p2pnet - rss feed: P2p file sharing contained: RIAA
p2p news / p2pnet: In what must be one of the most blatant, bald-faced distortions of truth it’s managed so far, the Big Four Organized Music cartel’s RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) is claiming unauthorized song swapping has been “contained”.
Quoted in USA Today, “The problem has not been eliminated,” dissembles RIAA boss Mitch Bainwol, “But we believe digital downloads have emerged into a growing, thriving business, and file-trading is flat.”
“Digital downloads” can be summed up as online deliveries through Apple’s iTunes, the only significant corporate music service. And it isn’t even a service. Rather, it’s a self-funding loading application developed exclusively for Apple’s iPod music player.
Moreover, the European Commission has looked into Apple’s pricing. It charges 79p (about $1.40) per track against the 99 euro cents (about $1.20) in France and Germany. Nor can Britons beat the differences by downloading from EU sites.
With Microsoft behind it, RealNetworks is mounting a determined effort to become a player, and Napster continues its fruitless efforts to emulate the success of the original Napster, killed by the music industry.
But it’s all academic, for the moment, because assertions by Bainwol and his opposite numbers in Europe notwithstanding, currently, there is no worthwhile corporate music market.
It could be otherwise. For example, instead of eliminating Napster, the major labels could probably have suborned it.
Unlikely? Napster (the original) creator Shawn Fanning has shown his eagerness to work with, and for, the industry. He’s behind Snocap, an application developed specifically to allow the labels to make money from p2p applications.
And even without that, if the Big Four were to drop their wholesale prices and open their catalogues, in all likelihood, they’d now be making as much, if not more, money as they did when physical sales ruled.
Proof of that particular pudding comes via Russia’s AllofMP3.com, a highly affordable p2p download services which bases its sales on download size.
Music lovers are flocking to it, one of the reasons the Organized Music cartel is, with the Bush administration in lock-step, going flat out to destroy it.
Warner Music, Vivendi Universal, EMI and Sony BMG currently wholesale individual digital files for at least 60 to 85 cents, forcing the likes of Apple to charge $1 and more for each download.
The result? Every minute of every day, hundreds of millions of music lovers, each one called a “criminal’ and “thief” by the labels, are ignoring the corporate offerings. Instead, they go to AllofMP3.com, or one of the growing number of independent music sites launched by professional and amateur musicians —— or to the free p2p networks.
This May, globally, the number of p2p users simultaneously logged on at any given moment was close to 10 million, p2p research firm Big Champagne told p2pnet. In May, 2005, the number was 8,665,319 and in 2004, 7,286,377.
In the US in May, 2005, the number was 6,290,327 and in 2004, it was 4,589,255.
Meanwhile, it’s estimated that some 60 million Americans have shared with each other. Against that, the RIAA has issued subpoenas to around 19,000 people, including young children, using the mainstream media to imply that the subpoenas are lawsuits and that the 19,000 have been successfully prosecuted for the non-existent crime of file sharing.
In fact, not one of the RIAA victims has ever appeared before a judge in a civil trial. Patti Santangelo, the New York mother of five, will be the first.
However, 19,000 is apparently a large enough number for Bainwol to be able to claim file sharing is being contained in the US.
Digg this story.
Also See:
USA Today - RIAA chief says illegal song-sharing ‘contained’, June 12, 2006
NOTE: p2pnet is being sued by Sharman Networks and Nikki Hemming, ceo of p2p application Kazaa. “The suit is a little odd, since P2PNet.net is a champion of peer-to-peer file-sharing, which is the same business that Kazaa is in,” says The Globe & Mail. If you’d like to help p2pnet, or find out more, please go here.
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June 13th, 2006 at 7:33 pm
Yeah that story is great.
Cheers.
June 13th, 2006 at 7:40 pm
Could it be that the trade orgs, like any beaten bulllys, have decided to simply declare themselves winners and announce that the war is over and won. Sadamm “won” the war with us, didnt he? This way they can quietly exit this hopeless fight, insisting all the while that things turned out exactly as they had hoped and planned. After that they can announce that “the dvd is dead” or some other Big Lie.
June 13th, 2006 at 8:33 pm
Indeed, I was going to make mention of just such a move as a standard ploy only to find another poster has beaten me to it.
It is very common in corporations, where face saving and apperances are everything to do such. Making it sound as if it’s a done deal and all was accomplished. It is hoped by them that doing so, convences the public to follow suit and leave p2p. In the real world, that doesn’t work nor does it float.
It looks to be like Hillary Rosen paved the way for them. By her saying the cartels should rethink their stradegy of sue ‘em all, they are not locked into such an action and yet the door is opened for them to make that move. By her no longer being in association with the cartels by being under employement, she is not held responcible should the cartels move this way and fail.
We all know the real truth, that enspite of the best efforts of the cartels to stem the flow of free flowing data they don’t control the gates to, it has and continues to slip through their fingers. Responding far too late and without good alternatives, they have in the world of the public, put their heads in the sand and refused to deal with real world issues and business models that don’t fit into the digital world. The idea that they can protect digital with locks both kills the ownership reason to buy and at the same time turns customers away from their offerings with over-restrictive terms and outragous prices. We all know what happens when customers no longer see the value in a product for the price. It is one of the main reasons they can’t really get a good music or movie on-line service off the ground, despite all the claims to the contrary.
June 13th, 2006 at 10:31 pm
dream on RIAA hahahahahah
June 14th, 2006 at 12:58 am
I didn’t know Bagdad Bob worked for the Riaa
June 14th, 2006 at 1:00 am
This whole misinformation BS could be avoided if BigChampagne would just release details of file sharing statistics - I for one am wondering WHY they have tracked p2p usage for 2+ years, and now all of a sudden have not published anything since February - its great for jon to be told ‘around 10 million’, but some of us really want to know whats going on - I myself emailed them a month or so ago and asked to subscribe $$ to whatever service they had that published the statistics and they never emailed me back…..??? If Mitch Bainwol is getting his info from them I will be very unhappy cos it means they have sold out - have you sold out BigChampagne???
Second, in relation to “not one of the RIAA victims has ever appeared before a judge in a civil trial” - this is not quite right as there was the case of BMG Music et al v Gonzalez 2005 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 910 (District Court For the Northern District of Illinois, 2005) which was appealed to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeal, and a woman was held liable for 30 songs and ordered to pay $22,500 setting the precedent in Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin that sampling for future purchase was not fair use…. NEVER mind the fact that she had already purchased 250 CDs - idiots - now she will probably buy none…
And in relation to a comment above “they are not locked into such an action” - BS - they have backed themselves into a corner - they can’t very well come out an announce that they arent going to sue anyone anymore - they cant win against the architecture and they wont change their business model so they have to sue the crap out of users: “Anyone who claims you’re going to win the war on piracy is a very foolish person. But if you don’t fight the war, it gets worse.” John Kennedy, Chairman and Chief Executive of the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry.
This is just like the Iraq War - a BIG MISTAKE - with no exit strategy.
Sal
June 14th, 2006 at 1:06 am
Mr. (Mitch) Bainwol, you’re so full of crap your eyes are brown. 60 million people who’ve shared files, compared with a piddling 19,000 (plus a few dozen more, perhaps) extorted from, and then Victory (is) declared?
Words fail me.
June 14th, 2006 at 1:18 am
“they can’t very well come out an announce that they arent going to sue anyone anymore”
No they can’t. That would be an admission of defeat which they are much to arrogant to do, BUT they can quietly stop pursuing the lawsuits. There hasn’t been a major round of lawsuits launched since Feb.
June 14th, 2006 at 1:52 am
Actually 235 lawsuits were commenced around 22 April 2006
http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=1158
but yes I agree they have been slowing down - I had earlier questioned whether this was just because they were changing law firms, or whether it was because some people had started fighting back but it seems for some reason anyway that there has been some reduction in numbers.
I frequently dream oneday a judge will throw out one of these cases and make RRRRRIAA pay back all the money it has taken from its victims - that would be ohhhh so nice…
June 14th, 2006 at 2:24 am
“held liable for 30 songs and ordered to pay $22,500 setting the precedent in Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin that sampling for future purchase was not fair use…. NEVER mind the fact that she had already purchased 250 CDs - idiots - now she will probably buy none… ”
The most interesting thing about this case was the fact that they
initially tried to sue for over 1000 songs, then DROPPED all the
counts in which she had a corresponding CD. The RIAA claimed
that they did it out of “kindness”. It was actually precedent that
they feared in this case. They didn’t want a judge to rule, once
and for all, that having mp3 files is fair use, REGARDLESS of the
source, as long as a person has purchased copies.
They got one favorable precedent, didn’t wish to risk another
unfavorable one.
Shitheads.
June 14th, 2006 at 2:24 am
Yes, I haven’t forgotten about that. Jon had an article here about that as well, but I still have never seen an official press realease on that, just a link to a local paper in NC. Either way, 235 in 4 months is a VERY significant drop from the 750 per month that for so long was the norm. I honestly don’t think it was worth the headaches anymore from the lawyers’ perspective, hence the departure of S,H & B. People started fighting back and it’s had zero effect on sharing anyway, contrary to what these RIAA stooges keep wishfully telling themselves.
I share your dream, along with many others I’m sure:)
June 14th, 2006 at 7:45 am
Gee Mitch,
Perhaps now you can stop filing lawsuits, quietly drop the ones you’ve got going and save all that money on attorney fees. Just that drop in expenses would probably make up what the Music Distributing industry REALLY lost (if anything), and I mean REALLY lost, not some “Oh every download is a lost sale BS.” type of ersatz-pseudo loss.
Then perhaps you could stop worrying and get to the gym. God, have you gotten fat.
–Binky
June 14th, 2006 at 8:46 am
if this is not a lie, and who can believe that, then it means when mpaa execs pay for others to steal evidence it is totally unjustified…why has the departyment of justice not rounded up the mpaa people who conspired to steal the evidence in THAT recent case?
June 14th, 2006 at 1:46 pm
“Morpheus: You take the blue pill and the story ends. You wake in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill and you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit-hole goes. Remember — all I am offering is the truth, nothing more.”
(Mitch Bainwol takes the blue pill and swallows it with a glass of water)
June 15th, 2006 at 4:47 pm
(Mitch Bainwol takes the blue pill and swallows it with a glass of water)
He then happily waddles off to the golf course….