The Pirates Can't Be Stopped

[el jopez]

Internet piracy is a major concern to the both the music and movie
industry. For years the industry has attempted to fight off what would
other wise profit them billions of dollars in revenue.

What follows is a very lengthy yet well written article that shines light on
an often neglected perspective in the "online war". What goes on here makes the
battle between Blu-Ray and HD-DVD look like a fight between incapacitated
toddlers. For those wondering why Hollywood is greatly interested in an online distribution model for its products, this article well help clear up much confusion.

The Pirates Can't Be Stopped

by Daniel Roth
















February 2008 Issue

This
teenager hacked into the outfit charged with protecting companies like
Sony, Universal, and Activision from online piracy—the most daring
exploit yet in the escalating war between fans and corporate giants.
Guess which side is winning.

[oldtimer]

The idea that every pirated movie is equivalent to a retail sale and wholesale profit is patently false. Yet that's how the industry comes up with these numbers. Many who will watch a pirated flick for free would not have purchased the authorized release. I would love to see a figure that includes an amount of what the exposure is worth factored in. Remember, this is a product that is inherently by its nature (entertainment) a waste of time. The real crime is just how many millions have been made by those attached to it.

[oldbuckster]

I stated long ago HD-DVD, and BLU-RAY aren't about better product for the consumer, it's about PIRACY, period !!!!!!

[Jay481985]

darn I thought this thread was supposed to be about captain jack and how the pirates of the carribean franchise cannot be stopped!

[Islander]

Remember, this is a product that is inherently by its nature (entertainment) a waste of time. The real crime is just how many millions have been made by those attached to it.

First, I don't believe entertainment is a waste of time. Some entertainment (well, maybe not all that much from Hollywood) is art, especially music, and I've never considered art to be a waste of time.

Second, if you think entertainment is overpriced, and some certainly is, just don't buy it. Prices that are perceived to be too high don't justify stealing the product.

Wedding photographers run into this all the time. It used to be standard practice to let the happy couple take home a set of proofs so they could choose which pictures they wanted enlarged for the wedding albums. Not any more! Clients will take home the little 4x6s and scan and print them for their friends. The prints won't be pro quality, but they'll be cheaper and be "good enough" for cheapskates. Then people see these machine prints and are told they were done by a pro, even if they were printed at Wal-Mart, which sure doesn't help the reputation of the professional photographer, so he loses on both present and future sales.

Entertainment, like most other things, is priced according to what the market will bear. If no-one grumbles at least a little bit at the cost of a product, it's likely underpriced. If no-one buys it, it's overpriced. It's as simple as that. Sports stars also make buckets of money, but someone is buying all the tickets that pay them.

[Jay481985]

Art and entertainment are two separate things. The reason why monets and van gogh paintings are expensive is because one they are beautiful and two a little sinister but they are tax exempt. Why does that make such a big deal? Well when you die and want to let your kids inherit your wealth uncle sam takes a big percentage or the so called death tax. But artwork is non taxed so when you die, your children do not have to pay 49% of the 100 million dollar monet so they get to keep it in entirety until they sell it but at that point the monet will be 200 million!

[boom3]

When I clicked this link an in-frame message came up saying "this website has been compromised" and then I was forced back here. My PC defenses did something and opened a DOS box for an instant.

You may want to delete that link for safety.

[jacksonbart]

I love Captain Crunch.

[mas]

The real crime is just how many millions have been made by those attached to it.

It is exactly this sentiment with which I veheminently disagree.

Because someome is intelligent enough to market a product to millions of people, rather than to market it on an individual basis does not make anyone or thing a "crime" or obscene or any of the other absurd descriptions too often attributed to it. Because someone chooses to use non-linear means of promotion and distribution leveraging the Internet, large scale stadium sales, or various other media to reach many instead of a few does not make the monies earned, nor the people who perform the service any less entitled to the revenue.

The old saw that says artists, authors, athletes, Ron Popiel, or the music industry less entitled to their earnings because they appeal to a larger market than someone who does not is simply resentful whiny classist thinking. I don't care how much education one has, or how noble one is in their endeavors, the comparison that says one is more entitled than another to their earnings simply based upon the economies of scale of their market is baseless.

The only sad thing is that so many of us were not educated to understand this from the onset and and we are not educated regarding how to access and use the system to excel rather than simply being taught to go to school, work hard and make good grades, and get a good secure job working for someone else that is an out of date message applicable to another time and age which ignores the current world and market. A message applicable to the industrial age, but terribly antiquated in the information age. And the resultant resentment of those who have managed to leverage the newer business models by those who have not is little more than a whine.

And as regards the music industry, I fear the focus is simply on how to hang on to the old model, rather than understanding the changing market structure. What seems to be missed in the discussion is the fundamental shift in market structure that underlies the 'crisis'. The implications of the change from a vertical to a horizontal business and marketing structure is all but missed. But DRM is no less an issue in either business and marketing model.

Wired magazine has a couple of articles that actually explore some of the changes in the market structure that both explains and deliniates some of the evolving market models. And the reaction of the traditional market structure to the changes is what so many are focusing upon and crying about rather than understanding the direction in which the industry is headed. In other words, the majority of the attention is focused upon listening to the cries of those deparately trying to hang onto the old model as they experience market changes which they have attempted to resist rather than leverage.

So, might I suggest that you check out David Byrne's article in Wired regarding the changing music market:

http://www.wired.com/entertainment/music/magazine/16-01/ff_byrne

Another article that discusses various models, including the limits to a free market envisioned by so many idealists, is conducted with David Byrne and Thom Yorke

http://www.wired.com/entertainment/music/magazine/16-01/ff_yorke

And more importantly, the changes they describe are in no way limited to the music industry, and the more important message may be how these changes are impacting our world in a larger sense, and the degree to which we each understand and leverage them. What would be nice is if we all started to better understand and impliment such an understanding to our advantage rather than to simply lament the changes.

[oldbuckster]

Ah Yes, Progress ............. Isn't life Grand ? ............ No matter what they do, there will always be a nurd somewhere, smarter than they are. All the gloom and doom for the Recording Industry, they did it to themselves. They want more sales, and less Piracy, simple then, LOWER YOUR PRICES, offer more selection, and give the consumer the best product available .............. doesn't seem hard to me !!!!!!!!!!!

[mas]

Nope.

You treat the problem as if the market has remained the same that it has traditionally been and that the only issue is their price structure!

Nothing could be further from the truth. You obviously did not read the associated articles where a prominent act has tried giving away away their new album and how spectatcularly sucessful that was(n't).

The problem is that the market structure has changed and many of us, the record companies included, are still looking at it in the same old obsolete manner!

And as far as "simply lower THEIR prices", despite the cost of distribution increasing, its always nice to hear some tell others that they should earn less money. But you never seem to hear these same folks volunteering to take a cut in their own salaries...Isn't that strange that only OTHERS are supposed to make the sacrifice that these folks refuse to personally consider.

The business models have changed, yet many have not kept up with it. And the fundamental problem is that the music industry has for the most part retained their industrial age conception of the marketplace and product delivery to the exclusion of the newer current information age model that has not waited for them to modify their perspective.

And the complaints of many reflect this same lack of understanding of the changes in the world marketplace.

You might want to read the Byrne articles for an introduction to the realities of the new marketplace.

[oldtimer]

Well Mas maybe by now you have figured out that sometimes I will post statements meant to provoke further discussion. Your post was most enjoyable and i will read the links when I get the time. i have no problem with artists making all the money they can from their work, however the history of the music industry has not favored many artists. Islander, I'm glad you brought up the point of art versus entertainment, a concept which i also hoped would surface. Don't think that when i say "waste of time" that it is necessarily a negative. Entertainment and even to a certain extent art is only obtainable when there exists enough leisure time to create and then enjoy it. The contrast between the performance arts as they are called and the traditional arts when seen as a business model through time is worthy of further comment and study. For instance, Van Gogh and painters in general simply do not collect royalties every time their painting is viewed. Yet how is the creation of a masterpiece on canvass to be valued in a different way than the creation of a jazz masterpiece (or insert whatever floats your boat)? If you listen you must pay, and hopefully a portion goes to the composer/artist. But just feast your eyes on a sculpture or canvass and hey, it doesn't matter, the first buyer already paid for it. Every buyer after that (much like a share of stock) is paying the previous owner, with no funds accruing to the creator.

[oldbuckster]

mas, you completely misread what I posted, RECORDING industry GREED killed the industry ........... they shot themselves .... there is no way it's $18.98 to make, distribute, and sell a CD ......... Yes the world is changing, has changed, but not for the better, in this man's opinion, and that's all any of this is; opinion ...................... EH !!!!!!!!!

[mas]

mas, you completely misread what I posted, RECORDING industry GREED killed the industry ........... they shot themselves .... there is no way it's $18.98 to make, distribute, and sell a CD .........

Nope.

But I love how you also include the retailers mark up in "the recording industry greed" as well.

You are listening to the whine of an industry akin to the shoe industry complaining that the market has changed and that we should all go back to how business used to be conducted. rather than embracing the change and developing other streams of delivery. The market has developed in spite of them, and you are hearing the cries of dying industry desperately grasping for every last penny that is quickly slipping through their fingers and beyond their grasp as the market shifts to digital delivery independent of the need for a centrally managed and promoted vertical market organization.

Read Byrne's article and you will see how the market has shifted, and how the industry no longer is required to manage, produce, market and distribute product. THAT is the cause for their demise - AND their panic.

And most folks here fail to understand nor appreciate it as well, as most of us simply want cheaper CDs. The fact is, we are also the anachronistic mirror image of the record companies to the degree that we resist the changing market model as well and resist the notion of audio and video as being part of a larger network attached service! Yup, any day now...records will make a comeback.... Yup! And any moment now the Internet will go away and we will see a reurgence in the brick and mortar marketplace... ROFLMAO.

Like it or not, it has already changed - we just haven't yet seen the extent and the implications fully manifest!

What you fail to understand, is that in a digital marketplace, the ENTIRE baggage of the old supply chain management model is an anachronism! Shipping, inventory management, duplicate formats - CD, DVD, HDDVD, BR, etc - cutouts, returns, defects, and all of the incredible labor costs to manage it, etc.; it is ALL baggage. It isn't whether the cost of a CD is $18.95, or $16.05 or $1.00 - its ALL unnecessary expense and baggage in the new information based economy!

But you fail to think that all of the infrastructure of the record industry wants a raise too, and healthcare, and paid vacations, and childcare, ...and all of the perks YOU demand but begrudge them! You see, their costs are rising too! But you don't see them as people, you simply see them as a "greedy industry". And your whine is part of the reason that this entire model is going away - along with the jobs and salaries and healthcare; as there is a more efficient and economical model! Without all of those whiny greedy employees..

And like it or not, in the digital information age delivery network, DRM is here to stay, as that is the new management tool for digitally delivered product - should they choose to regulate it..

[el jopez]

When I clicked this link an in-frame message came up saying "this website has been compromised" and then I was forced back here. My PC defenses did something and opened a DOS box for an instant.

You may want to delete that link for safety.

I cannot imagine why, works perfectly on my end. Would you like for me to post the entire article here? Would be about the same length as one of Mas's posts []

[oldbuckster]

Lets make it simple here ................... Consumer ; Overpays .... Artist's ; Underpaid ..... Recording Industry ; Fat, Rich, and looking for more, poor management, failure to adjust to market trends, paying way too much money, for way too little talent, ...... I feel no pain for the Recording Industry, I still buy their product, and would buy more in a more affordable price range, as would many more people .................. I think DVD's are a better dollar to dollar investment right now ................ but I'm sure mas will tell me I'm whining ..................I am !!!!!!!!!! and, I've missed the point ........ probably !!!!

[mas]

Buck, my gripe with your incessant whine is that you treat the "greedy recording industry" as if it consists only of an overpaid CEO without understanding that the VAST majority of "The Industry" are just individuals who earn a salary (which the vast majority feel is inadaquate) just like everyone else here. I know quite a few of them. They aren't rich. They don't lounge at Tropez. They bust their rears everyday for a diminishing market.

And most of them are sick of listening to the hordes who have decided that they are entitled to the product of other's labor for free.

But whatever you do, don't read the Byrne article. And Byrne is the same David Byrne from the Talking Heads who is no fan of the traditional recording industry. So don't read it and understand how the traditional industry has been structured and how the evolving marketplace has forced the change in business models and thus understand how the market is changing and how your ideas are just as antiquated as the old monolithic recording industry's model.

Your complaint is just the consumer perspective that compliments the traditional industry's complaint as well as the retail music distributors who are also watching their businesses go under. You're two sides of the same coin.

The fact is that my purchases of 'newer' music has declined dramatically. And most of my purchases are filling in either previously unreleased older material or of classical, with only a smattering of new stuff. And I want hard copies and eschew the MP3/iTunes model. I have no use for disposable volatile low-fi material. But then I don't buy ringtones either or text. I guess I could whine about the development of the market that doesn't suit my purposes. Instead I ignore it and don't pay for it. But I certainly understand the changes in the business models in response to the changing technologies and marketplace.

So you can become familiar with the challenges and the changes and either embrace the newer models or complain as the Titanic slips beneath the waves due to the inability or unwillingness to adapt - and wonder why... But whatever you do, don't read the articles and address the topic from a substantial POV instead of an emotional POV. That's no fun, as if you do that, there is no room for insipid whining.

So, to which part of the traditional business model cost structure do you object? Gee, I think they omitted the "CEO Windfall" category!

[oldbuckster]

I am not a David Byrne fan ...... not a fan of the Talking Heads ..... mas you are correct, I have a problem with Big Business !!!!!!!!

[mas]

What does being a fan of David Byrne or of the Talking Heads have to do with anything?[*-)]

Or for that matter, why should anything of substance make a difference to an emotional position... []

[][][]

[Duke Spinner]

i simply don't buy much new music, because the artist's .... sux ...[*-)]