RIAA embarks on new round of piracy suits

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RIAA has misread alot of consumers minds I think: First let me preface this by saying that I "Do Not" download music from kazaa or anything like that. I have use the new pay .99 cent services some but I have problems with those as well that I will get into later.

For me as a consumer that doesn't trade music anyway I don't care if there were trading available or not it wouldn't change my mind I DONT buy CD's it is a total rip-off to the consumer. How often do you buy a CD for every single song that is on it. If you are like me you would be buying it for one or two songs and I am sorry but 12 to 18 bucks for a CD when I only really want one or two songs off of it is a rip-off. CD's cost pennies especially when you buy in large bulk which I am sure the music industry has to do. The fact that the RIAA says the music industry is losing money maybe so but in the grand scheme of things very little. CD's sales would decline regardless of internet trade anyway. It is an inefficient way to distribute music anymore. Its time for something new. Technology has advanced and the Music industry got caught with it's pants down and its head buried in the sand and doesn't want to admit it. So the lash out at the consumers. Doesn't seem like good business to me. Instead of wasting all the time money and energy trying to squash the few (and in the grand scheme of things it really is not that man) people that trade music "illegally"; Why not put that effort into coming with a "legal" hassle-free (and I stress that last part) alternative. No they would rather sink time and efforts into trying to bail water out of the Titanic after it has already sunk 100feet under the ocean. Of course someone in the RIAA will read this and focus on the legality of the issue. Here is a hint I am with you on the legal issue as I said I don't use file swappers. You are missing the point. The reason file swapping has come about is because alot of consumers were sick and tired or getting ripped. They wanted an alternative you refused to provide it so they made their own. In an of that I don't fault them.

Your first mistake was taking this to the general public by publicly attacking Napster. You cause a number of bad things to happen there. One you made people that would have never known about trading music aware of its existance and therefore caused the explosion of music trading. Two you were so focused on crushing Napster that many many P2P clients based on the Napster code popped up so that buy the time you kill one head and looked up you were dealing with a many many headed Hydra. Let me just give you a hint I have seen this time and time again you are not going to kill this completely and the harder you fight it "openly" the faster it will grow kinda like Kudzu. To kill this you would have to kill the internet and technology and frankly I don't see that happening.

Now on to my last issue with this whole business. I tried out iTunes and Bestbuy's music download site because for once I saw something that might be a possible alternative. I was wrong or at least it is not near where it needs to be. Here are my problems with these sites.

1. You don't have almost every piece of music on the planet to choose from. This is something that the "illegal" options have you beat on. For the most part you can find just about anything you are looking for on P2P networks. Not so with these paid for services.

2. Encrypted downloads. If I buy a song by god I should be able to print it out on paper and wipe my behind with it if I wish. I paid for it! Stop limiting what I can do with it for personal use. Again I don't think it would be right to buy the song and then give a copy of it to 15 of your friends. Might some people that buy the song do that maybe. I am sorry but thats just the risk you will have to take. figure out how to tag the song so you can track where the copy came from don't limit the law abiding consumers that try and buy your product by making the jump through hoops just to get the songs they want in the format they want that will play in the players (hardware and software) of their choice.

3. This one isn't a complaint but I wanted to compliment them on one thing the price I think that around a buck a song is a fair price to pay. I hope it stays that way.

You see not all of us computer users are out there trying to dream up ways to steal your money. However you aren't gaining any sympathy from alot of consumers when you continue on the path you are on with blinders on.; Posted by: Icingdeath Posted on: 01/21/04 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use