Copyright Law

When Big 4 move towards online subcription services, please do not patronize them

By Ty Rogers and Ray Beckerman

Excuse me folks, this is one of my off-topic posts, but I just had to get this off my chest. -R.B.

We have read, on Conde Naste Portfolio.com, that the Big 4 -- Warner Bros. Records, SONY BMG, EMI, and Vivendi/Universal -- are finally trying to get on board with selling music online on a subscription model, and that the person heading up this effort at Warner Brothers now says "I don't think we should be suing students and I don't think we should be suing people in their homes".

Well it's very nice to hear him say that, now, while his employer continues to bring new lawsuits, and to wreck the lives of innocent people, on a daily basis.

But I hope that when these idiots finally do open their subscription services, none of my readers will patronize them.

The lawsuit campaign is a campaign launched and managed by idiots, who have accomplished nothing except to hurt the lives of others while destroying their own companies.

We, the public, should remember what they have done, and not do business with them when they finally cave and beg the public to come back to them.

If you consider any subscription service, please be sure it's not one affiliated with, or even peddling the music of, any of those 4 companies or their labels (if you want to identify the labels to stay away from, that's real easy... go to the Index of Litigation Documents table of cases and look at the names of the record company plaintiffs. Here's a list: Arista, Atlantic, BMG, Capitol, Elektra, Fonovisa,
Interscope, LaFace, Lava, Loud, Maverick, Motown, Priority, SONY, UMG, Virgin, and Warner. As a matter of principle, we should never buy music from any of those companies.)

Please stick to independent music. Here's my partial list of places to get independent music online.

Thank you.

Keywords: digital copyright law online internet law legal download upload peer to peer p2p file sharing filesharing music movies indie independent label freeculture creative commons pop/rock artists riaa independent mp3 cd favorite songs intellectual property

Full post as published by Recording Industry vs The People on March 28, 2008 (boomark / email).