Pippin, guess we'll just have to agree to mostly disagree regarding the impact of piracy on the music business. You seem to want to substantially discount the impact, preferring to assign blame to various aspects of corporate greed.
However, big corporations have always been greedy, and the music companies are no exception. Your example regarding MTV is hardly new. Up to 1941, ASCAP was virtually the sole US copyright entity. Their contract with the radio stations was expiring and on renewal, they attempted to double dip on the fees charged for radio stations to broadcast music. The stations refused. ASCAP simply assumed they had all the cards in their hand and the stations would cave in short order. They didn't, but instead formed BMI and started broadcasting public domain material (they say Stephen Foster had a big revival). The radio stations also started recording their own music, using musicians and composers not under the ASCAP contract. This consisted heavily of country/hillbilly and black music, which became very popular with the public. The styles eventually merged to become rock 'n roll. It sure disrupted the status quo, but the big music companies eventually co-opted the upstart and absorbed them into the corporate structure. Time will tell if the music industry figures a way to live with the new reality. While some of their problems were indeed self-created (the MTV situation sounds like a near repeat of 1941), a lot of people would disagree with you that piracy is not a problem. A widespread sense of entitlement is an issue and has its costs, whether they are fully understood in advance or not. I'll now bow out of this discussion, as I've pretty much said what I have to say. Hope you find something good to listen to this evening. I'm enjoying the Schubert Ensemble's version of Franck's Piano Quintet in F minor. Good stuff. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ mlsstl's Profile: http://forums.slimdevices.com/member.php?userid=9598 View this thread: http://forums.slimdevices.com/showthread.php?t=95541 _______________________________________________ audiophiles mailing list audiophiles@lists.slimdevices.com http://lists.slimdevices.com/mailman/listinfo/audiophiles
