p2pnet news view | P2P | Music:- Time for a history lesson, kids:

1980s: BPI (British Phonographic Industry) launches a campaign claiming that “home taping is killing music”.

Mixtapes and “Cassette culture” in general, continue to thrive.

The most significant thing to come out of BPI’s propaganda effort is the use of a skull-and-crossbones emblem where the skull is a cassette tape.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Home_Taping_Is_Killing_Music

1982: Jack Valenti (MPAA weasel) testifies before United States congress in a desperate attempt to get the “consumer” VCR banned.

His comparison of the VCR to the “Boston Strangler” will resurface twenty years later to bite not only him, but the entire “industry” he represents — in the ass.

1992: “Dont Copy That floppy” manages to be — if possible — even more stupidly laughable than the “Home Taping” thing.  It’s still fondly remembered by “Gen-Xers” as one of the many things which added to our cynicism in regard to our corporate overlords.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don%27t_Copy_That_Floppy

1996: Desperately imperlied by the mere existence of the Public Domain, corporate lobbyists manage to buy themselves yet another extension of copyright “protection” for their corporate backers.

1999: Napster – the crude precursor to modern p2p applications – allows people to easily exchange files between one another.

Understandably the corporate megaliths are frightened by the prospect of their precious all-but-perpetual monopolies evaporating.  Thus, they destroy Napster.

But instead of the desired outcome, Napster’s demise spurs the creation of steadily-increasing numbers of p2p applications, and – equally important – a fundamental rethinking of what copyright, patents, and “Intelectual property” in general, is supposed to be.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napster

2004:  Lawrence Lessig publishes “Free Culture”.  This book is probably the first widely-read inquiry into — and critique of — current IP law.

More significantly, his book articulates – probably for the first time – the emerging viewpoint of what will eventually be known as “copyfight”.

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Enough history.  The above was in no way intended to be a “complete” rundown, but is merely to highlight a few facts:

P2p and “Free culture” in general is inescapable.  The RIAA may have destroyed Napster, but, significantly, they felt compelled to “Brand” their erzatz replacement with the name and formerly-infamous “cat” logo.  That should tell you something.

Anybody remember mp3.com?  It was the first fully-integrated and useful platform for “unsigned” artists, and it offered everything.  Hell, you could even generate – and sell – “DAM CD’s” right from the site itself.

The RIAA seized on an attempt by Mp3.com to allow users to “remotely” access their music collection from anywhere (”MYmp3.com”, it was called), as excuse and justification to destroy it.

I say “excuse” because that’s exactly what it was: the “Major labels” – for the first time – were confronted with something which provided “unsigned” artists with an integrated platform, and potentially global reach.

You could even make the CD’s automatically.

It wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to say that mp3.com in it’s original form, rendered the RIAA and the “labels” who back it, obsolete.

What’s significant with the mp3.com situation is, yet again, that they felt the need to retain the “brand”, when launching their (neutered and utterly pointless) corporate “replacement”.

Also significant is that killing mp3.com in no way killed the “indie artist” platforms.  (Soundclick, anyone?)

———————–

The RIAA and the “labels” it represents are irrelevant, and have been for at least a decade:

1. Inexpensive (sometimes free) software is widely available which allows anybody to create a fully-functional DAW (”Digital Audio Workstation”) with off-the-shelf equipment.

2. VST (”Virtual Studio Technology”) allows people to create their own effects and “software synthesizers”.  There’s even an “integrated development environment” called Synthedit which allows you to “build” your own devices and effects and export them as VST’s.
Put bluntly, the “majors” no longer offer anything in technological terms.

3. Remember “Grey Tuesday?”  A guy calling himself “DJ Dangermouse” created a remix-album using the Beatle’s “White Album”, and Jay-Z’s “Black Album”.
When threatened with “cease and desist”, instead of meekly complying, the album was SPREAD FAR AND WIDE with something like several hundred websites and individuals hosting it for twenty-four hours.

The album is still widely available on any p2p network you’d care to use (as well as via TPB).  What’s important is the fact that “Cease and desist” bullying was defeated NOT by secrecy or more and better “darknets” — but by a clear and principled REFUSAL EN MASSE to comply.

Make it “too big”, and they can’t AFFORD to push us around anymore, no matter WHAT kind of draconian bullshit they manage to buy from the courts.

(Interestingly, Dangermouse – rather than being “Persona Non Grata” to the major labels, was the primary producer on Beck’s latest album “Modern Guilt.”  Think about that: the corporate weasels are RECRUITING TALENT from the very “underground” they’ve been trying vainly to destroy.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Grey_Album

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_Guilt

The Moral?

The corporate weasels CANNOT win, and never stood a chance of doing so.  Every new “enforcement” effort just risks pissing off more people, and radicalizing the “copyfighters” more.

That’s why I almost hope they “win” their case against the Pirate Bay.  (I can’t wait to see the profusion of bittorent trackers, new “copyfight”/Free culture efforts, and newer, better p2p technologies that would result from that.

Let me close by saying:

Good luck RIAA/IFPI/corporate weasels.  You’ve done an admirable job pissing everybody off so far, and watching your desperate efforts to cozy up to government has finally put the lie to those who still claim that capitalism is based on a “Free” market.

Henry Ermich – p2pnet
[Ermich says he's, "just some guy," sometime musician, wannabe writer, sporadic blotter, and (hopefully) good-natured person.  He and his wife live in Pennsylvania with two cats, and, "entirely too many record albums".]

February , 2009

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This entry was posted on Friday, February 27th, 2009 at 9:07 am and is filed under Music, P2P. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

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