Media > Music
Interesting discussion about music piracy and artist compensation
Caffiene:
--- Quote from: Lukas on Jun 20, 2012, 02:45:30 PM ---
--- Quote ---Artists: 99.9 % lower middle class. Screw you, you greedy bastards!
--- End quote ---
--- End quote ---
I reject his assumption that the vast majority of music piracy isnt targeted at giant music mega corporations.
I reject the further assumption that even if the companies involved arent huge, that the individual artists get the major share of profits from sales.
I dont really support piracy, but I think his argument fails at making a good point.
He spends a lot of time talking about the cost of the royalties that would have been paid to artists and how it would add up to $2000, but he ignores the non-royalty part of the price it would have cost. iTunes in my experience charges about $1 per track, which makes the full price of all the tracks about $11,000 - a price the college student almost certainly wouldnt have been able to pay, regardless of piracy.
It seems like a pretty obvious example of the idea "one pirated copy does not equal one lost sale". Even if she had $2000 to spend (which he concludes she probably didnt/doesnt) she could have bought only about 1/6 of the tracks she pirated, meaning about $330 to the artists. That is a meaningful amount taken over all the people who pirate, but his hyperbole undermines his article.
GodSlayer:
--- Quote from: Caffiene on Aug 09, 2012, 08:40:44 PM ---
--- Quote from: Lukas on Jun 20, 2012, 02:45:30 PM ---
--- Quote ---Artists: 99.9 % lower middle class. Screw you, you greedy bastards!
--- End quote ---
--- End quote ---
I reject his assumption that the vast majority of music piracy isnt targeted at giant music mega corporations.
I reject the further assumption that even if the companies involved arent huge, that the individual artists get the major share of profits from sales.
I dont really support piracy, but I think his argument fails at making a good point.
He spends a lot of time talking about the cost of the royalties that would have been paid to artists and how it would add up to $2000, but he ignores the non-royalty part of the price it would have cost. iTunes in my experience charges about $1 per track, which makes the full price of all the tracks about $11,000 - a price the college student almost certainly wouldnt have been able to pay, regardless of piracy.
It seems like a pretty obvious example of the idea "one pirated copy does not equal one lost sale". Even if she had $2000 to spend (which he concludes she probably didnt/doesnt) she could have bought only about 1/6 of the tracks she pirated, meaning about $330 to the artists. That is a meaningful amount taken over all the people who pirate, but his hyperbole undermines his article.
--- End quote ---
that's my most common defense -- I only get new music because it's free. and I'd sooner delete most of the songs I have than part with my entire life savings. ... more podcasts, more TV, more reading, more exercise ... there's no reason I couldn't make do with only the few songs I can afford. But I think it's better for everyone that I've got more than I can afford--I just switched back here after being on a music forum recommending 5-10 bands I wouldn't even know the names of if not for piracy--even if piracy is sometimes bad in some ways, for those bands my piracy regarding them has not been anything but good for their careers...so ya kinda get to that old "rape culture" argument...what blame do I deserve, what resentment should they feel towards me, for my raindrop contributing to the flood where people who otherwise would have paid the artist choose not to because of the culture they're in?
Desert Fox:
If I like an album (unless it is a must have), I will look for a used copy
Is that piracy?
I have boxes of CDs but have recorded almost all to MP3 and listen to them in that manner
GodSlayer:
--- Quote from: Desert Fox on Aug 11, 2012, 09:18:35 AM ---If I like an album (unless it is a must have), I will look for a used copy
Is that piracy?
I have boxes of CDs but have recorded almost all to MP3 and listen to them in that manner
--- End quote ---
it's legal to buy second-hand, and it's legal to make a backup CD or mp3 of your bought CD, but it seems like if you sell your CD second-hand you'll have to delete your back-up, otherwise you're guilty of piracy (the buyer isn't).
Johnny Slick:
The industry is rapidly changing and with it I think a lot of these "oh, I only download pirated music to see if I like it" and "I'm not really taking money from musicians but production companies instead" arguments are going away, too. Last year, for instance, Jonathan Coulton IIRC made the Billboard Hot 100 for a 100% self-produced album (which is awesome BTW, especially if you're a nerd) (yes, it does have a version of the theme to Portal). It's simply too easy to listen to a 30 second sample now, or even spend a dollar on a song or two, to really make these arguments make much sense anymore. And the costs are going down too - 20 years ago I might have to pay $20 for a new CD at Musicland whereas now I can go online to iTunes or Amazon and get a new title for half that (really, more like a third after you consider inflation).
Books are going through a similar sea change (and, it should be said, renaissance; people are reading more now than they have in years).
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