p2p news / p2pnet: Shamed Organized Music member Sony BMG is in very deep excreta with the other members of the crime family, Vivendi Universal, Warner Music and EMI Group.

With a paltry few lines of Digital Rights Restriction (DRM) code, it’s done more to focus attention on the depths OM will sink to in pursuit of you and your money than years of phoney lawsuits.

Sony BMG is one of the four owners of the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America). So wouldn’t it be tasty to know if the CD you’re thinking of buying was made by an RIAA proprietor?

“This is kind of cool,” say the guys on CDFreaks.

“Many of us out there feel that it is wrong to support the RIAA, as they have shown a complete disregard for consumers and consumers rights. There is a problem out there, but this jihad against the little guy is not going to solve it.

“Putting children and the elderly on the legal hotplate for ‘possession of copyrighted lossy files’ from the Internet, just doesn’t sit right with even the most callused among us.”

Right on, and what’s cool, says the post, is RIAA Radar a, “handy, free service, you can quickly check through Amazon.com’s voluminous database of music, to see if the album you want is produced by an RIAA member”.

Knowledge is power, “and knowing where the product came from can (and should) influence what you buy.”

Yup. And you can thank Amazon.com’s huge music database.

“All you have to do is add the RIAA Radar bookmarklets you’ll find on magnetbox to your bookmarks/favourites list, then go to any album’s Amazon.com detail page to check it out,” p2pnet said when RIAA Radar first appeared a couple of years back.

We also had a few words with Ben, RIAA Radar’s creator, who told us his original idea was to, create a sort of ‘family tree’ of product/brand ownership, “but for all products and companies, and done in a very public, user-submitted way (there are companies that offer this kind of information, but as a very expensive pay service.) People could enter in any item (or an entire day’s or week’s products and activities) to understand how many (or really how few) companies they are profiting. This isn’t necessarily an idea that only I have had, I just knew I (and others) would find it useful, and it didn’t exist.”

Ben zoomed his sights down to, “a niche that I was interested in, namely, music. Big record companies were a great fit because they are big, slow, and people have strong opinions of them (meaning they’re easier to keep track of than most public companies, and people already have reasons to dislike or like certain record labels - especially ones that are affecting things people like to do, such as file-sharing, CD-burning, and finding new music.) Realizing that Amazon.com already gives developers a window into their database, all I had to do was put two things together: Amazon’s music data, and the RIAA membership list.”

“I hope I did it right.”

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win
- Mohandas Gandhi

Tired of being treated like a criminal? They depend on you, not the other way around. Don’t buy their ‘product’. Do bug your local political representatives. Use emails, snail-mail, phone calls, faxes, IM, stop them in the street, blog. And if you’re into organizing, organize petitions, organize demonstrations and then turn up on your local political rep’s doorstep, making sure you’ve contacted your local tv/radio station/newspaper in advance.

See:-
deep excreta - Sony DRM rips off L.A.M.E., November 10, 2005
CDFreaks - RIAA RADAR - tell if that music CD is released by the RIAA!, November 11, 205
first appeared - Anti-RIAA Radar, 2003

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