The Copyright Debate...

Leonis · 01-22-2003, 06:46 PM

I've been thinking about the difference between filesharing of music and film, and how it affects the respective industries.

Going off an Australian perspective, I've come up with a few points.

Say a Movie and a CD are released on the same day.

* The CD costs between AUD$20 and AUD$30 - an average of AUD$25 - if it's a chart topper it will very soon be available between AUD$20 and AUD$25 at major retail outlets. You can take it home, or wherever you have a cd player and listen to it thousands(?) of times.

#The movie will cost you between AUD$8 and AUD$16 (depending on location and discount status - student/child etc...) And you may see it once, at a limited number of locations.

* Someone buys the CD, copies it and makes it available online with little or no quality loss.

# Someone takes a video camera into the cinema and records the film. Quality will vary, but will generally be poor to medium.

* Depending on your taste (mp3 vs. wav etc) and type of internet connection, you can download the entire CD in anything from a few minutes to a few hours.

# Again depending on quality and connection, the film download time will vary rapidly.

However, here we reach a major difference. Most people with a dialup connection won't bother with a whole film as it will take far too long and will likely drop out many times before finishing. (and forget about your download limit! Cheaper to keep seeing it in the movies)
Those with capped cable may not bother because it eats up way too much of their download limit too.

Many people who want to download the film will wait until a DVD copy comes online - by which time the movie studio (hopefully to them) has covered costs and made a profit. Again many people still won't bother as you only watch most movies once, your favorites relatively few time - and you need all that hard disk space for mp3s...

The CD is available from day one at full quality.

What would happen if music was released only in some sort of DVD format - with images interlaced to bolster the file size?

Would this have any effect? You could still get a pretty good analouge to digital copy without image by running a line out to line in from player tro recorder - or would there be other ways to seperate the audio easily with no loss?

Chewbacca · 01-22-2003, 07:06 PM

I think the problem with any sort of copy protection is the fact that copying for personal use is practicly a right gauranteed by law, at least here in America, so which ever way media is protected, it must be done so in a way that still allows for fair use.

It should also be noted that he markets for cd's and dvds are much different than each other. Dvd is a phenomonally growing market, where as cd's are in two straight years of 10% declines.

The first day sales of the best selling dvd of 2002 out sold the best selling cd of the entire year of 2002. I forget the details as I read this in billboard magazine at work.

Piracy of Dvd's are a problem though and the movie producers have far more resources to fight it than the music guys. I had a bootleg cart down the street from my store that sold bootleg and counterfiet cd's 2 for $10. Most of the cd's were for albums that weren't released ye, but soon.

This cart operated for a year and a half 20 feet from a police kiosk even after I contacted the RIAA, and 5 major record labels. One of the street reps put me on the phone with a vice president of the label so I could tell him how busy the cart was and how much my cd's sales declined.

Anyway. The cart started selling burned dvds of movies still in theatres about two months ago. Finally last week they were raided and shut down after almost two years of piracy and bootlegging in broad daylight.

On Monday they opened for business again, minus any DVD's, but still plenty of counterfeit and bootleg cd's.

Leonis · 01-22-2003, 07:58 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Chewbacca:
EDIT SNIP: It's just above.

Agreed 100% on the fair use issue. If the 'DMVD' idea did work, it could still be coppied easily, but make the task of downloading it a chore - not what the kids want. It only be a minimisation patch, not a solution. But it may be completely unworkable - just a thought that struck me.

Your stats and the cart tale are quite amazing - interesting that at least three of the "Big Five" record co.s are owned by parents that also make movies (Universal, Sony, Warners - not sure whether the other two do or not) yet they seem to only act when their movies are threatened...

[ 01-22-2003, 08:00 PM: Message edited by: Leonis ]

Leonis · 01-22-2003, 08:55 PM

Well here's something great

The wonderful service that allows artists to promote their music free of charge thus making it ok to steal anyone's music was known as mp3.com

Now renamed "MajorProfit$.com" here's their latest news on how their recent sale to a major - Universal/Vivendi has made the whole system better for everyone...

Quote:

MP3.com's latest artist annnouncement:
Artist Alert

Dear Artist,

We just wanted to remind you about the launch of our all-new Gold Service and some other big changes to the Artist program.

Introducing the Gold Service!
The Gold Service offers fewer of the Platinum Service (formerly the Premium Artist Service) benefits for a lower fee of only $4.99 a month or $49.99 a year. Gold benefits include priority customer support; faster song, image and CD approvals; and the ability to list up to 100 songs on your Artist page. Learn more!

The New Song Limitation
After January 31, you will not be able to display more than three songs on your Artist page. If your page displays four or more songs, it will automatically default to display the three most recently uploaded songs. Important: You will not need to re-upload songs as a result of this change, and the Song Admin allows you to quickly and easily change the songs you'd like displayed. If you have a lot of songs you'd like displayed all the time, consider joining the Gold Service which offers a 100 song maximum. Learn more.

Artist Cash Going Away
Artist Cash will be discontinued on January 31, 2003 due to accounting and engineering resource issues. If you have an Artist Cash balance, please read our FAQ about how this change will affect you, and consider applying your balance to our fabulous new Gold Service! Learn more.
Read more about today's changes.

Sincerely,

The MP3.com Artist Team

Pay for play rises again! Yay! I'm so happy I could just wet myself! [img]graemlins/1puke.gif[/img]

01-22-2003, 06:46 PM	#1
Leonis Symbol of Cyric Join Date: March 6, 2001 Location: Somewhere on Earth - it changes often Posts: 1,292	I've been thinking about the difference between filesharing of music and film, and how it affects the respective industries. Going off an Australian perspective, I've come up with a few points. Say a Movie and a CD are released on the same day. * The CD costs between AUD$20 and AUD$30 - an average of AUD$25 - if it's a chart topper it will very soon be available between AUD$20 and AUD$25 at major retail outlets. You can take it home, or wherever you have a cd player and listen to it thousands(?) of times. #The movie will cost you between AUD$8 and AUD$16 (depending on location and discount status - student/child etc...) And you may see it once, at a limited number of locations. * Someone buys the CD, copies it and makes it available online with little or no quality loss. # Someone takes a video camera into the cinema and records the film. Quality will vary, but will generally be poor to medium. * Depending on your taste (mp3 vs. wav etc) and type of internet connection, you can download the entire CD in anything from a few minutes to a few hours. # Again depending on quality and connection, the film download time will vary rapidly. However, here we reach a major difference. Most people with a dialup connection won't bother with a whole film as it will take far too long and will likely drop out many times before finishing. (and forget about your download limit! Cheaper to keep seeing it in the movies) Those with capped cable may not bother because it eats up way too much of their download limit too. Many people who want to download the film will wait until a DVD copy comes online - by which time the movie studio (hopefully to them) has covered costs and made a profit. Again many people still won't bother as you only watch most movies once, your favorites relatively few time - and you need all that hard disk space for mp3s... The CD is available from day one at full quality. What would happen if music was released only in some sort of DVD format - with images interlaced to bolster the file size? Would this have any effect? You could still get a pretty good analouge to digital copy without image by running a line out to line in from player tro recorder - or would there be other ways to seperate the audio easily with no loss? __________________ Better run through the jungle! Grrr...

01-22-2003, 07:06 PM	#2
Chewbacca Zartan Join Date: July 18, 2001 Location: America, On The Beautiful Earth Age: 50 Posts: 5,373	I think the problem with any sort of copy protection is the fact that copying for personal use is practicly a right gauranteed by law, at least here in America, so which ever way media is protected, it must be done so in a way that still allows for fair use. It should also be noted that he markets for cd's and dvds are much different than each other. Dvd is a phenomonally growing market, where as cd's are in two straight years of 10% declines. The first day sales of the best selling dvd of 2002 out sold the best selling cd of the entire year of 2002. I forget the details as I read this in billboard magazine at work. Piracy of Dvd's are a problem though and the movie producers have far more resources to fight it than the music guys. I had a bootleg cart down the street from my store that sold bootleg and counterfiet cd's 2 for $10. Most of the cd's were for albums that weren't released ye, but soon. This cart operated for a year and a half 20 feet from a police kiosk even after I contacted the RIAA, and 5 major record labels. One of the street reps put me on the phone with a vice president of the label so I could tell him how busy the cart was and how much my cd's sales declined. Anyway. The cart started selling burned dvds of movies still in theatres about two months ago. Finally last week they were raided and shut down after almost two years of piracy and bootlegging in broad daylight. On Monday they opened for business again, minus any DVD's, but still plenty of counterfeit and bootleg cd's. __________________ Support Local Music and Record Stores! Got Liberty?

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