The RIAA - Pot and Kettle
I've been noticing the RIAA actually hates being in business. RIAA member companies have had videos pulled from YouTube where they claimed their music was infringed upon. In some cases, that may be true. In others, it simply isn't. I've seen mashup videos deleted because maybe two seconds (out of a 300 second title) might have contained company content. I've seen quite a few videos removed from YouTube by the RIAA and its gang of thugs where music is barely audible, and in some cases, there's so much noise its hard to tell there's even any background music at all. Some videos removed by RIAA companies never had any RIAA content - they were solo artists making new music and using YouTube to get their stuff out. Think about that for a moment, I'll get back to it.
RIAA claims its all because they want to protect their outdated and failed business model. I think the old business models should fail, to make room for new Internet-enabled business models. No, I don't mean the companies should go out of business, I'm saying they should modernize. The global communications network is here, and the success (or failure) of any business greatly depends on it. This global communications network has been in science fiction for the last 70 years, and we call it "Internet". Essentially, if you are a corporation and you want to be successful, you need a presence on the Internet, and more importantly, you need to contract with well-known Internet-based stores to stock their non-existent shelves with your content. That's your distribution infrastructure, and it costs mere pennies per few-thousand customer purchases (yes, transfer is incredibly cheap, and even free on some networks). While it is important to get your content out there, you also need to allow for discovery. If you don't embrace the Internet, you will fail.
Discovery is when someone finds new content they like, whether it be music, movies, or games. If they like it, they might buy it. If they don't like it, oh well, it just didn't fit with their tastes. But how do you allow for discovery? One way might be to license it to stream, podcast, and bittorrent shows, but that isn't good enough since audience sizes can be limited. The best way to allow for discovery is to simply let people tell each other about it. One person gets the content and their friends hear it. Or, a person rips it and uploads it somewhere. I can list off at least 20 tracks I got because I heard them on YouTube. Two more I got because they were included in Plasma Pong.
Yes, at least 20 tracks (perhaps even more) I got because I heard them on YouTube (told ya I'd get back to it). Scatman is one of them, I had heard it before, but you know how terrestrial broadcasters are, they never tell you what's playing. After nearly 8 years of knowing this song and knowing I liked it, I heard it on YouTube and the title was listed in the credits. I have only (about) 30 titles I got because I heard them on XM, and I've had XM for 3 years now, I've been a YouTuber for much less than that (only about the last 18 months). I also play Second Life, and there's a couple tracks (at least) I got because of SL. Someone was streaming them across voice, I asked what they were, and I purchased them. I purchased more music in a shorter amount of time with YouTube than XM or SL, because with YouTube, I have full control over the media I see, so I can view a lot in a relatively short amount of time.
So, aspiring artists use YouTube to get their music heard. Similar to 50 Cent, he used the Gnutella Network for the same purpose. People upload complete high-quality titles and others (like me) stream those videos, like the music, and buy the music. Its free advertising and it drives sales. In watching the RIAA continually remove videos due to "copyright violations", I can only assume the RIAA and its member companies are not in business to make sales. They are doing everything they can to make sure people cannot discover their content, thus making sure their sales numbers will drop, and then they will attribute those "lost" sales to the Internet and piracy, when it was through their own actions those sales were never made. Seems to me they are actually in the business of abusing the law to bankrupt people as their main source of income, and making sales being that low-priority thing off to the side.
With that mindset, its a miracle they've lasted this long.
RIAA claims its all because they want to protect their outdated and failed business model. I think the old business models should fail, to make room for new Internet-enabled business models. No, I don't mean the companies should go out of business, I'm saying they should modernize. The global communications network is here, and the success (or failure) of any business greatly depends on it. This global communications network has been in science fiction for the last 70 years, and we call it "Internet". Essentially, if you are a corporation and you want to be successful, you need a presence on the Internet, and more importantly, you need to contract with well-known Internet-based stores to stock their non-existent shelves with your content. That's your distribution infrastructure, and it costs mere pennies per few-thousand customer purchases (yes, transfer is incredibly cheap, and even free on some networks). While it is important to get your content out there, you also need to allow for discovery. If you don't embrace the Internet, you will fail.
Discovery is when someone finds new content they like, whether it be music, movies, or games. If they like it, they might buy it. If they don't like it, oh well, it just didn't fit with their tastes. But how do you allow for discovery? One way might be to license it to stream, podcast, and bittorrent shows, but that isn't good enough since audience sizes can be limited. The best way to allow for discovery is to simply let people tell each other about it. One person gets the content and their friends hear it. Or, a person rips it and uploads it somewhere. I can list off at least 20 tracks I got because I heard them on YouTube. Two more I got because they were included in Plasma Pong.
Yes, at least 20 tracks (perhaps even more) I got because I heard them on YouTube (told ya I'd get back to it). Scatman is one of them, I had heard it before, but you know how terrestrial broadcasters are, they never tell you what's playing. After nearly 8 years of knowing this song and knowing I liked it, I heard it on YouTube and the title was listed in the credits. I have only (about) 30 titles I got because I heard them on XM, and I've had XM for 3 years now, I've been a YouTuber for much less than that (only about the last 18 months). I also play Second Life, and there's a couple tracks (at least) I got because of SL. Someone was streaming them across voice, I asked what they were, and I purchased them. I purchased more music in a shorter amount of time with YouTube than XM or SL, because with YouTube, I have full control over the media I see, so I can view a lot in a relatively short amount of time.
So, aspiring artists use YouTube to get their music heard. Similar to 50 Cent, he used the Gnutella Network for the same purpose. People upload complete high-quality titles and others (like me) stream those videos, like the music, and buy the music. Its free advertising and it drives sales. In watching the RIAA continually remove videos due to "copyright violations", I can only assume the RIAA and its member companies are not in business to make sales. They are doing everything they can to make sure people cannot discover their content, thus making sure their sales numbers will drop, and then they will attribute those "lost" sales to the Internet and piracy, when it was through their own actions those sales were never made. Seems to me they are actually in the business of abusing the law to bankrupt people as their main source of income, and making sales being that low-priority thing off to the side.
With that mindset, its a miracle they've lasted this long.