ASCAP declares war on Free Culture

[KrazyKatz]

Like I said... Go out and ask. Don't count on your own example being the approach of others.

One of the question I ask usually people is, what was the last CD or mp3 you bought. I'm no longer surprised to hear "never" anymore.

95% of downloaded music is illegal (unpaid for, in your terms). That's a statistic.

So yes. What is my argument indeed?
People don't value music like they used to. Certainly not like you and me.

Tell you what... I'll ask the first 100 people I see listening to music on Ipods how many of the songs they paid for. And the sincere truth is that, I hope that I'm proved wrong.

[uncloned]

95% of downloaded music is illegal (unpaid for, in your terms). That's a statistic.

What on earth....

Do you think the only music downloaded comes from the RIAA's clients?

Or are you making the same argument as the RIAA that when I (and you!!) offer music for free we are "damaging" copyright?

In the short time I've hosted the modplug downloads - the old files... 106 gigs have gone out the door.

96 gigs of *microtonal* music from my subdomain micro.soonlabel.com have gone out the door in a year

1.2 terabytes of my conventional music have gone out the door in a year

In the short time Not Only Music has been open 25 gigs have gone out the door.

And this is not counting the traffic generated by my friends personal sites whom I host.

And let me add this - I am by no means a very popular independent artist. I get hundreds of hits on sites like TheSixtyOne when other independent artists get thousands or tens of thousands of hits or hundreds of thousands.

So you know....

I think you are dead wrong.

You have bought into the Big Lie of the RIAA.

[KrazyKatz]

Do you think the only music downloaded comes from the RIAA's clients?

So are you saying that of those terrabytes of music, more than 5% supported you by paying for it?

Again you are using your own example as a case study. Go out and ask!
See the mentality people have instead of using your own as a comparison.
The point I'm making is this: Your concept that people are willing to support by paying for music they like is "dead wrong".

Or are you making the same argument as the RIAA that when I (and you!!) offer music for free we are "damaging" copyright?

RIAAs arguments don't interest me. Nonetheless I'll answer saying the artists copyright gives them the privilege to release it for free, or to charge for it.

You have bought into the Big Lie of the RIAA.

I'm trying to be productive here. You are being insulting now. Let's keep this thread fruitful.

[uncloned]

insulting?

let me see data to support your side.

I provided data for an obscure artist and it is not hard to extrapolate to other independent artists more popular than I.

you stated

95% of downloaded music is illegal (unpaid for, in your terms). That's a statistic.

produce the data (from an source other than the RIAA to avoid bias)

lets see a tally of all RIAA music versus traffic from all  independent artists.

[uncloned]

more evidence of the reality - people ARE willing to support good artists.


* In Rainbows has sold three million copies thus far, a figure that includes downloads from Radiohead.com, physical CDs, a deluxe 2-CD/vinyl box set, as well as sales via iTunes and other digital retailers.

* The In Rainbows deluxe edition sold 100,000 copies via Radiohead fan service W.A.S.T.E.

* Radiohead made more money prior to In Rainbows' January 2008 physical release than its total take on 2003's Hail To the Thief.
(editor's note - more money when it was "pay as you like if you like or you can even have it free")

* The physical release of In Rainbows entered both the US and UK charts at #1 in January, despite having been freely available since October 2007.

* In Rainbows was the first Radiohead album available on iTunes, where it went in at #1 in January, selling 30,000 in its first week.


http://www.brooklynvegan.com/archives/2008/10/radiohead_in_ra.html

[KrazyKatz]

Amazing how Radiohead are the #1 example of success, and all the failed sides are never presented.
RadioHead can release their music for free because they already have the fame and publicity as a direct result of the record companies prior sponsorship. There would be no chance they could achieve that result without that prior marketing.

As for the tally, traffic in downloads aren't going to tell you who paid for the music they love.

I would be glad to make a tally of people that pay vs people who don't.

[uncloned]

its amazing how you agree with me - people will support artists they like - and still embed it in pro-RIAA propaganda.

and - you have no data to back your position.

all you are doing is repeating what the RIAA has told you to believe.

Another fact you seem to overlook is that more artists make a living from performance than from selling mp3 / physical media. And now the RIAA wants a cut of the revenue from live performances. Thus the cancer grows ever deeper.

The article that I pointed to when I started this thread should scare you. The RIAA wants to prevent you from posting your work on the internet for free and want use a perverted interpretation of the copyright law to do so. That would mean no more CTGmusic - no modplug - no traxinspace - no last fm - no soundclick - no jamendo - not even a modest home page for you to share your work.

And yet - you defend these bozo's.

I am amazed.

[uncloned]

I make no distinction between the RIAA and ASCAP etc. there really isn't any in reality as this is a hydra conglomerate.

Let me tell you what really pissed me off.

I bought sheet music of two of Carl Ruggles' pieces. On the site where this sheet music (not a recording mind you!) there were NO notices on the restrictions attached to the use of the sheet music. However when I received what I paid for and opened to the first page there was a very large notice. And this notice said that not only couldn't I make copies of the sheet music (not unreasonable) it also said I couldn't perform the sheet music.  Well.... that struck me as... this is ludicrous - surely they mean something different like if I make lots of money or something. So.... I called them up. And the lady informed me that of course I can perform the music in my own home. So I asked - what if I recorded my performance? And she asked - what would you do with the performance - I said - I dunno - say put it up on youtube for free. She said I'd have to pay royalties and connected me to the "revenue" department of the firm.

Now... what the f*ck?

This composer is long dead - and this company is even worse than the composer who had a debate with the teen girl. I wonder... if the teen (and that composer) read the restrictions  on the sheet music they debated about they might have to pay royalties too.

And the sad thing is this. In this day and age it costs next to nothing to print sheet music. Must be a 100% or greater mark up. And yet they are so greedy as to want more and more.

[KrazyKatz]

Quite frankly I'm disgusted in your approach. I don't mind you attacking my arguments, but you have chosen to attack me.

You continue to be insulting to me and ignore my argument that is simply PEOPLE DO NOT PAY FOR MUSIC THEY LOVE. ASK THEM!

All you do to avoid that is post RIAA sentiments and claim that those are what I am saying.

Please read what I am saying and not what you want me to be saying.
It just sounds like you are annoyed and are lashing out.

[KrazyKatz]

Look were both getting upset by this. How's about cooling off, and coming back to it.

[uncloned]

You continue to be insulting to me and ignore my argument that is simply PEOPLE DO NOT PAY FOR MUSIC THEY LOVE. ASK THEM!
.

My own personal experience, and radiohead's experience, and my wife's experience, my son's experience, my older daughter's experience say yes. They pay for music - and *especially* they all pay for live shows.

My younger daughter is a bit of an exception since she largely listens to independent artists on youtube and being too young to make any large amount of money she tends to a few live shows a year.  Even so she has received quite a few physical Cds as a gift or bought them from gift money.

And if no one was paying for music how come iTunes, Cdbaby, amazon, etc. etc. are still in business?

You just seem to be unable to accept evidence to the contrary of your position and your argument doesn't hold up to any real scrutiny.

And I'm not insulting you. That's your perception not my intent. I suspect the only way I could avoid insulting you is by agreeing with you.

The facts are the RIAA / ASCAP / MPAA all are making lots of money still. Look at the lawyers they can afford to array to sue private citizens. The advertisements all over the web and TV and movies etc.

The real problem here is that the RIAA / ASCAP / MPAA all think they should be making MORE money.

And that is greed, plain and simple.

[g]

you stated

95% of downloaded music is illegal (unpaid for, in your terms). That's a statistic.

produce the data (from an source other than the RIAA to avoid bias)

lets see a tally of all RIAA music versus traffic from all  independent artists.

Itunes alone had somewhere around 2 billion downloads in 2008 (the year IFPI claims 95% of downloads are illegal), so I'm pretty sure traffic generated by songs made available freely by independent artists is pretty negligable. Piratebay alone had 25 million simultaneous connections in November 2008, so combined with other trackers and p2p-software I don't think the 40 billion songs IFPI claim were illegally downloaded is that unbelievable.

As for copyright, I'm all for it. But the market is flooded with music, so in a way it has lost a lot of value. Sure, I could support an artist I think is great, but honestly if he quit there would be 10 others waiting to take his place.

Btw, apparantly Prince has decided not to release his music online anymore... well good luck with that mr Prince!

[KrazyKatz]

One of my key interests when I go to someones place is looking through their bookshelf and their music shelf.

It's become a rarer experience to see discs after the 90s era. I also ask people I meet the last mp3 or disk they bought (more so to get to know them). My experience indicates that people still listen to music, however they invest very little if anything into it.

I even go to CD shops and get told that certain discs I'm looking for won't be imported due to limited demand.

True CD shops still exist, and Itune and there are people that pay. However I believe that people largely don't appreciate music as much as previous generations did. Live shows are still ever popular, but you can't copy those digitally. Yet...

I'm going to investigate more into it as I said earlier, but so far my experience has proved unfortunate.

[uncloned]

Itunes alone had somewhere around 2 billion downloads in 2008 (the year IFPI claims 95% of downloads are illegal), so I'm pretty sure traffic generated by songs made available freely by independent artists is pretty negligable.

Then why are they trying to block (truly) free (and independent) music /art / software ? Why are they saying EFF is eroding their "profits" oops - I mean "rights"

i.e. the article that starts this thread?

[Paul Legovitch]

The fact that ASCAP wants money from its member to fight against free music is just amazing, very mafia-esque.
The french equivalent of ASCAP is called SACEM and it's a known fact that it collects a lot of money and very few of it is send back to the authors. A recent governmental report has been released, exposing this association and other as a very corrupted system (2nd biggest annual salary is around 300000€, 1st one is said to be +143% of the former).

http://translate.google.fr/translate?hl=fr&ie=UTF-8&sl=fr&tl=en&u=http://www.lepoint.fr/actualites-medias/2010-04-10/revenus-comment-la-sacem-se-goinfre/1253/0/442942&prev=_t