The boycott starts today
p2pnet.net News:- Today is Day One of the P2PUNITE entertainment industry boycott.
“How many have bought a CD or watched a movie that turned out to be less than satisfactory?” – ask the organizers.
“How many have felt cheated after a night out at the movies, having gone there after seeing trailers, commercials, and posters for another big box office release that turned out to be one of those ‘let’s save the movie company a few bucks by fooling people into watching this dud during the first weekend’ flicks? How many get sick to their stomachs while hearing about revenue losses after viewing an episode of ‘Cribs’ on MTV?
“The production companies have the audacity to say that we are using people’s creativity and talent, without paying for it. Well, guess what? Most P2P users actually do buy the products they like!”
And we didn’t even mention the people who are being sued by the labels and studios.
So for the next seven days, put the entertainment industry on IGNORE.
From today until the end of the month, where movies, CDs, DVDs or anything else which puts money into the pockets of the cartels is concerned, SWITCH OFF!
But stay tuned for more news from catflap on other actions designed to make the vested interests realise they aren’t in charge.
WE ARE !
>>> And spread the word online and offline !!! >>>
Something you think we should know? tips[at]p2pnet.net
April 24th, 2005 at 6:19 pm
Awesome, finally wecan see how this goes
I’ve officially started boycotting
.
_eAgLe_
April 24th, 2005 at 7:22 pm
hopefully the word has been spread other than P2Punites site, with only ~100,000 visitors of which an est. of lets say 80% follow thru, it wont make much of an impact. but its a start.
April 24th, 2005 at 7:30 pm
I am opposed to the idea of a boycott because it links filesharing to economic issues. As I see it though, people are filesharing either because they love the material they are sharing or because they are interested in contributing their material to help build a vast library of information. When people mix a commercial aspect or an economic aspect into filesharing, they have a corrupted view.
The question we have to ask ourselves is who really owns the music. Is it the RIAA, or is it the fans of the music who are the filesharers? While a boycott is intended to empower the filesharers, what it instead does is lend support to the notion that the RIAA owns the music.
April 24th, 2005 at 10:01 pm
Prehaps the question should be more in the line of “Do we allow the majors to own culture?”
Ever sat down to go through your record collection, looking at the covers? Those nice big covers are no longer part of the culture at all. But you can not do such scanning of covers without it dragging out memories of your life. What you did, what was happening at the time, where you were. So what is left for the younger generations when it comes to this? Only the sounds as digital files no longer carry such artwork. A selling point gone, influanced by the accountants that now seem to rule the megacorporation, where cost and not art is the ruling theme.
Paying for such, gives you the right to own. Now a days, the theme of the industry is that you buy a license, not a product that you own. As such it is nothing but a downloan. I suggest to you there is a difference between renting something and buying it for your very own. After all, why buy something if not to own it? Typically if you rent something, because you don’t own it the price reflects that. Something that the music industry goes against the grain on.
The major music companies have been convicted of price fixing. Strangely this has not affected the price at all. Take your pick of buying services and the price is homogenous across the board. How can that be if the price is not fixed? Are we saying it costs the same to send out a 30 year old song as it does to mix a new one? It would seem so if price is the tape measure to judge by.
When you buy something, do you support that the music industry still has control over what you bought? If you bought it, isn’t it yours? Or is it? If it isn’t then why buy?
Every try to go buy something at your local store that you heard as a kid? Chances are very good you can’t. It is out of print and not made anymore. So where do you obtain a copy of that which in part defines who you were and where you were at the time? In the give aways of copyright there are some serious glaring holes. One of them is this. Copyrights are given for the idea that at some point that item copyrighted will become public domain. What was the last thing you remember ever reaching public domain? Further, where is it if it did? There is nothing to prevent a copyright owner from destroying said copy or master once it has reached its financial end. That financial end usually reaches far less than the life of the copyright. During the changeovers of formats from vinyl, to tape, to cd, and dvd, many of those artist and their works were lost. They were never reprinted nor were they ever repressed. They are lost. If not for p2p those same works would never be heard again. In many cases, those masters were destroyed to make room for more financially sound recordings, more up to date. There is at this time no penalty sound a copyright holder decide to destroy such a work. So who loses?
April 25th, 2005 at 4:25 am
The boycott is a nice idea but it won’t work. I would estimate that at least 95% of consumers have no idea that a boycott is actually going on and are clueless about the issues pertaining to the boycott. I haven’t bought a music CD since the RIAA started suing people. If you’re going to boycott do it for more than a week.
eclectica, I disagree with your stance on boycotting the RIAA/MPAA. By purchasing their content we are funding and helping them. What do they do with some of this money? They bribe politicians. They hire an army of lawyers to intimidate and extort money from file sharers. They run ad campaigns.
The only way to defeat them is to stop buying their product. This will not kill music. On the contrary, the RIAA will finally listen to file sharers if they stop buying their product. They will either cease their war on file sharing or artists will smarten up and sign with a label not associated with the RIAA.
You can’t fight the RIAA/MPAA any other way. The law is on their side and as long as there are corrupt or weak politicians, we don’t stand a chance.
If we can organize a real boycott, not one of these silly one week boycotts, and seriously cut into their revenue then we might have a chance.
April 25th, 2005 at 5:06 am
You can’t steal intellectual property. You can’t deprive the owner of the idea if you take it. That is what stealing is. If you take the idea, the owner still has it. You can’t give it back to him either. If you give it back to him a thousand times, he is none the richer for it. Same with ip properties.
As far as bread and butter goes, have you ever heard of some of the artists and their ideas on the payments they get? You know, the bread and butter? Try this one for an idea….
http://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2005/03/is_there_an_ups.html
April 25th, 2005 at 11:42 am
there IS another boycott in town…
and i’ll be writing about it here at p2pnet.net very soon.
http://www.say-no.se/
April 26th, 2005 at 12:51 am
Spread the word! I just sent out e-mails to people who don’t even visit the site, but use p2p like crazy. They’re sure to join.
April 26th, 2005 at 12:56 am
Exactly. How can you own something that is non-tangable? It’s just not possible. And thats what the movie and record companies are trying to do. But in reality, they own the DVD’s and CD’s, not the acutual movie or song. The farthest you can get is to take credit for making or participating in it.
April 28th, 2005 at 5:24 am
True Drake what you say BUT a WEEK is a start and everyone has to start somewhere!!!!!
April 28th, 2005 at 2:09 pm
How will they even know that we’re boycotting them? If most of our ‘consumption’ of their product is via p2p networks….. it won’t even be a blip on their radar when we stop and start buying their authorized product from authorized dealers.
Perhaps we could stop sharing their content for a week as well. I think this community has a better chance of turning those valves on and off. While the labels might cheer our boycott of their product on p2p networks at first…….. it just might catch their attention. They’ve got it stuck in their heads that each download is a lost sale while in reality each download is a potential new customer.
April 28th, 2005 at 8:19 pm
Americans have always been in the top team for embargos and sanctions…..;)
April 29th, 2005 at 5:40 am
The P2P people are boycotting the industry automatically all the time, aren’t they?