I really need your help folks, it costs a fair amount of money to run the site. Between return phone calls to the media, postage, countless hours spent online and on the phone speaking with members of congress and their staffs, subscriptions to pay sites for obtaining data, surveys, upgrading software, etc.. it adds up.

Now with the added intensity since the RIAA started going after individuals it has increased our need even more.




I have been at this since July 11th 2000, the day that Lars whined in front of congress "Napster ripped me off".

I realized that day I could probably never use a file sharing program again with the relative safety that I had before, as the day the site was launched I became an RIAA target. (or at least a thorn in their side anyway). The next day I received an email frm the RIAA "wanting to talk." They actually wanted me to visit them in their offices. I declined, I wanted to have doumentation and suggested we "talk" by e-mail, they declined and suggested we talk by phone, which I did finally do after 3 days of not sleeping (and trying to keep a full time job).

They tried to spin me, and I wasn't buying. I've fought with them in forums and on email lists, and helped to bring to the attention of as many as possible the tactics and methods they use, I make sure our legislators know the load of crap they are being handed by the "Sky is falling lobby" Rather than give them made up numbers we document the facts that are available. I forward them selected e-mails that you send. I send them links to articles they need to be aware of. I've traveled to meet with them, several times having to spend the night, we've attended events such as the Future of Music Conference two years in a row, SXSW, just to make sure that our points were heard and made.

Our sales of merchandise are up with the RIAA's recent actions, but we need more. Many ask why not have a form and predesigned letters we can email or fax directly to our represntatives. We would love to. But to obtain that service it would cost us approx $18,000 per year. Another suggestion we hear constantly is "You need to take out a full page newspaper ad in the New York Times or The Washington Post. We would love to. New York Times would cost somewhere around $45,000 to $80,000 for a full page ad. Washington Post (which is delivered to every congressional office and the other movers and shakers in the DC area would cost about $10,500. WE NEED YOUR HELP. Not comfortable with Paypal? No problem. We also accept donations via snail mail, too. Send them to Boycott-RIAA, 101 Greenwood AV. Suite 230, Jenkintown, PA. 19046. Don't have money? We'll accept anything we can sell on EBay.

Did you realize that if every person using file sharing programs sent us the cost of a CD we could actually out gun the RIAA in publicity? We could have full page ads in all the major markets. Run TV spots. Radio spots. We can win this war, but you have to step up and help. Some of you have and we thank you. But the few of us can not do it alone.

2003 promises to be a huge year with the bills that are currently in congress and are due to be introduced this year. Currently I'm probably the lowest paid lobbyist (yeah I hate the word too but many have called me that)in the country. Please Help. This is a grassroots movement. You reap what you sow. Lets get busy.

Bill Evans
boycott-riaa founder

Buy One of Our Products

I would be interested in a bumper sticker that has "www.boycott-riaa.com" on it.
Didn't find it on your shopping list.
Thanks

I'll get one made up!

Thanks

Do u have a number where u can be reached?
Thanks

I still think the idea of boycott-white.com would be useful..
gah, yes im still angry about that!
I, and many, loved this site when it was black, just like the greedy RIAA site.

Ok Spikester I hear ya...but we've had a bunch of people tell us how happy they were to be able to print the pages without jumping through hoops as they had to before (like they had to on the RIAA website.

Bumper stickert is done...

deal 'tack. I know I'm not the only one that says/will say this.. but I've been planning on buying some stuff for a while.. ya know how it goes tho, if ya don't do it right THEn..well.. it don't get done. great job on the secret police logo! Is there a way to get that on a sticker so I can put it on my cycle helmet? don't sweat doin it if it's not feasible, I think I've asked before anyhow.
Great site. I've been here for about a year, and I've had ZERO complaints. I know that ain't $$, but it's where I'm at. You realy do keep current and up on what's what.. and it would be a shame to see it go away.
ttb-riaa!

I'm flat out broke as it is but I'll take some of the workload that doesn't require going places if it helps.

Remye you know youll have to trim it, right?

Can i get your phone number, thumbtack, you have my email when i registered on the site.
THanks

Bill,

Just sent a few bucks in your direction. Keep up the good fight. I'm wearing my Boycott-RIAA t-shirt with pride!

Just a thought - for the people outside the US, "boycott RIAA" doesn't mean very much since nobody knows what the RIAA is. Any chance of making some slogans slightly more generic? The "Fair Use" sticker is a good example - as long as it promotes MP3, most people will know what you're trying to say.

i have a better idea:
if you are on some university campus, or any other densely populated area, just get together with a few friends, print several hundred anti-RIAA etc flyers, and post them all over the place.
No need to let the authorities know who you are, of course, it can be done at night.

I want to see how many aggressive anti-RIAA or anti-copyright flyers it takes to get on the evening news.

On it's way Jeff

no sweat 'tack. I just want people to think something else when I'm riding my bike in the snow. Right now, I know what they're thinking.."That idiot..etc"..heh.. just gives em something else to concentrate on.
ttb-riaa

lets see if it takes my card. fingers crossed, like Remye, i've been sorely tempted to buy something.... well, the only thing stopping me is the card, and if that dont work, mail me constantly until i send a check

I'll try to convince my wardens to let me buy something, hopefully they'll see this as a "good cause." I'll be doing all I can.

well, f*** me sideways, my card was accepted..... i think

"if if dont play, i wont pay"

thanx Bill, sorry i didnt buy sooner dude

Thanks to everyone who is pitching in...every little bit helps.

if i had money i'd give it to you but you have my full support.

WOW, I never realized there were so many broke people out there with computers and an internet connection. Perhaps Lee Felsensteins "Computer Utopia" has finaly been realized. Some how I doubt it.

place some $ your way, keep the truth out in the open, sir.

i've been lurking here for a long time, and felt obligated. $50 for now is what i can afford.

And Very Much appreciated! thank you k4dwi

I would consider buying something, but it only takes $. I only have £.

That bear would look quite good on top of my shelves .

paid mine in $ and I only had £££. pfffft

would webspace help?? you can email me @ jebadiah@mailandnews.com

CornBr24d, thanks for the offer that is the one thing I do have DMusic gives us serverspace and use of their db system for news, etc. That used to be a major problem and dmusic has helped out tremendously with that.

I tried to buy a cap. The site simply expects too much. You have to register befor you can even checkout. On top of that my browser states that the 'secure page' is unicode encrypted. Im not here to criticize just throwing some light on why you may be experiencing problems. Tell you what, you put the cap on Ebay, and Ill buy it.

A lot of us here in the third world may not be able to afford sending out $$$ in your direction but you have our support. (I've been trying to preach the gospel truth about copyrights in this region of the planet and telling a lot of people what they're missing.)

Thanks for your efforts and do keep us posted.

I just bought a couple of Anti-RIAA bumper stickers. I'm going to cut them up into 3 separate stickers. One for each car, one for my snowboarding helmet, one for the lamp post on the corner right under the Wi-Fi Freespot sticker. The rest I will give away. One suggestion: If there was an option to donate $$ with the order, I would have done it. (The bank charges me $1 per transaction, and I always go over the 6 free ones) I'll go ahead and send a donation anyway, but it would make it easier for others. I had no idea you did all this stuff in addition to the website. Thank you for standing up for us. (For all the people complaning about only having Euros, your credit card/bank card will do the conversion. You can donate whatever you want, and it will get converted at the daily exchange rate automatically. )

97,000 visitors and only 5 t-shirt sales huh? Really not all too surprising considering the the majority of persons who frequent this site are all about getting whatever they can for free.

They somehow have this crazy notion that other people's hard work should be available to the public for free. I think that very few of the members and visitors to this site have any honourable intentions.

Sure the RIAA is evil and selfish, but so are freeloaders. Sorry for the rant. I DO NOT support the RIAA, but neither do I support freeloaders who pretend to be advocates of the greater good.

DrSp, just as a quick note, you should see the email we get from musicians who are just as frustrated with the "traditonal recording industry" as I am. To the indie musician out here obscurity is more of a threat than giving away some free tunes. I hear that over and over again.

I truly beleive that musicians should get paid for their work, but I also beleive that filesharing services should also be able to obtain licneses to distribute music from the majors, if they desire.

On your first paragraph I would like to inform you that the t-shirt sales have skyrocketed since I put this plea up, as have donations. Its a good beginning, but to be able to have the consumers voice heard in this as well as independent musicians, we need more.

Before you start making generalizations perhaps you should do some research. Here is a suggestion. Fire up a filesharing program (i'm not saying share or download anything) then do a search for music your parents liked. (ask them, if you are under 30, ask your grandparents) Most likely you will find it. Then do a search on Amazon, or any other service (or even ask your local shiny plastic disc vendor) if ts available to purchase or order. Unless it was a huge hit that continues to sell
multiple thousands per year, it most likely isn't. No one is getting paid, not the songwriter, not the label and sure as hell not the artist. Try to buy a single of the one song. YOU CAN'T. The labels (RIAA membership) have been lowering numbers of singles for years, long before Napster, or any other file sharing program. Filesharing shows there is the market there, and the labels foolishly ignored the possibilies for inexpensive distribution. (no inventory needed, no shipping, no packaging, no graphic work, hell it's even stored on the consumers hard drives. Why? because the artists get paid 50% of the royalties on online distribution, whereas they get approx 10% of the royalties if the label sells a shiny plastic disc and the artist pays all of the costs out of their share, before they ever see a penny.

One of the proposals that I have lobbyed hard for, is for copyrights to revert back to the artist, if the labels lock it up for more than a year, not making it available for purchase.

This is not a black and white issue as I soon discovered, but has a multitude of shades of gray. Copyright needs reform, and all of the parties need to set down and realize the world has changed. "This is the way we have always done it and thats the only way we'll take it" must change. I want the celestial jukebox, I want the artists paid, but until the labels open up the safe to those locked away recordings,it will never happen.

As for me I have yet to see a compelling subscription service, that offers me the same variety of music as any filesharing program. When they start offering the millions of songs that have been recorded not just a 100,000 or 250,000 then they have a product that I will be interested in.


Last year I bought 53 cd's ALL from Independents. Not one red cent went to the major labels. Before I started boycott I bought about 1 cd every two weeks. So I have increased my $ spent on music, but not on major label stuff. They drove me away.

The original motto I used was: "Get educated... Don't take our word for it. Research. Learn. Don't be Manipulated." Perhaps its time to bring it back

A link to an article on the music cd settlement from my alma mater. Thought you'll might like to check it out http://www.thepinelog.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2003/02/26/3e5d6afb1b229

As a first time visitor, I have a few thoughts on the web page...Information about an actual boycott is hard to find - the links are all the way at the bottom of the front page, and the information on those pages is fairly sparse. It seems to me the best thing visitors can do here aside from supporting this site is to actually participate in the boycott to hit the RIAA where it hurts (specifically, in the wallet). I know that's why I sought this site out - after today's news about the RIAA's lawsuits against four college students, I was ready to officially participate in some sort of a boycott (as opposed to my unofficial practice of just not buying new CDs). I understand that the site is laid out to parody riaa.com, but I don't think that's the most effective way to make pertinent information available to people who are ready to show the RIAA just how they feel.

Anyway, this is a great site and a great effort. I'll be donating and spreading the word as much as I can. I just feel that emphasizing the actual _boycott_ front and center on the main page would be a good idea - if you have 97,000 visitors and they just read the news and facts on this site, the RIAA sees nothing. But if those 97,000 visitors stop giving money to the RIAA...well, that's hard for them to ignore.

I just added a link to this page to totalfark.com - if it's selected, it will be on the front page of fark.com, and if that happens, well...
you'll see how many people visit the site and toss you guys a few bucks.
Keep up the great work, and f**k the RIAA!

Thank You for all your work, I am a first time visitor. I just wanted to comment on the comment left by ThumbTack on Feb 27. My understanding (at least in the rest of the copyright world) is that the person or persons that actually create the work are the copyright owners of the said work. This is unless of course the rights are sold on the copyright.

Am I mistaken? I sure have a hard time giving my hard earned cash to someone who has in my eyes stolen the work from the artist in the first place.

I might be mistaken, and like your slogan says, "Get educated... Don't take our word for it. Research. Learn. Don't be Manipulated." Maybe I just need "Get more educated" which if fine.

One last point, if the RIAA and its artists would create more than one song on an album that was worth buying or listening to I would be alot more enclined to purchase the album. Infact on the rare occasion that there is an entire album that I find that I do like I will go buy it.

That is my rant for now thanks. Keep up the great work.

All I gotta say is fuck all them bitch ass rich mutha fuckin artists who complain that they're gettin ripped off. THATS BULLSHIT!!!! FUCK THEM Bitches. They're the rich ones. And I was downloading on Kazaa today and get this message from the RIAA...But I continued to do it because I won't be intimidated by them bitch ass muther fuckers!!!!!!!!!!!! FUCK THE RIAA!!!!!

Let's everybody go to the RIAA's site and write them five e-mails a piece and flood their server. LMAO

Any possibility of getting buttons? I know a lot of people that might stick them on their backpacks at school...

How about a downloadable .jpg flyer of some sort? So that everyone could download and distribute as to raise awareness in their area?

I've already got a great t-shirt from you all, and just ordered 100 stickers. Keep up the good fight! I also linked to you from my blog.

(http://merenda.livejournal.com)

Thanks for all your hard work!
-Frank Merenda

the above link got hosed when it posted.

http://merenda.livejournal.com

-Frank

one more time.
Line breaks apparently show up..

http://merenda.livejournal.com

Hi

Just order a bunch of sticker to put on packages when I send CDs (original of course) to customer or traders, I hope it will help to spread the word ! Next time I will buy a t-shirt and more stickers ! For now all my money disappeared into music. I usually buy for about 200 $ per month in CD or Vinyl but never from majors which are thieves and have no taste at all. I don't really like p2p programs because I think you can find on the web all the music you want to discover artists, on their website or on labels site, some of them even diffuse a complete album each day on the web (For exemple http://www.malignantrecords.com). But p2p aren't the cause of majors troubles of course, RIAA doesn't understand anything, that's why they will soon "die"

P.S: Sorry for my bad english but I'm a French living in Canada... But I learn !

although I understand why the RIAA is doing what they are doing, I think that they are wrong in a way too. The Constitution guarantees freedom of trade and says nothing about copyright material. But the other problem is that when they decide to stop producing a CD or song, if you don't have it, you are SOL, and so I feel if they want to make such a big issue about this, they should make the music available so people can buy it. The RIAA has a monopoly on the music industry and although monopolies are not illegal, they are unfair. They are just feeling threatened because of competition. That's what I think the real battle is.

Well, I haven't paid for a CD in years, but I'm going to send some donation-dough your way. You support what I really believe in - acknowledging the artists without padding the expense accounts of pompus corporate music executives who couldn't play with themselves, let alone a musical instrument.

That RIAA Secret Police shirt would own if you had it in black, but soon I'll be buying the one you have available now. Then a black one if you get it (Along with the sticker! heh)

What can people who dont have any money to send you do to help?

Hear Hear! I'm with mays41. No cash to send. Lots of free time. Willing to help. Need direction.

ReadyRockG --- monopolies, as well as trusts, ARE ILLEGAL. Without debate. The debate comes to what, exactly, is a monopoly?

Is there any way for us to subscribe to the site as well through snail mail. I plan on sending you a check but need to know if I should put a small note telling you it is for me to subscribe or what?