Submitted by r0dr0ddy

With all the talk about the RIAA suing little kids, price fixing CDs, manipulating the legal system to deny citizens' constitutional rights, etc, I think it's time we took a look at the victories we've had in the past few months.

Victory #1) Our letters to our congressmen have been answered with hearings about p2p and the DMCA subpoena division. In fact, transcripts reveal that many of the panel congressmen were critical of the RIAA and even put Cary-Sue under considerable pressure. His replies to tough questions were soft at best.
Victory #2) Universal, the largest of the 5 "big labels" in the US, has announced a plan to slash CD prices by 30%, and even challenged others of the big 5 to follow suit. Why? The labels finally got the message that "piracy" isn't the main cause for sales declines... it's overpriced, under-quality product.
Victory #3) The media has been VERY critical of the RIAA lawsuits, esp. the whole 12 year old girl incident. The more "black sheep" victims that come forward, the more sympathy the media has, and the worse the RIAA looks. All our talk about the media being owned by RIAA affiliates may have been premature.
Victory #4) Although p2p use is down (a part of our boycott!), CD sales are down even further since the start of the "sue-em-all" campaign (another part of our boycott!). Of course, the decline prompted Universal (et. al. hopefully) to drop sales prices.
Victory #5) More and more "legal" music downloading sites are springing up, and it won't be too long before a "compulsory license" version of p2p becomes available... meaning that we will have the option someday of having access to the current p2p library, and ensuring that the artists do get paid. No announcements yet, and this may still be a pipe dream, but like how VCRs became commonplace in American homes, so will legal versions of p2p software apps.
Victory #6) Public opinion is swaying greatly against the RIAA as public education increases, many thanks to this very website.

It's important to realize that we're facing an uphill battle, but we have several key victories to draw strength (and firepower) from.

Changes are happening - changes for the better - and we must not lose sight of the success of this campaign.

5508...hear the death rattle of the RIAA.

godd one r0dr0ddy. we have to keep up the fight at all cost to bring the riaa down. every little bit counts. united we stand.

For an industry crying because they are not making the profit that they once did, maybe purchasing the ears of politicans wasn't such a good deal. Especially if they wind up not being in office the next time around.

Ever notice that the RIAA is sueing for the profits they "feel" they should have made for the last three years? The p2p group has made a handy whipping boy but when looked at closely it is holding less and less water.

Thing is, it isn't the p2p group for the largest part that are saying this. It is coming from the public sectors. As opinion slumps lower and lower for the poor CEO's and managing positions of the major labels. RIAA is tap dancing as fast as it can to try and put a happy smile on the goofs it is making and continues to make.

Well, they lost my money and no amount of lowering the price is going to make me feel better about it. However a major change in the business model might. The very thing they are fighting tooth and nail to prevent.

All I can tell Cary is go look in the mirror and see a fool...

Good article. It's nice to have what we have been working on put into a simple little list like that. We have been making an impact, perhaps not as much of one as we feel we need to though. That time will come and we will win this war. I am honored to be here with you all in this, and I learn more from each one of you every time I visit this site (almost hourly). Keep up the good work.

Im posting flyers on all the kiosks I can find in the trendy/music happenings in NYC and friends doing it in Chicago.

Im educating indie musicians I meet on their shows an alternative to their career by staying indie, and how awful the major label treatments of artists are.

Periodically faxing and emailing local radio stations how their top 40 radio is boring the shit out of me even tho I really dont listen to radio LOL

Im advising people everywhere to do the same. Strength in numbers people!

Support your indies by checking out music venues for unknown acts and if u like them..youre likely to get a FREE promo CD or EP...if not..their CD's are like $5- $11.

Go to http://www.cdbaby.com http://www.cdstreet.com http://www.amazon.com (indie section)


"Keep your eye on the prize" - Quote from the Civil Rights Movement

I don't know if I would call these victories. A victory implies that we have won the fight and we can sit back and relax because we've won. I see these more as a step in the right direction. The first steps on a long road.

GoofyCACA

Id say battle victories..we havent won the war yet and we have a looong way to go.

The most major victory for us was when the California judge ruled that P2P technology was not unlawful (under similar precedent back to VHS/Beta rulings) and he blasted the RIAA for being slow on technological and business trends.

When the RIAA and major labels are reduced to nothing more than mere agencies is when I consider victory

Indeed, this list is a small one of battles we have won- in other words, goals that we have achieved (eg. senate hearings). The war is a long way from being over, as indieWarriors says... but we can look back and say, "Yeah, I played a part in shaping up 'Big Music', if it wasn't for us, things would be much worse..."

The small victories we've gained are in no way an excuse to slack off now- quite the contrary. Since we know we DO have some voice in the matters, we should be ramping up our boycott!

And indieWarriors, that court victory completely slipped my mind. We should add that one to the list, for certain.

""More and more "legal" music downloading sites are springing up, and it won't be too long before a "compulsory license" version of p2p becomes available""

I won't use it. That's the reason I'm not running an Internet radio station. I can't deal with the darn licensing rules.

I'm a former disc jockey. I used to get my records for free because I was considered a promotional tool. Why the heck should I have to pay any artist or record company for promoting their products at my expence?

I feel the same way on free p2p. What I am sharing I am promoting. I am doing a job for free that the record companies would otherwise have to pay somebody to do. So now I have to pay the people I'm working for? Not doing it. No way, no how.

I will accept nothing less than free, unrestricted non-profit p2p, with every record company and government nose well out of it. Else these fool artists, politicians and record people can just forget about ever making another dime off me again.

Otaku

I agree.

Also MP3's are inferior cassette qualities which I have no interest in paying for. If I REALLY like their songs..Ill buy the CD from them.

Back in the 70's - 80's, we would make mix cassette tapes of copies of albums because we didnt like all the songs on the album. Were they quality rip offs? Hardly! And we didnt get our asses subpoenaed either

Great post, and more power ot us

mp3 is not inferior by any standard, 320kbps mp3 is exact same quality as cd audio, 196kbps mp3 is undeterminable from cd audio and in my opinion 128kbps is fine also, there is no noticable drop in quality untill below 128kbps, although others argue its from 196->128 but either way, its very slight and cd audio is just not a good format. its just very wasteful an excuse to pack a cd with 15 songs when a mp3 cd can hold 100-200 easily.

ummmm, in relation to point 5, my p2p software (and everyone elses) is in fact legal.

BTW I dont know what time it is over there but the sigs are up to 7202

About the quality of MP3’s and pay sites.

Hi-Fi is easily deceptive that way. And much of today's music is not good for judging high fidelity.

Malice Mizer is a highly dynamic symphonic rock group. When I downloaded their MP3's I though they were fantastic. But later when I bought the CD I could hear instruments I had not even known were there on the MP3's.

MP3's are adequate for certain kinds of music, but on music for which an audiophile would demand perfection they don't measure up.

MP3's are commonly listened to on computers and portable MP3 players, so the loss of quality isn't often noticed. But pump them through a really powerful hi-fi system and their defects become apparent.

In the end an MP3 is no better than something you taped off the radio. Only we use CD's today instead of tape. It's nothing like the professional product with perfect sound and nice displayable packaging that you would buy in a store.

Further, when you buy an MP3 from a pay site, you are literally paying for air. You don’t get to own anything you can put on a shelf and keep forever. Nor can you eventually re-sell it or give it away. You can’t transfer it to any other player. And on some sites, believe it or not, you will only be allowed to listen to them 12 times or less. And if you happen to miss one time because your Real Player was running and you had to leave the room, what’s Mr. Roboto gonna say on the other side of your screen? “Too bad, Kilroy. Deposit 99 cents for the next 12 plays. Please confirm and conform.”

there's no limit to keep fighting we got to keep bashing these guys hard and give them a slap to the face.

indieWarriors

Like what you are doing with the flyers in NYC and Chicago.

Do you have a copy you could send via email? I live in Olympia, WA where we have lots of indie venues. Not that they necessarily need education, but its still good to post around town.

arlanwalsh@yahoo.com if you would.

Thanks

As I said in posts on other threads, the RIAA told TechTV, that they intend to fire off another big bunch of lawsuits in a few weeks, and long term, the plan to file suits every few months until they "cover every jurisdiction" with lawsuits. At the rate they are going, suing grandpas, 12 year olds, unemployed single moms, guys who weren't even in the country when the alleged offense occured, it seems that the story of each new defendant is in some ways, sadder than the last. They are on a roll of suing very sympathetic defendants. From what I've seen, they are playing Russian roulette with the court system, and its only a matter of time until a senator's kid gets sued, a Mafia don, or some other person with power. Even their slapshot way of firing off subpoenas may be their own downfall.
Check out this linke from GILBD...
http://www.openp2p.com/pub/a/p2p/2003/09/11/riaa_supoenas.html
"A recent decision by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals finds that a party using "patently unlawful" subpoenas to obtain access to another party's stored electronic communications could be liable for violations of electronic privacy and computer fraud statutes. This could have serious implications for the RIAA's mass subpoena campaign in that, if such subpoenas were also determined to be "patently unlawful," for whatever reason, the organization could be held liable under electronic privacy and computer fraud statutes for accessing user data under false pretenses.."

In the end, the RIAA might end up looking less like Darth Vader, and more like The Gang Who Couldn't Shoot Straight.

""Like what you are doing with the flyers in NYC and Chicago""

If anyone has flyers, please scan them and post them at my Yahoo site so everyone who needs them can have easy access to them.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Anti_RIAA_Cental/

Hello all!

This is my first (and probably not my last) time posting here.

RIAA is mad because people are tired of buying mass-marketed mediocre albums. I hate to point to comedic movies as an example, but look at "Josie & The Pussycats". It pokes fun at mass marketing with all the blatant product and logo placements, but I think it really burst the advertising bubble and people have gone back to buying something because they like it, not because they are told to by Hollywood and Madison Avenue.

Makers of saddles and buggy-whips did everything they could to prevent the advent of the automobile...

I'm in strong support of a legal way to P2P. However, I will not participate until I know that the corporations are not getting "ANY" of my money and all of it, save that of a resonable fee to the maintainers of the P2P service, get my money. I absolutely refuse to line the pockets of the big 5 in any way. They have had their chance and they are out. Profits from music belong to the artist, PERIOD. Especially considering the majority of the resource costs for P2P are placed on the part of the users. The cost of maintaining the P2P services will no wheres near approach the money that could be made on a $5 / month fee. However, the artist deserve that money. I say we give 4.92/month to the artists and .08 to the service provider. It's not like they pay for the bandwidth that allows P2P to work. In fact many services have nothing to do with the owner of the P2P service except the creation and maintence of the software. Lets not allow the P2P owners to become the next big 5. We should petition the government to make rules about where profits need to go.

In olden times musicians performed in the streets. People gathered around, and if they liked what they heard they threw money.

I belong to a cosplay site where cosplayers post pictures of themselves in their costumes. Whenever you look at the efforts of a certain cosplayer there is a little window on the side of the screen that says "Tip the cosplayer here." You can then type in an amount of your own choosing and electronically throw money them.

Every musician should maintain a PayPal or other online payment account whereby when people are pleased with what they hear they can throw money right there on the spot. Maybe they could even send a note with it. "I liked this particular song best. Please do more songs like this one."

After well over a century of the current system, which has made people feel detached and distant from musicians, this idea may sound silly. But think about it a moment. Why should the relationship between musician and listener be so estranged? And why should people not want to pay freely for something that makes them feel good? People would much rather pay out of gratitude than be extorted from.

I must say that I am outraged at the tactics that the RIAA is using. We all know that it is a simple matter of greed. Thank God for this site that holds so much information for us to grasp. Yes this is an uphill battle but as we build our forces with each day, the road gets harder for RIAA. We must all stick together in this fight and not support those idiots that choose to pick on the little people buy keeping this boycott going until we win. No matter what happens i'm in this for the long haul and I hope that everyone that joins this fight stays too. I know that some people think the artists are suffering but I feel that the consumer suffers even more when he is paying $18.00 for a cd that has 2 good songs on it, while the artist goes to the studio to make his next cd driving a Bently. With all problems there is a solution. The RIAA is not the solution, they are the problem!

They will lose, and hopefully they will see that before everybody hates them as much as us.

very nice. Yes, we are striking gold with the RIAA's foolish and completely insane "sue 'em all" campaign.

DOWN with the RIAA!

:-:~ PhantomGhost ~:-:

I myself have officially boycotted purchasing any cd of any kind. I have come to a revelation that the RIAA , and record labels constantly, and effectively extort, swindle, if not out right steal the money well deserved that the artist should get. I have had enough of buying a cd which cost me $15-18 and like 2 songs 3 songs if im lucky are of any reasonable quality or original in style. It does come down to "profitability" and the"bottom-line". But what the RIAA forgets is that instituting strongarm "gestapo scare tactics" is unconstituional downright illegal in more than one form (hacking and attaining permission from ISP for "private enduser personal information")now I understand their view they are a business, but they have merly turned themself in our eyes as the music version of MICROSOFT, in which they try to control the dispersal of all and any music in any format, cd or digital. IN the end the RIAA will realize what they are doing is illegal, and in the end is going to destroy themselves, "greed and money is the root of all evil" WHen they realize what they are doing is futile they will start to communicate with certain groups on the feasability of compuslatory P2P services which offer a flat monthly fee to download music, in which the artist NOT the Record label gets the financial recogintion. ALso this form allows us as a consumer to select and more closely refine our choice on music, which in turns makes us more "educated" consomer. This will make our money go further. why? cause the quality will be on the high end, unlike 90+% of "HIT" cds which have 2 songs and the rest if filler. IN short, time will come to pass where the RIAA will learn the error of its ways, and finally realize that focusing its attention on the artist, and more importantly the "wants" of the consumer, after all we are the ones who write their paychecks!. DOWN WITH RIAA! CONTINUE THE FIGHT!HOOAH!NO GUTS NO GLORY!

also to note i used to work for a record label! so ive realized some really creepy, underhanded tactics far as contracts, agreements etc, to name a few which would take too long to go into. but needless to say this allows them to have the upper hand at all times.

You want to know why I think sales in CD's have decreased? Because I think parents are sick and tired of the crap they are selling to our kids. The majority of songs that ARE mainstream have bleeps in them. It seems the day they gave the music industry a sticky label all the quality music went out the door and was replaced with crappy music. I mean do I really want to purchase a song for my kids with lyrics in the song of "Get Low" or "Right Thurr" I am a music lover of all kinds of music, I worked in the music industry in my younger years.. I play guitar as does my son and daughter and I have turned them on to music...real music not this crap they have out today.

The RIAA is out of hand...This is a witch hunt... Is there any lawyers or politicians out there with some decency willing to help put a stop to this???

EE
"I was destined for greatness
but the tickets were sold in advance"
~Neal Peart~

Dear Friends,

Please enjoy my article "Links to Tens of Thousands of Legal Music Downloads" at:

http://www.goingware.com/tips/legal-downloads.html

Traffic to the article has increased significantly since the RIAA filed the lawsuits on the 8th. My article is the #1 search hit at Google for the query "legal music downloads", as well as a number of other queries having to do with music downloading.

If you agree with what I have to say, please copy the entire article to your own website under the terms of the Creative Commons license given at the end of the article. I'm also looking for foreign language translators.

Thank you for your attention.

Mike

The link I posted to my article above seems to have got screwed up. I'll try again:

http://www.goingware.com/tips/legal-downloads.html

Emrld-I keep trying to turn my kids on to great music too. My youngest son and daughter are open to it and like quite a lot. My oldest son who is 14 insists on listening to the rap crap and it boggles my mind daily how debased that stuff is. He listens to the radio and I ask him how do know what they are saying, every other word is bleeped out, sometimes whole passages are bleeped. It's getting ridiculous. I don't want to take away anyone's right to free speech, but these record corperations know the demographics and what they are doing even the rappers aren't intelligent enough to know.

even if the rappers, I meant.

What a minute here. P2P use is down, partly due to it being part of your own boycott?
Sorry, that makes no fucking sense to me.
It may be down due to FEAR, but boycotting? LMFAO ridiculous.