[Leroy S. Mort]

Why stop there? Go after the power companies who supply the electricity to power all those thieving PCs and the hard drive manufacturers who produce all those huge storage devices.

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[Revolting cat!]

Brilliant! That's why they got their MBA's! All night brainstorming sessions yielding results.

[Chi-townChief]

And then wedding bands can sue the Recording Industry Association of America for all the wages they lost due to rent-a-DJ.

[canuck_conservative]

You're closer than you think!

A few years back, at the urging of the record industry, the Candian government was all set to introduce an "anticopying fee" of $5 per blank CD. They only backed down a few weeks before the announced start date when the public threatened a revolt, and have continued to threaten its re-introduction.

Greedy bunts!!!

[Nick Danger]

It gets to the point where these RIAA people are so arrogant, and so offensive, that even though the illegal copying is wrong, one hopes it puts these loathsome wretches out of business.

[TransOxus]

The music industry is a joke. With the liberals now completely in charge of the entertainmnet industry corporate takeover of radio stations, freedom of expression has gone out the window as DJs are now automated robots. There is no outlet for new music other than canned crap which is the fashion of the moment but soon forgotten. Creativity has been stifled. Blaming the internet is a joke especially when you consider the outrageous prices they still charge on music made in the past by the music stars who made them at much lower cost. Now they want to charge the ISPs!!! Look at yourselves you dumb liberals and realize you are the problem. Wait till everybody is on high speed internet, then internet radio and video station by many will bypass your stranglehold on distribution of music, musicians will no longer need record labels and companies when they can do it on non-restrictive outlets,

[HHFi]

These guys simply refuse to get it: people aren't buying CDs for the simple reason that the major labels are churning out crap that nobody wants to listen to. Apparently, nothing will hammer this into their thick skulls, not even the surprise sales success of Norah Jones, one of the few people who appeared on a widely-distributed label last year who actually has musical talent and knows what a good song is.

I am a music fan and a record collector, and I buy lots of CDs, but in my tens of thousands of LPs, singles, tapes and CDs, I don't have a single thing by Faith Hill, Britney Spears or any of the other flash-in-the-pan no talent rappers and hip-hoppers with their MTV-ready looks and tuneless, say-nothing songs that are being shoved down the radio listeners' ears. We're told that the labels push them because that's what people want, yet all of them are suffering from free-falling CD sales.

Meanwhile, here's a list of some people I consider to be the biggest talents in music, and whose CDs I always make it a point to buy. Best country singers: Don Williams and Lacy J. Dalton. Best pop songwriter: Marshall Crenshaw. Best female singer/songwriter: Amy Rigby. Best alt-country band: the Lucky Pierres. I could go on and on, and everyone I listed would have one thing in common: not a single one of them has a major label record deal. And until big time record executive weasels once again start signing and promoting artists based on their musical talent rather than their looks, fashion sense, attitude and age, they will continue to see their sales fall until they go bankrupt and have to stand around begging for cocaine on street corners. Can't happen soon enough to suit me.

[xrp]

Yeah, like this will fly...

The peer to peer applications that allow for file swapping will was born in the Internet underground and cannot be stopped. The RIAA is fighting a battle as winnable as the US War on Drugs. Sure, ISPs could block file downloading and also identify the song files that people are downloading, etc, but once this starts up, the file swapping will just morph again. Soon they'll move to encrypted forms of file swapping (this already exists in some underground circles) and at that point, the ISPs won't know what the heck the end-users are doing/downloading.

[dennisw]

Die RIAA die! You greed bags are headed to the ash heap.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

"We will hold ISPs more accountable," said Hillary Rosen, chairman and CEO the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA),

What an ego! What makes her think she or the RIAA has the power to make the ISPs do anything at all? Sue 'em! That's her answer for every woe the RIAA has. Just sue everybody...customers included.

[wolfman]

Money shouldn't be the motivation for making music anyway.

[sleeper-has-awakened]

Before I was able to download music I only bought about 2-3 CD's a year. With the peer to peer site I go to there are chat rooms generally set up by people interested in the same style of music. I had know idea that my favorite type of music was still alive and well. Progressive rock is not played anywhere on radio these days, but thanks to p2p sharing I was able to discover great music. I now buy about 50 CD's a year, thanks to the ability to check out new artists on mp3.

Of course, most of the CD's I buy now are from small independent labels, it would be interesting to see how the sales of small independent labels has been doing since file swapping started.
I think the major labels have missed the boat and are stuck in their old ways. The solution to their problem is quite simple, put out a better variety of music artists, reduce the cost of CD's to something reasonable like the costs old LP's and tapes from days gone by, and embrace the p2p technology to promote your artists, set up your own network and charge a monthly fee.

[jpl]

Almost fifty posts and Bush2000 still hasn't shown up yet?

[k2blader]

Bump for later read.

[Centurion2000]

The music industry is in a tailspin with global sales of CDs expected to fall six percent in 2003, its fourth consecutive annual decline. A major culprit, industry watchers say, is online piracy.

Lower your prices and this goes away ......

[Black Bart]

We should all be thankful that the notion of intellectual property did not exist when a prehistoric man (or woman) discovered fire. Imagine the royalties that patent would generate today!

The whole notion of "intellectual property" is a flimsy house of cards that will become indefensible eventually. It does not exist in a natural world.

[nononsense]

I remember when the RIAA had its panties in a bunch because there were websites devoted to listing the lyrics of songs. I believe they even had the police seize the servers of one of the websites. Now they have an even bigger problem.

A lot people refuse to pay between 13.99 to 18.99 for 11 to 15 songs album when they don't like half of the songs. Folks feel like they have been cheated and are looking for ways to screw the music companies.

[Flashman_at_the_charge]

This makes about as much sense as going after the USPS for lost revenue from internet cigarette sales.

[steve-b]

Music HCI Exec: ISPs Gunmakers Must Pay Up for Music-Swapping Armed Crimes