse of music, the quality must be high (not likely to happen), and what we're able to do with that music is very important. If I am not able to do what I want with it, the service is useless.
A BIG incentive for me to pay for such a service is something that the record companies probably won't bother with: old and out of print material. If there's nothing but what's on TRL at the moment, you won't find me there.
Well, as someone already pointed out, emusic provides nearly all of these. I doubt they have a single TRL song on the service. The quality is high (Lame VBR for nearly all tracks). Admitedly, the selection is lacking so that after the initial downloading, you do have to hunt for music you like, but that's what being into music should mean. On a basic economic leve, where else can you get the entire They Might Be Giants dicography, the entire Dropkick Murphy's discography (for you punk fans) and the two disc set of the greatest hits of Wesly Willis for $45?
Emusic may not have the selection, but they've got the business model. The challenge is unsubscribing when your 3 months are up like you planned to.
Matthew
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#179212 - 15/09/2003 13:20
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: matthew_k]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 08/03/2000
Posts: 12344
Loc: Sterling, VA
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That's fine, but I'm going to hold these stores to a FAR higher standard than my local Best Buy in terms of stock. Whereas Best Buy must sell what they think people will buy, balanced with the amount of display space a non-selling album takes up, online stores have to worry about signing up with certain artists or labels. We're talking iTunes without the Beatles. And just because there are obscure artists doesn't mean they have a large number of obscure artists. I'll look at their site, though. Is it possible to search their inventory without signing up?
*edit*
After a quick search, I'm not impressed. Yeah, they have obscure artists like the Young Fresh Fellows (the very first thing I searched for), but they only have the lesser-known albums, not the hits or the ones that are considered really good. The service has also never heard of Nirvana or the Beatles. However, it appears to have most of Dead Moon's albums.
All in all, their selection doesn't impress me in the least. Plus, many of the big names they claim to have either don't actually have albums on there ( Smashing Pumpkins simply has a blank page), or merely a few songs on a compilation. It's quite odd.
*edit 2*
Upon further browsing of emusic, my opinion is that it's a place to go to download what they have. You name dropped some artists, and yeah, they have large selections for them on there, but you only dropped them because they were there. If you actually go searching for an artists, your success rate is about 20%
Edited by DiGNAN17 (15/09/2003 13:35)
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Matt
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#179213 - 15/09/2003 15:08
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: Dignan]
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member
Registered: 12/08/2001
Posts: 175
Loc: Atlanta
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I have been on Emusic for a year and a half, and I have been downloading at least 10 albums a month. I can't stand listening to commericial FM stations, and Emusic has the stuff that the local college stations play. I must have downloaded over 15GB from them so far. For me, Itunes or anything else that gives major labels would be worthless, except for some older jazz.
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#179214 - 15/09/2003 17:13
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: Folsom]
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enthusiast
Registered: 17/08/2000
Posts: 334
Loc: Seattle, WA. USA
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This big problem people have with Emusic tends to be "they don't have X by Y!" And I tend to agree, it is annoying. The reason they have only a couple YFF albums (excellent choice btw) is they have deals with the labels. Mostly smaller labels that are not turned off my Emusic's complete lack of DRM. If your album of choice is either not on an Emusic label, or the label has decided not to release the album to Emusic, you won't find it.
The biggest problem I have with this whole RIAA thing is they are completely missing the point. The CD method of delivering audio content is stagnating. People now have the ability to create their own physical CDs from downloaded music tracks and are picking and choosing the music they want. The physical CD is quickly becoming irrelevant to a significant portion of the populace. Create a simple to use, non restrictive, inexpensive store front to your catalog and I guarantee you people will buy. Guarantee high quality encoding and full back catalog searching at say 50 cents a track... and the ease of use will out weigh for most people the Free part of P2P.
It happened with Video tape. Why borrow your friends tape and record it when you can grab "Monsters Inc." at the check stand for $9.99...?
The music and film industry need to deliver what the public is saying they want... or they are going to turn to other sources... in this case P2P.
THAT'S capitalism at work.
_________________________
Brian H. Johnson
MK2 36GB Blue, currently on life support
"RIP RCR..."
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#179215 - 15/09/2003 21:04
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: JeffS]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 08/07/1999
Posts: 5549
Loc: Ajijic, Mexico
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...band that had "please copy this cd and distribute it freely"
This brings to mind a dichotomy I have a hard time resolving.
The record companies and artists devote a considerable amount of time and money towards getting their music played on the radio, because they want people to hear it for free.
The record companies and artists devote a considerable amount of time and money towards keeping their music off of the internet, in order to prevent people hearing it for free.
Is there some subtle logic I am missing here?
tanstaafl.
_________________________
"There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch"
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#179216 - 15/09/2003 21:16
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: Dignan]
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pooh-bah
Registered: 12/02/2002
Posts: 2298
Loc: Berkeley, California
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Upon further browsing of emusic, my opinion is that it's a place to go to download what they have. You name dropped some artists, and yeah, they have large selections for them on there, but you only dropped them because they were there. If you actually go searching for an artists, your success rate is about 20%
Yes, that's exactly it. It's definitly a digging for stuff you've never heard of kind of thing. The artists I mentioned are my favorites, and for $45 they're well worth it. If you stay with it, you're going to have to discover artists you havn't heard ot before.
Matthew
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#179217 - 15/09/2003 21:21
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: tanstaafl.]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 27/06/1999
Posts: 7058
Loc: Pittsburgh, PA
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Is there some subtle logic I am missing here? I don't think it's much of a contradiction. As I'm sure you know, radio singles are just the bait to get people to buy albums. The radio stations, not the listener, choose when those singles are played. So what you get by buying a CD is the ability to play that single, and all of the other tracks on the album, whenever and wherever you choose. You also get higher quality playback (satellite radio notwithstanding.) And oh yeah, no commercials, lame DJ interruptions, etc.
So it basically boils down to the consumer paying for convenience, along with the non-single tracks. Both of these are things that the radio doesn't give you, but filesharing does.
How about a supermarket that spends "a considerable amount of time and money" giving away free samples, but also spends "a considerable amount of time and money" on anti-shoplifting measures to make sure consumers don't get away with lots of free product. No double standard there, is there?
Sheesh, why am I telling you this, don't you work at a radio station? 
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#179218 - 15/09/2003 23:37
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: wfaulk]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 08/06/1999
Posts: 7868
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The P2P thing is about listening without charge. For me in most cases, I just need a few good samples to be convinced that I will like the CD. And thus far, I have been very impressed with the iTunes store. It has major albums, and allows 30 second previews of any song without ever giving them any information. I doubt I will buy music off the iTunes system, but I will use it to get a preview and shop online elsewhere to have a CD sent to my house.
On the whole issue, I'll probably think up a response later.
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#179219 - 16/09/2003 07:52
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: drakino]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 25/12/2000
Posts: 16706
Loc: Raleigh, NC US
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For whatever reason, I've never found the partial samples enough to give me the feel of a song or an album. Maybe iTunes does a better job selecting which 30 seconds (I haven't listened that much), but it's still not as good as listening to the whole song. Hell, if they'd distribute 56kbps mp3s, they'd be doing good. The quality there is enough for me to determine if I'd like the song, but well irritating enough for me to need to get a replacement if I like it.
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Bitt Faulk
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#179220 - 16/09/2003 07:53
Re: riaa bullsh*t
[Re: tanstaafl.]
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carpal tunnel
Registered: 25/12/2000
Posts: 16706
Loc: Raleigh, NC US
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Is there some subtle logic I am missing here? They couldn't care less, I'm sure, if the end user gets to hear it for free as long as they get paid, and they get paid for radio broadcasts.
So, yes. You're looking at it from the wrong end.
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Bitt Faulk
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