P2P TORRENTS AND THE EVIL THEY DO

[The Fiddler]

What in your experience would lead to that hypothesis?

If your local gas station starts selling more types of fuel (E85, biodiesel, etc.), does that mean you're going to buy more of it? No, of course not.

OMG.

No, of course you're not going to buy more gas because more types of gas are being offered. The station owner is going to sell more gas to more people who don't fuel their vehicles with the same fuel that you do.

As long as the station down the street isn't giving their gas away for free, doesn't the station owner benefit by offering more choices for a diverse group of consumers purchase?

Doesn't the increased revenue provide the station owner with the option to expand their business and then offer even a larger variety of products that people are interested in (like pizza, coffee, etc.,)? (analogy to a record store carrying not just country music, but rather country+pop+metal+classical+blues+jazz. Which will sell more CDs?). Does Trek Bicycle stand to make more by offering only high-end racing cycles, or do they stand to make more by widening their product line by offering mountain bikes+hybrids+kiddie bikes+velo bikes+bike accessories?

Likewise, do investors reduce risk and enhance gain by diversifying their purchases, or are they better off to put all their money in one stock? Of course, all that logic and the classic model of supply and demand economics gets thrown out the window the day DOW-indexed companies decide to randomly give away their quarterly profits to annonymous people other than the stockholders who invested in the company (analogy to the pirates illegally providing someone else's music to annonymouns individuals for free).

That is my logic and that is my experience as the owner of a small business, and it is that of other business owners as well.

 

[sccaldwell]

Oh sure. It can't have anything to do with Lion Music having a bunch of non marketable bands/projects can it?

Sure they haev a couple good bands/arists (such as John Macaluso & Michael Harris). But a lot of blah stuff comes out of their label.

Do you realize how absurd your argument is? "Their music isn't very good, and that's why so many people download it illegally instead of buying it." If it no one wanted it, then no one would be buying OR downloading it.

And, with fuel prices increasing, foreclosures increasing, DVD sales increasing, video game sales increasing... maybe people are just spending their money elsewhere.

Yes, they're spending their money on the things that are harder to steal, and then stealing the music rather than buying it. Another option would be to choose where to spend whatever money you have, and if that means you can't buy the latest music, that's life. If that means you have to work harder or get a second job to be able to buy the music you want, then that's life.

And before you come back with "Oh, I'm too busy to get a second job" or "I don't want to get a second job," remember this: Many of those artists (whose music is being stolen) ARE THEMSELVES WORKING A SECOND JOB IN ADDITION TO PUTTING OUT THE MUSIC THAT IS BEING STOLEN FROM THEM.

Think about that for a second before you fire off a response.

Craig

 

[eaeolian]

Sure, some bands may be doing better. Good for them. But does that mean they're "getting by" without a day job? If people weren't stealing their music, maybe the band members could actually afford their own home and a nice car, too. I bet a lot of the illegal downloaders have their own home and a nice car.

Uh, there's just one problem - a download is not a loss of a guaranteed sale. That's the RIAA's thinking, but it's flawed.

 

[The Fiddler]

Thank you for finding one fair priced CD of a band I dont like out of millions. You sir win the debate!

And I even forgot to mention all the Whitesnake "Best Of" compliations and remasters for $11.99.

 

[woosta]

Brilliant, Fiddler. You summarized the matter perfectly. And, in print -- in the cold, hard cast of black and white type -- the argument for downloading looks damn silly, even insane.

You echoed sentiments I expressed earlier; namely, that it's not possible to stand in front of Lance King -- or, better yet, Lance and his family -- and say to them all, face to face, "Uh, dude. I didn't think your music was worth paying for, so I downloaded it. But, hey, I think you charge too much, anyway. So it was okay."

What truly amazes me about this thread is that there are people who don't see the difference between iTunes and illegal downloads, or the difference between abiding by laws (whether you agree with them or not) and taking laws into one's own hands. The twists of logic, and denials of reality are astounding. I mean, truly astounding. I didn't know rational people were capable of such flights of fancy.

I don't understand how people -- in the face of overwhelming evidence -- continue to say illegal downloads don't hurt anyone. Right here on this board we have record label owners. We have bands. I, personally, have spoken to many band members and independents over the years. They all, to a person, to an industry, have said that illegal downloads have taken money from their pockets and that they have been hurt financially because of it. Now, what about that do you not understand? That's not conjecture. That's not pulling "facts" or "logic" out of my hind end. That is reality. Just like the law is reality. It is the law. You rationalize breaking one, you can rationalize breaking all. Just because you don't agree with the facts (because you're like an addict on crack who denies he/she has a problem) doesn't mean they don't exist. You merely choose to ignore them.

I think there should be a forum at PPUSA IX for this topic. I agree Fiddler. I would love to see all of these people stand in front of band members, label owners, and -- hey, just for laughs -- members of the FBI. Argue your case for illegal downloads. Be as creative with your excuses as possible. See where it gets you.

I'll argue that motherfucking point and I don't care who is there. Not that it doesn't hurt the industry but it's only one of numerous causes hurting the industry including sub-par recordings. I'm not an ass kisser unless an ass needs kissing and if you're going to charge me $19.99 for a cd, then that fucker better sound like a raging orgasm to my ear. That's 1/5 of a fucking hundred dollars for a cd. 1/5! And I've got a great number of cds, some of which are just shit that I paid for but I kept all the same and if it's a ProgPower artist, I'll hand it right back to them. That's not internet courage, that's how sick I am of "the fans are hurting this and the fans are hurting that" while holding no culpability to retailers, labels, managers, ad agencies, song writers, musicians themselves, etc etc. Every single one of those motherfuckers is in on this "hurting" that's going on in the biz so let's get over pointing the finger at "fans" alone.

 

[sccaldwell]

I download. Know what? I also buy a TON of records from those downloads. While I can claim that my actions have had a net result of "hurting" the industry technically, I believe I am helping more than harming. I average 100 cds a year purchased. Take that for what its worth.

While still illegal, I *personally* see little wrong with downloading-to-sample. Unfortunately, most people (especially the younger generation) tend to "download-to-avoid-paying".

My view is that if you've downloaded a song or CD and listened to it 5 times, it's time to make a choice: Delete it or Buy it.

Craig

 

[adaher]

I spent about $50/month on CDs from about 1998-2004. I'd say about half of them were CDs I hated or were outright poor quality. Then I discovered downloading.

Now I still spend $50/month on CDs, only I like 100% of them because I sampled them. The only bands being hurt by downloading in my case are bands that aren't very good or otherwise don't appeal to me.

Most products, you get to check out before you buy. Still more products where that is not possible, you can return if it doesn't meet your needs. Music and movies have always been, until recently, something you take a chance on, and if you hate it, you'll never get that $10 and time wasted back.

As for the effect on artists, it's undoubtedly helping. Would a Sonata Arctica ever break outside of Finland without downloading? Lord knows you couldn't buy their albums in the stores until recently, and even now only maybe half have of them. Not to mention Lion music releases, which you'll almost never see in stores.

You can't regulate the internet to the point where only the good stuff(easier exposure and marketing) continues and the bad stuff(downloading) ends. Lance King has had a long career, and it's pretty clear that his career has grown with the internet. Without the internet, both the good and the bad, Lance King wouldn't be able to catch a break or market his projects. Before the internet, few people knew who he was. Now he's a metal icon, one of the most well known and respected vocalists(and record company execs) in the business. And overall record sales for his projects are far better than they were in the 90s.

Illegal downloading hurts artists if you look at it in a vacuum. But illegal downloading doesn't exist in a vacuum. It exists because of the internet, which has brought incredible benefits to underground music. And frankly, I doubt that much illegal downloading is actually dollars lost. Most illegal downloaders who don't buy what they like are kids that can't afford to buy in the first place.

 

[The Fiddler]

Uh, there's just one problem - a download is not a loss of a guaranteed sale. That's the RIAA's thinking, but it's flawed.

Of course RIAA doesn't literally believe every download equals a lost sale. What you're conveneiently forgetting to mention is that when illegal downloads reach the tens of thousands, that the numbers of lost sales will start to become significant. In the end, it means less money labels have available to sign or promote hungry new talent, like, say, Division. (This is where the talented, starving artists continually living at poverty level snap at all the people trying to beat and break the system, and fight back by flooding torrents with a virus).

And also not mentioned is that when the economies of scale are applied to smaller, independent labels, it only takes a few hundred lost sales to limit what the label can do for it's bands in the future. It all adds up, a fact that most everyone here is oblivous to.

 

[The Fiddler]

While still illegal, I *personally* see little wrong with downloading-to-sample. Unfortunately, most people (especially the younger generation) tend to "download-to-avoid-paying".

And the sad part is that these younger generations have never had it any other way than free. They grew up with free illegal downloads and view the banning of free downloads as an infringement on their civil liberties, or some BS like that. Few of them are old enough to remember a day when the only way to obtain music was by purchasing it on vinyl or cassette tape. They've grown accustomed to not having to pay for music (i.e. stealing it) and to hell with the musicians who created what they "sampled" (their euphamism for "stole").

 

[sccaldwell]

How is my opinion on a cost of a cd irrelevant? im a customer and like metal, I am exactly what they are aiming for. Just like I wont pay for a game that costs this much, a movie tahts this much, a shirt that is this much.

I like how your opinion counts towards the cd and mine doesn't. Thats great if you feel like being ass rammed by overpricing, I dont.

Your opinion on the cost of a CD is COMPLETELY relevant. As a matter of fact, little else matters. The problem is that you've missed HOW it matters.

It's really, really simple. If you think a CD is overpriced, that's completely fine. DON'T BUY IT. But even if that's your choice, you still don't have the right to steal it. No one is forcing you to buy it, and there's nothing at all wrong with saying "The price on this CD is more than it's worth to me, so I choose to not buy it." The problem comes in when you decide to instead steal it.

I think the Porsche Boxster is overpriced, but by your logic, I should then be able to just steal one and be totally justified in doing so.

The ONLY difference between my example and your argument is that it's easier to trace a Boxster than an MP3, so I'm more likely to get caught and prosecuted. FACT: BOTH ARE ILLEGAL.

Craig

 

[lunar]

Internet piracy will never be stopped, its futile to stop it. What is going to happen is that eventually the music business is going to evolve where money is made through touring and merchandising, not through songs. Technology is so user friendly and available to anyone that these days bands could pretty much do it for them selves as far as recording goes. Sure it takes a lot of knowledge, skill, and expensive equipment to do recordings, not to mention management and producers telling the bands how to do it better. But I think that this all will evolve where they strip all that down and start making music anyway. I also bet for awhile the quality of music made this way will be far inferior, but as time passes, people will be able to learn how to make it better and better. In sort, bands who have a passion for music, not money, will learn how to do it for themselves. Where there is a will, there is a way.

I wonder how many more years it will take for this to happen? Oh by the way, Radiohead just put their latest album online which you can download for a donation. 1 cent if you like. I see the gears of this revolution slowly starting to turn...

 

[sccaldwell]

1) You said several times that it's illegal. What does that mean? Nothing- since just because something is illegal doesn't mean it necessarily SHOULD be illegal in the first place (SEVERAL countries feel that it shouldn't as is...). You can keep saying that file sharing is illegal, but that doesn't help your argument one bit. You missed the point on this one entirely which only proves to me who is really the informed one here on this subject.

If you live in the U.S., then those are the laws that apply to you. Until those laws are changed, either (a) obey them, or (b) move to another country whose laws more suit your preference.

There are only 2 ways someone can steal music (that I can think of off hand) from a musician: 1) if I were to publish someone else's music as my own, or 2) if I were to steal a physical CD and run off with it without paying for it. When you download an MP3 from a P2P program or website, the artist doesn't lose the rights to that piece of music/recording. Therefore nothing is being stolen in the first place. Someone might be downloading it "illegally" since he doesn't have the license for that piece of music (which costs money), but nothing is being lost on either end. Therefore, nothing is stolen. This is how one can argue that there is more gained from downloading than "lost".

You're kidding, right? It's really simple. If the listener had been unable to illegally download the music, then the listener might have instead BOUGHT that music. But because the listener WAS able to illegally download the music, he/she didn't. Therefore, the artist/label/store didn't get any money, but the listener still got the music, without permission. That's called "stealing."

You can't say nothing was stolen just because there was no physical product involved. If you get a haircut, do you also walk out without paying? If you do, then you effectively "stole" a haircut.

Remember, music is less about the physical media and more about the work, effort, and expense that went into making the music, whether it's a CD, vinyl, cassette or yes, even an MP3.

Craig

 

[Cheiron]

Do you realize how absurd your argument is? "Their music isn't very good, and that's why so many people download it illegally instead of buying it." If it no one wanted it, then no one would be buying OR downloading it.

I didn't say that. I said they aren't buying it because its crap. Not that many people are downloading it... if you didn't notice. And a lot of the people that are downloading it to listen to it are deciding its crap. The others with any interest are going to myspace and listening to a couple songs and deciding its crap.

Yes, they're spending their money on the things that are harder to steal, and then stealing the music rather than buying it. Another option would be to choose where to spend whatever money you have, and if that means you can't buy the latest music, that's life. If that means you have to work harder or get a second job to be able to buy the music you want, then that's life.

And before you come back with "Oh, I'm too busy to get a second job" or "I don't want to get a second job," remember this: Many of those artists (whose music is being stolen) ARE THEMSELVES WORKING A SECOND JOB IN ADDITION TO PUTTING OUT THE MUSIC THAT IS BEING STOLEN FROM THEM.

Think about that for a second before you fire off a response.

Craig

Why are you getting in a moral debate? Is this philosophical discussion or a discussion of how things really are? If the goal of this discussion is to convince people they should stop downloading, then its preaching to a near choir on this board. I spend a lot of money on music, including CDs, t-shirts, concerts, and sponsoring a band at ProgPower last year and most likely this year. a lot of people here spend a thousand dollars to see some bands play live. And the people here buy enough music to put JediKing through community college!

I'm not going off on 'moral' debates. That's a pain in the ass and its best for people who think they are much smarter than I am as they sit in coffee shops drinking one coffee for 7 hours while using their Internet. I'd rather just try to figure out why things are happening and how things can either improve or try to predict how the industry will change.

See: http://pmx2.krose.org/forum?action=view&forum_id=1&message_id=250247

 

[dcowboys311]

Do you realize how absurd your argument is? "Their music isn't very good, and that's why so many people download it illegally instead of buying it." If it no one wanted it, then no one would be buying OR downloading it.



Yes, they're spending their money on the things that are harder to steal, and then stealing the music rather than buying it. Another option would be to choose where to spend whatever money you have, and if that means you can't buy the latest music, that's life. If that means you have to work harder or get a second job to be able to buy the music you want, then that's life.

And before you come back with "Oh, I'm too busy to get a second job" or "I don't want to get a second job," remember this: Many of those artists (whose music is being stolen) ARE THEMSELVES WORKING A SECOND JOB IN ADDITION TO PUTTING OUT THE MUSIC THAT IS BEING STOLEN FROM THEM.

Think about that for a second before you fire off a response.

Craig

How would people know that the music is garbage if they didn't download it?

Also, games and movies are just as easy to pirate as music.

 

[PurpleCrayonWriter]

...Not that it doesn't hurt the industry but it's only one of numerous causes hurting the industry including sub-par recordings....

I'll grant you that one, woosta. I maintain that a good deal of the problem with the record industry these days is that most of what the mainstream labels produce is shit.

I also know there are a lot of labels, bands, and CDs out there these days. It's hard to know what's good and what isn't.

But it's not my right to download CDs illegally to sample them. I can't possibly know all the bands out there that are good and which ones aren't. That's what MySpace is for. Or Amazon. The snippets they play on those sites tell me all I need to know before I make a purchase. I can tell in a song or two -- offered from a free, legitimate source -- if I'm going to like a band or not. There's no need for me to go all renegade and download albums illegally. I don't have that right. And neither do you.

Another point: No one says you have to buy so many CDs that you need to take out a second mortgage. If you can only afford one or two CDs a month because they're $15.99 or $17.99 each, so be it. You're not going to hell because you can't amass all the CDs you think are good. Just enjoy what you find and call it good. Next month, try something new. Why does everyone think they have to be 100% dead sure they're going to like something -- a new band or a band's new CD -- before they buy it? Whatever happened to the joy of discovery?

I rely on MySpace a lot these days for discovering new music. In fact, I'm flabbergasted by the number of bands out there. I've discovered whole new countries full of music! Australia, Finland, Italy -- there are bands out there I never heard of. But their MySpace pages give me all the information I need to make an informed purchase. For example, I spent 2-3 weeks and $25 on a CD from an Aussie band called brillig simply because I loved one song on their CD enough to invest that much time and money. I ordered the CD from my local independent CD store. It took him three weeks to get it in.

Serendipity plays a huge roll in my CD buying. I've discovered some really good music by accident.

Anger doesn't make this issue go away, wooster. It doesn't change the facts. And it doesn't make illegal downloading okay. Rant and rave all you want. You can no more change the facts of this matter than you can change gravity.

 

[sccaldwell]

Uh, there's just one problem - a download is not a loss of a guaranteed sale. That's the RIAA's thinking, but it's flawed.

Oh, of course not!! And I never said it was. But it doesn't matter. The downloader is still stealing music. Some of them may have actually bought it if stealing weren't an option, and those are the true lost sales. But even if it's only one in 20, that's significant. That's money out of the artist's pocket, even if it's only a few bucks.

But I also have a problem with the people who wouldn't have bought the music anyway, but are listening to it for free, saying "but you didn't lose a sale 'cause I'm too cheap/broke to pay $15 for a CD!!" IT'S STILL ILLEGAL.

I'll go back to the Porsche Boxster example. I wasn't in the market to buy a new Boxster, anyway, so does that mean it's OK for me to steal it? After all, they aren't losing a sale to me, 'cause I wasn't going to buy one, anyway!!

Funny how that logic doesn't work when you apply it to a physical product instead of a digitally-distributed product. Just because you can't touch it, doesn't mean that work, effort, and money didn't go into producing it.

Craig
P.S. No need to alert the authorities, I'm not going to steal a car.

 

[lady_space]

Respectfully, how did successful big-chain stores like Tower Records and Musicland thrive before the arrival of mp3s and high-speed internet, but have since gone out of business? Didn't they go out of business because their revenue stream dried up? For every big chain that went down, how many smaller independent retailers also lost enogh revenue to continue? Why are record labels laying off people? If illegal downloading wasn't a factor in their decline, shouldn't they now be booming and hiring with the increased number of bands (choices) available to customers today (as proponents of illegal downloading are so quickly to point out)?

But how much of that is actually due to downloading? I don't think it's possible to accurately measure, despite "studies" and "reports" that claim otherwise. I think more of it has to do with big-box retailers like Wal-Mart and the advent of online ordering, personally, though of course I too have no data to back it up.

Also, I think it's more a problem with these young whippersnappers today. Seriously, even though I've known older people (over 30, say) who download illegally pretty much exclusively and feel like there's nothing wrong with it, it seems to be mroe of an entitlement issue with the younger generation, and (depite our Puritan-rooted attempts) you simply cannot successfully regulate morality.

That said, I have a burned mp3 CD in my car with bunches of stuff I will probably never buy or listen to again after a week or two pass. but I will probably pick up 1 or 2 albums that I wouldn't have otherwise. Rationalization? Sure, but that's how it is with me. I don't upload very much at all, and then only to an FTP site with very limited access of a few friends. Wrong? Maybe, but it's all a matter of degree to me, and the good vastly outweighs the harm IMO.

Shaye

 

[sccaldwell]

Try this analogy, say you own a "restaurant." Someone snuck in your establishment and stole a whole bunch of food. They then proceed to stand across the street and handout free samples to anyone that will take some. Now one of two scenario's will happen, either the food is really good and everyone will want to eat there, or the food is shitty and no one will want to eat there.

Now, the "restaurant" with good food will thrive because people will now have a reason to go there and PAY for the food. Not everyone who sampled the food will agree, but the better the food, the higher the chance people will PAY.

The shitty "restaurant" will struggle if all they do is blame the thief and not concentrate on the real problem, the food.

Nice analogy, and well-explained. And for some people, it works that way. I've had some "free" food on a couple of occasions, then gone into the restaurant to buy it (I've also had some that made me throw up and I* never ate there again <grin>).

The problem is that it seems that many people are sampling the food, then saying "Wow, that's GREAT food!!! Hey, can you show me the back door to that restaurant, where you got in to steal the food? Sweet!! <Runs in to continue eating stolen food and tells friends where they can steal it, too>"

In that case, you have tons of people running around proclaiming it as the best restaurant in town, yet every night there are only two or three people in there actually paying for their dinner. Eventually, even though he hears how everyone loves his food, the restaurant owner gets discouraged and closes up shop.

Craig

 

[TBJ]

Internet piracy will never be stopped, its futile to stop it. What is going to happen is that eventually the music business is going to evolve where money is made through touring and merchandising, not through songs. Technology is so user friendly and available to anyone that these days bands could pretty much do it for them selves as far as recording goes. Sure it takes a lot of knowledge, skill, and expensive equipment to do recordings, not to mention management and producers telling the bands how to do it better. But I think that this all will evolve where they strip all that down and start making music anyway. I also bet for awhile the quality of music made this way will be far inferior, but as time passes, people will be able to learn how to make it better and better. In sort, bands who have a passion for music, not money, will learn how to do it for themselves. Where there is a will, there is a way.

I wonder how many more years it will take for this to happen? Oh by the way, Radiohead just put their latest album online which you can download for a donation. 1 cent if you like. I see the gears of this revolution slowly starting to turn...

I guess more and more bands will see that they can probably do the albums themselves at minimal cost and slowly but surely record companies will cease to exist, only to leave maybe their marketing and/or distribution departments alive.

 

[sccaldwell]

Thank you, I brought this up awhile back and nobody else mentioned it. Before downloading, I used to buy a ton of used cd's from a local shop. No one was complaining back then that I was killing the music industry.

It's because that's the same as buying a used car. Someone else bought it, enjoyed it for a while, then sold it to someone else (at a loss, most likely). It's now theirs to enjoy. The same number of licenses (CDs) have been sold and the same number of people are listening to the music. Balance is maintained.

The difference is that some people keep COPIES of their CDs when they sell the originals at used CD stores. That's no different IMHO from simply copying a friend's CD illegally, because the end result is basically the same (OK, so maybe you lost a couple of bucks in selling the used disc).

Don't lose sight of what you're actually paying for when you buy a CD. As I understand it, you're buying a LICENSE for permission to listen to the music contained on that CD. When you sell the CD, you're selling your license, and should destroy/delete any copies you'd made of the original CD, as you've sold your license to someone else.

This brings up another question, and I'm surprised that I've never seen the following argument: I bought an album on vinyl/cassette/8-track (yes, I'm that old). If I really bought a LICENSE for the music, then why did I have to pay full price to get it on CD. Sure, I should have to pay something for the physical media, but I should have received a discount since I already have a license from buying the vinyl/cassette/8-track.

On these grounds, I *personally* see nothing wrong with downloading MP3s of albums that you already own (originals, not copies) on vinyl or some other media, because you DO already own a license for the MUSIC...the media just might be worn out.

Basically, I wonder if this argument would stand up in court: "Sure, I downloaded MP3's of Giuffria's debut album [for example], but I already owned a license from buying the vinyl album years ago, so nothing illegal happened."

Thoughts on this, anyone?

Craig