Mom charged $80,000 per song for file sharing

[BlueTear]

Heard of supply and demand? It's what our entire market is based on, more supply than demand and the price drops, more demand than supply and the price rises. With computers the supply of a game, song, movie is theoretically infinite. Yet the price hasn't dropped to nothing. It's run by a monopoly, as ONLY one group are selling the object, they could charge you $100 a song and you can't go elsewhere as that place will also have to charge you $100 a song or they won't be allowed to sell you the song.

A) "theoretical infinite supply" is [cabbage], more or less. The creation of an additional copy is practically free, sure, but that first item that is being copied still has a production cost. A game - which is considerably easier to use as an example because we don't have to deal with the whole "but artists can make money from performing" - still has a development cost assosciated with it. Someone has to pay that cost, and the idea that file-sharing is fine is either incredibly naive (you don't really see that someone needs to be paid) or incredibly arrogant (you see that someone has to pay, but it sure as hell ain't going to be you). You can argue that the current costs are not reasonable, and I'll agree, you can argue that the current business model most commonly employed will never be able to charge reasonable prices, and I'll agree again.

 

 

 

But someone, somewhere, still has to pay for this "theoretically infinite" supply.

 

 

 

B) It's still a luxury product. Even if there was only one company in the entire world that produced music (or movies, or games) and sold it for five billion dollars a piece, you'd still survive without it. They're not selling air. They're not selling water. They're not selling food. Raving about how expensive it is is pointless; If it's too expensive, don't use it til they get the hint. The fact that you complain that it's too expensive and then consume it anyway just fuels their fires through lawsuits like this. Imagine how quickly they'd founder if all the people going "it's too expensive" would just stop using their products.

[Zierro]

It's still a luxury product. Even if there was only one company in the entire world that produced music (or movies, or games) and sold it for five billion dollars a piece, you'd still survive without it. They're not selling air. They're not selling water. They're not selling food. Raving about how expensive it is is pointless; If it's too expensive, don't use it til they get the hint. The fact that you complain that it's too expensive and then consume it anyway just fuels their fires through lawsuits like this. Imagine how quickly they'd founder if all the people going "it's too expensive" would just stop using their products.

 

 

 

You're right, but they can also survive without that five billion dollars. Also, one person has a very minimal impact on the market. Unless you somehow convinced every single person to boycott it along with you, your personal boycott would be pretty futile and it would be wiser to just obtain it without paying, realistically speaking.

[Furah]

I'm 14. I don't have the damned money to buy a new game every day. I don't have the money to buy the new Maxïmo Park album.

The record companies ("the selfish nazi's") want more money than they can get. You want more digital entertainment than you can pay for ("fourteen year old without money").

 

 

 

Greed's greed. Since survival without more digitial entertainment than you can pay for is still perfectly possible, I fail to see any argument in regards to the record companies greed that couldn't be turned against you. I mean, [cabbage], if you break copyright on a textbook or two to further your own education, that's one thing. But music? Video games? Movies? They're luxury products. Not a neccesity, and certainly not a right.

 

Heard of supply and demand? It's what our entire market is based on, more supply than demand and the price drops, more demand than supply and the price rises. With computers the supply of a game, song, movie is theoretically infinite. Yet the price hasn't dropped to nothing. It's run by a monopoly, as ONLY one group are selling the object, they could charge you $100 a song and you can't go elsewhere as that place will also have to charge you $100 a song or they won't be allowed to sell you the song.

 

 

 

You can consider me "for" piracy, but this is the most [developmentally delayed] piece of logic I've ever read. Do you even know what a monopoly is?

 

mo?nop?o?ly

 

 

 

noun, plural -lies.

 

1. exclusive control of a commodity or service in a particular market, or a control that makes possible the manipulation of prices.

 

Either my interpretation of that is wrong, or recording industries do have a control that makes possible the manipulation of prices.

[BlueTear]

You're right, but they can also survive without that five billion dollars. Also, one person has a very minimal impact on the market. Unless you somehow convinced every single person to boycott it along with you, your personal boycott would be pretty futile and it would be wiser to just obtain it without paying, realistically speaking.

 

Yes, living off of wellfare while producing digitial entertainment from the goodness of their hearts.

 

 

 

Come. On. The vast majority of the digital entertainment consumed by what we'll sloppily refer to as "the masses" is produced with a clear commercial purpose, funded by commercial interests. That means that that song you downloaded, or the game, or the movie, the soundtech ensuring a proper digital copy, had a salary. He was paid. Or the actor. Or the quest designer. Or the graphical artist. It's their respective livelyhoods (notice again how we're neatly ignoring the whole "musicicians can perform for their money!" argument by focusing on other forms of digital entertainment).

 

 

 

Gina the Graphical Artist might be able to survive without the money her studious latest game would have brought in, but she sure as hell won't be making money as a graphical artist. And while you might get by just fine without her game, she probably needed that salary to buy lunch.

 

 

 

Someone still has to pay. There's plenty of ways to organize that payment - the current mostly used system being old, outdated and dying - but you'll never get around it. Games do not spring into being because a richass board of directors chanted satanic verses for 21 days, they're produced by people with salaries. Salaries someone has to pay.

 

 

 

 

 

And realistically speaking, how many songs worth of sales via, say, iTunes were the record companies awarded in fines in this lawsuit? How much money are they making from essentially legalized extortion from people who'd they'd get squat from if they didn't act like they heroinists who NEEDS THEIR FIX PLZ?

 

 

 

Fueling their fires.

[Zierro]

Not getting paid 5 billion dollars = living on welfare? That's a strange theory.

 

 

 

I do think artists deserve reasonable compensation, but 5 billion dollars isn't reasonable at all. You seem to be putting the producers on a higher pedestal than the consumers, even though we're talking about a mutual exchange here. Both parties are providing something for each other. Money for cd's, cd's for money. You say that consumers can simply stop using/buying/obtaining (can't think of a good word here) it if they don't like the price. Well, it can go both ways. The producers can stop producing if they don't like their material being pirated just as well - but of course, they're both ridiculous things to do and don't solve anything at all. That was my point.

[Nadril]

Come. On. The vast majority of the digital entertainment consumed by what we'll sloppily refer to as "the masses" is produced with a clear commercial purpose, funded by commercial interests. That means that that song you downloaded, or the game, or the movie, the soundtech ensuring a proper digital copy, had a salary. He was paid. Or the actor. Or the quest designer. Or the graphical artist. It's their respective livelyhoods (notice again how we're neatly ignoring the whole "musicicians can perform for their money!" argument by focusing on other forms of digital entertainment).

 

 

 

You're right. However, as long as we are talking about music, the current model for selling music is broken. Shelling out $15-$20 for a CD is pretty expensive, and I think that the industry needs to realize this. I still stand by what artists such as NIN have done with their music. They have moved away from the big record company (who ends up taking most of the money from sales anyways) and started their own based around the idea of digital content and free content. Want the album for free? Go ahead! However if you want an album with extras on it feel free to pay for it, and they do this by having several different models of albums. They actually made more money than had they been with a record label this way, it's incredible really.

 

 

 

And that's really just the tip of the iceburg. If artists would realize that if you go down the same road as NIN you can fuel a lot of profit just by sticking an advert on the download page for your album. [cabbage], you'll probably make close to what you'd get for an album sale if you stuck with the RIAA.

 

 

 

So I wish that more artists would catch on, because the RIAA are just crooks. Not only do they not give the artists any money from these lawsuits (no their only purpose is to line the rich business mans pockets) but artists just don't make much from CD sales period.

 

 

 

Gina the Graphical Artist might be able to survive without the money her studious latest game would have brought in, but she sure as hell won't be making money as a graphical artist. And while you might get by just fine without her game, she probably needed that salary to buy lunch.

 

 

 

 

You're assuming a couple of things here.

 

 

 

- That she's going to get fired because someone pirated the game.

 

- That the pirate would have bought the game in the first place.

 

 

 

With the first one she's going to make most of her salary on that project while the game is still in development, so her not being able to afford lunch because of someone pirating a game is silly. Of course you then also assume that the pirate would have just gone out and bought the game in the first place, had he not been able to download it. You assume that they download these things because they feel they need them when in reality it's more of just getting it because you can, or because you want something to do. Everything I pirate and download I have had no intentions of buying, ever. It's not taking money out of their pockets (although yes, it is still wrong).

 

 

 

Someone still has to pay. There's plenty of ways to organize that payment - the current mostly used system being old, outdated and dying - but you'll never get around it. Games do not spring into being because a richass board of directors chanted satanic verses for 21 days, they're produced by people with salaries. Salaries someone has to pay.

 

 

 

I kind of talked about what I think about current payment systems for music, but for games? For one I think that developers need to realize that if they add in value to their game people will buy it. Online multiplayer, free DLC (or cheap DLC support after the game has come out) and even just having a game that lasts for longer than 5 hours will make people want to buy your product. In fact the biggest chunk of games that I pirate (and I don't really pirate many of them) are those which are so short that it would have been better to rent them, and trust me when I say if I could I would.

 

 

 

Well, there is a forth thing too -- STOP PUTTING INVASIVE DRM IN YOUR PRODUCTS. As a consumer this does not make me want to buy your product, because it's just going to infest my PC with DRM. I will never buy a game that has such invasive DRM in it to where it limits how I can enjoy my game. Things such as install limits (you can only install 5 times and then you're SOL!) are so stupidly done because they only serve to hurt the legit customer.

 

 

 

The one kind of DRM I support is the steam service, just because of how damn nice it is. Being able to download a game on any PC, at any time, just with your steam account is incredible support. Throw this in with steam cloud, which saves your game settings, and it's so easy to switch PC's or whatever have you with steam. Throw in great achievement support, friends list support and great deals (seriously, steam has some of the best deals on games anywhere) and you've got a service that I can support 100%.

 

 

 

THIS is how you win over customers, and THIS is how you combat piracy. You don't fight it with invasive DRM, you don't fight it with lawsuits. You fight it with an understanding that your consumer is a person, a good person. The second you assume off the bat that your consumer is a thief all bets are off.

 

 

 

And realistically speaking, how many songs worth of sales via, say, iTunes were the record companies awarded in fines in this lawsuit? How much money are they making from essentially legalized extortion from people who'd they'd get squat from if they didn't act like they heroinists who NEEDS THEIR FIX PLZ?

 

 

 

I still can't really tell what side you're on, if any. It is extortion plain and clear -- charging such a ridiculous price for 24 songs is just stupid. I mean, if I walked into a record store today and stole two albums (and then got caught) I wouldn't get fined NEAR as much as what this woman got fined.

[Wisp]

Well Nadril, you manage to cover any points I really would have made, and even used the same examples as I would have. Nine inch nails (though I think Trent is retiring, unfortunately, or atleast stopping touring) has been one of the first major artists to support free music, and p2p file sharing as a way of distributing music, which I really admire Trent Reznor (Trent is nine inch nails, for anyone who doesn't know).

 

What gets me to keep purchasing Valve games from steam, is the support they give most of their newer games. Like with tf2, it came out two years ago about, and there are frequent updates ranging from bug-fixes, to tons of content and new maps and all. That's the way to get people to buy your games.

 

 

 

Anything I might pirate is something I wouldn't buy. No one's losing anything there.

[Nadril]

Well Nadril, you manage to cover any points I really would have made, and even used the same examples as I would have. Nine inch nails (though I think Trent is retiring, unfortunately, or atleast stopping touring) has been one of the first major artists to support free music, and p2p file sharing as a way of distributing music, which I really admire Trent Reznor (Trent is nine inch nails, for anyone who doesn't know).

 

What gets me to keep purchasing Valve games from steam, is the support they give most of their newer games. Like with tf2, it came out two years ago about, and there are frequent updates ranging from bug-fixes, to tons of content and new maps and all. That's the way to get people to buy your games.

 

 

 

Anything I might pirate is something I wouldn't buy. No one's losing anything there.

 

 

 

I forgot to mention too that with PC games I wish there could be some rental kind of service (possibly through steam). That way you could rent those shorter games that aren't really worth buying, because honestly that really hurts more than anything compared to consoles.

 

 

 

 

 

Also while this doesn't have something to do with PC Gaming, used video game sales hurt the industry probably just as much or more than what piracy does. The reason why is that a person going into a shop has the intentions on buying the game, but if they decide to buy the used game (for a $5 discount more or less) then that money goes right to the retail chain and not to the studio who created the game. If anything the used industry is a much worse offender than piracy will ever be, at least in the video game industry. If I'm going to buy something (personally) I'm going to buy the new version, not the used.

[Furah]

Also while this doesn't have something to do with PC Gaming, used video game sales hurt the industry probably just as much or more than what piracy does. The reason why is that a person going into a shop has the intentions on buying the game, but if they decide to buy the used game (for a $5 discount more or less) then that money goes right to the retail chain and not to the studio who created the game. If anything the used industry is a much worse offender than piracy will ever be, at least in the video game industry. If I'm going to buy something (personally) I'm going to buy the new version, not the used.

 

Which is why I shop at EB Games when there is a sale on. :

 

Today I picked up a copy of Rainbow Six Vegas 2 for $25AU, which is near enough half of the cost of it preowned ($45AU). Now if you'll excuse me I'm off to go play it. :D

[Stragomagus]

Well Nadril, you manage to cover any points I really would have made, and even used the same examples as I would have. Nine inch nails (though I think Trent is retiring, unfortunately, or atleast stopping touring) has been one of the first major artists to support free music, and p2p file sharing as a way of distributing music, which I really admire Trent Reznor (Trent is nine inch nails, for anyone who doesn't know).

 

What gets me to keep purchasing Valve games from steam, is the support they give most of their newer games. Like with tf2, it came out two years ago about, and there are frequent updates ranging from bug-fixes, to tons of content and new maps and all. That's the way to get people to buy your games.

 

 

 

Anything I might pirate is something I wouldn't buy. No one's losing anything there.

 

 

 

I forgot to mention too that with PC games I wish there could be some rental kind of service (possibly through steam). That way you could rent those shorter games that aren't really worth buying, because honestly that really hurts more than anything compared to consoles.

 

 

 

 

 

Also while this doesn't have something to do with PC Gaming, used video game sales hurt the industry probably just as much or more than what piracy does. The reason why is that a person going into a shop has the intentions on buying the game, but if they decide to buy the used game (for a $5 discount more or less) then that money goes right to the retail chain and not to the studio who created the game. If anything the used industry is a much worse offender than piracy will ever be, at least in the video game industry. If I'm going to buy something (personally) I'm going to buy the new version, not the used.

 

 

 

Hold it right there. Have you not ever heard of the first sale rule? After it has been sold once, the developers have already made their money and are no longer entitled to anymore after that, subscription based games do not apply. A thriving second-hand industry actually adds value to what was originally bought by allowing people to sell their stuff back at a fairly good price, not the full amount mind you. If it were as big a problem as you think it was, then all of the major video-game magazines would be running headlines about it on a near weekly basis and the fact that they do not means it is not.

[Nadril]

I'm not really saying it's a terrible problem, but I think it effects sales more than piracy.

 

 

 

The point is that it is taking away the sale of a full version. If a person goes into a shop wanting to buy a game and then sees a used one for cheaper, they may buy the used one. That means that the potential sale is lost.

 

 

 

 

 

I'm not saying it's some big deal, but I find it kind of sad that the industry gets up in arms about piracy but not about used games.

[BlueTear]

As I said, the current model is broken, outdated and dying. Record companies, if we focus on music, are basically making money acting as a middle man that is, more or less, no longer neccesary thanks to advances of technology. Whether it's distribution or advertising, the internet offers to tools for a lot cheaper than most record companies come near. They're like the producers of typewriters when computers game around; Their original product is not needed, and if they do not adapt they will die. Legislating to maintain their corporate integrity is ridicolous, doing so by setting aside civil liberties is worse.

 

 

 

Having said that though, I think people are grossly underestimating how much work a record company puts into "grooming" artists. I think people are grossly underestimating the number of artists who didn't sell a considerably portion of their future income to a record company because they could, but because without an initial investment, they didn't really have a choice. Yeah, sure, the internet offers excellent advertising and even better means of distribution compared to record companies (though freakishly enough, real advertising agencies working the internet still do a better job that most laymen today). But NIN can do it in no small part because they've already broken the initial barrier where you can quit your day job and live of your music.

 

 

 

Without the record companies, that barrier is going to get higher. I'm perfectly fine with the resulting decrease in musical production, as I suspect most people are. Not because of some fantasy about "commercialized production being less pure" - give me a break, everyone needs to eat - but mostly because I don't really think I'd notice it. And because I don't care for the alternatives.

 

 

 

My problem, which is more or less related to the "side" I'm on, is the fact that neither the record companies nor the file-sharers represents sustainable systems with workable solutions that ensures "reasonable compensation"and maintains a steady production. Setting the music aside and moving back to games;

 

 

 

 

 

I'm assuming that if no one pays for the game, the game won't be produced. "But I don't think it's worth paying for, so I wouldn't pay for it anyway." We're all very impressed by the moral courage to never download a game you think is worth paying, but we're also assuming A) That a significant portion of any file-sharing is done by people with a similar morality B) That you're able to properly identify a games "worth". The first, and this goes directly to what I said about sustainable system, is like leaving your front door open and unlocked because "you wouldn't break into anyone else's home". It's naive. You will not build a sustainable platform of digital entertainment on an un-enforceable "gentlemans agreement". To be completely honest, and no I'm not doing a Goodwin here, it's like communism. It would work just fine if we could rely on people do their bit for the collective - in this instance, paying for a sufficiently large portion of their "cultural consumption" to keep the production going - but there's a pretty extensive track record for how that goes. Not well for production.

 

 

 

And secondly, is the idea - and this traces right back to music - that you as a consumer gets to decide to what the product is worth in the first place. Zierro said that artists deserves "reasonable compensation". I think everyone wants that. But who ensures it? Who pays? Who makes sure the money ends up in the right place? Steam, regardless of how nice it is, sure as hell takes a cut. Is that cut reasonable? Who says it's reasonable? Why do they say it? You can build a charity around that, sure, but not a financial system working at peak effeciency. And that's completely ignoring the whole argument around whether the makers of a intellectual entertainment product has a right do that product or not (which, in turn, is separate from the makers of medical intellectual products).

 

 

 

Don't get me wrong here, I'm not saying I don't believe you. I'm not saying that, assuming I do believe you, I consider the way you file share amoral. I'm saying that it's not a sustainable way to organize intellectual property within a society. There's no checks, there's no balances to keep the entire thing from falling the [bleep] over and production of digital entertainment to just, dwindle due to a lack of funding. I'm fine with that, the only form of digital entertainment I'd miss is subscription based since well over a decade anyway. Their bases are covered.

 

 

 

The question that the digital entertainment heroinist tends to forget about is whether they're fine with it. If I get to choose between civil liberty in the form of a non-infrastructural internet, one of the proposed ways to deal with file sharing, and the formation of a new Beatles, I'll keep my civil liberties, thanks.

 

 

 

 

 

So, to sum it up and reconnect with the thread at hand; The record companies are idiots trying to defend a business model that's dying, but the woman who lost in court got what she deserved. If you think it's too expensive, don't use it. It's a luxury product. You will not "suffer" in any significant way for not using it. At least the and record companies, outdated as they may be, are fighting for their livelyhood.

 

 

 

 

 

(There's also an amusing thing to consider with the whole "reasonable compensation" argument, mainly that it is not beyond you to go out of your way to do your bit for it. Take a bill. Put it in an envelope. Send to artist, or creator, or producer. Just skip the distributor. "That's a sustainable way of doing things!". Nope. But then again, I'm not the one trying to hide behind "I'd pay, just not this much". Say you spend 5 hours a game on games you wouldn't have bought at their asking price. Where's the renting treshold? A fifth of what the game costs currently? So buy every fifth game then. Or tenth. Or twentieth - though I think that's probably pushing it considerably due to money-per-hour-of-entertainment. For a rental service - or a streaming service - to function financially over file-sharing there needs to come a point where you'd pay. If you wanted to, you could pay up to that point today. It'd be a bit of a blunt instrument, but you can easily match your expenditures on your consumption to "reasonable compensation". I've got no stakes in this discussion, I'll never know whether anyone lies or tells the truth about what they'll do, this is just a nice way for me to force myself into formulating what I think into coherent arguments. But to yourself, no need to talk about it here, would you do it?)

[Dexek]

Glad that [cabbage] doesn't occur here. Penalty should be $25 to pay for the songs. I could see maybe $100 at the most if they wanted to be grubby about it. A penalty such as that sure creates some opinions about the legal system and music companies. It's just pathetic.

[Bouwzie]

Should've used something like Peerguardian. But damn, that amount is really way too high. Makes them look ridiculous.

[Nadril]

As I said, the current model is broken, outdated and dying. Record companies, if we focus on music, are basically making money acting as a middle man that is, more or less, no longer neccesary thanks to advances of technology. Whether it's distribution or advertising, the internet offers to tools for a lot cheaper than most record companies come near. They're like the producers of typewriters when computers game around; Their original product is not needed, and if they do not adapt they will die. Legislating to maintain their corporate integrity is ridicolous, doing so by setting aside civil liberties is worse.

 

 

 

Yeah, I agree with you there.

 

 

 

Having said that though, I think people are grossly underestimating how much work a record company puts into "grooming" artists. I think people are grossly underestimating the number of artists who didn't sell a considerably portion of their future income to a record company because they could, but because without an initial investment, they didn't really have a choice. Yeah, sure, the internet offers excellent advertising and even better means of distribution compared to record companies (though freakishly enough, real advertising agencies working the internet still do a better job that most laymen today). But NIN can do it in no small part because they've already broken the initial barrier where you can quit your day job and live of your music.

 

 

 

Actually with the right amount of viral marketing almost anyone can get themselves out there on the internet with a bit of work. I remember reading about a new artist (I wish I could find a link) who decided to take up NIN's model of selling albums online. You'd be amazed at how fast word spreads about your music if it really is something good and unique. With social networking sites at an all time high it's pretty easy to get your face out there, and once you get a few fans they'll tell a few people and before you know it you've got a bit of a following. Sure, this might not be as fast as a record company hyping someone up because, lets face it, I don't think that the idea of looking around for artists online is still all that mainstream yet. I don't think your mainstream consumer frequents around and looks for new artists, even though with more and more using social networking sites such as facebook and twitter I think this new way of marketing can work.

 

 

 

My problem, which is more or less related to the "side" I'm on, is the fact that neither the record companies nor the file-sharers represents sustainable systems with workable solutions that ensures "reasonable compensation"and maintains a steady production. Setting the music aside and moving back to games;

 

 

 

I can agree with this. I pirate because I don't think the current model of business works for a lot of digital entertainment.

 

 

 

I'm assuming that if no one pays for the game, the game won't be produced. "But I don't think it's worth paying for, so I wouldn't pay for it anyway." We're all very impressed by the moral courage to never download a game you think is worth paying, but we're also assuming A) That a significant portion of any file-sharing is done by people with a similar morality B) That you're able to properly identify a games "worth". The first, and this goes directly to what I said about sustainable system, is like leaving your front door open and unlocked because "you wouldn't break into anyone else's home". It's naive. You will not build a sustainable platform of digital entertainment on an un-enforceable "gentlemans agreement". To be completely honest, and no I'm not doing a Goodwin here, it's like communism. It would work just fine if we could rely on people do their bit for the collective - in this instance, paying for a sufficiently large portion of their "cultural consumption" to keep the production going - but there's a pretty extensive track record for how that goes. Not well for production.

 

 

 

You would be surprised on how easy it is to tell if a game is worth $50 or not. Between multiple review sites, tons of quick looks and previews and trailers it is pretty easy to guess. Of course the big thing when it comes to worth for me is how long is it going to last me? Like I stated before I would love there to be some sort of way to "rent" PC games. I would love nothing more than to rent these games I currently pirate because, chances are, they're only going to last me a few days. I think this is a big downfall when it comes to PC gaming compared to consoles, at least as of currently.

 

 

 

And no, I agree with you that piracy is not a longterm method -- it isn't a good method. I actually think we agree on a bit more than what we think. However I can tell you that what I am saying is true, and if you look at studies (at least between music downloading and music sales) even though the number of people who pirate music, games and movies go up... well, so does the amount of sales. There isn't any good link between piracy and sales to prove if it helps (or hurts) it.

 

 

 

That's beyond the point though, obviously if everyone turned to this model it wouldn't work. And in regards to your analogy there, a lot of family that I know up in South Dakota actually do often times leave their front door unlocked. It is a small enough town that nothing ever really happens there, but I think that is beyond what you're trying to say too.

 

 

 

And secondly, is the idea - and this traces right back to music - that you as a consumer gets to decide to what the product is worth in the first place. Zierro said that artists deserves "reasonable compensation". I think everyone wants that. But who ensures it? Who pays? Who makes sure the money ends up in the right place? Steam, regardless of how nice it is, sure as hell takes a cut. Is that cut reasonable? Who says it's reasonable? Why do they say it? You can build a charity around that, sure, but not a financial system working at peak effeciency. And that's completely ignoring the whole argument around whether the makers of a intellectual entertainment product has a right do that product or not (which, in turn, is separate from the makers of medical intellectual products).

 

 

 

I do think the customer gets to decide on what a product is worth, at least partialy. Obviously if they don't think the product is worth it they won't buy it, even more so for luxury products because they don't need it.

 

 

 

So, to sum it up and reconnect with the thread at hand; The record companies are idiots trying to defend a business model that's dying, but the woman who lost in court got what she deserved. If you think it's too expensive, don't use it. It's a luxury product. You will not "suffer" in any significant way for not using it. At least the and record companies, outdated as they may be, are fighting for their livelyhood.

 

 

 

See, this is where I disagree again. It's clear that she is being made an example of. In reality they should go after the "big dogs", but instead they decide to make an example out of this woman with a huge fee. It's wrong.

[wild_goat_14]

That's why you are supposed to use proxy chains and VPN servers while doing "illegal" stuff.

 

 

 

25,763 songs and counting \

 

 

 

$2,061,040,000 at 80k per song.

 

 

 

That's how rediculous this is.

[Joes_So_Cool]

I don't really think that's fair, considering how many others are doing the same exact thing. Really, close to everyone.

[Napalm]

$80,000 per song is very excessive, I mean, where the hell can she get that ammount of money?

 

sLucky they aren't charging me for that, or I would end up paying 160 millions >_>

[Furah]

$80,000 per song is very excessive, I mean, where the hell can she get that ammount of money?

 

sLucky they aren't charging me for that, or I would end up paying 160 millions >_>

 

Same, for the songs I have on this computer, on my laptop there is nothing as it got formatted. My old comp is useless sitting in the shed. With no HDD as my sister has it.

[Plugpoint]

$80,000 per song is excessive, 24 songs wouldn't even cost a thousandth of that.

[jasignhagj]

Supply and demand only works in a perfect capitalist world, just like everyone is equal only in a perfect communist world. Especially with music, which once produced has (for all practical purposes) an unlimited supply. I think the solution would be that every band sets up its own website, you pay an initial fee of $5, and you can download as much as you want from them in pure MP3 (no DRM [cabbage]). That way more money goes right to the band, and you get music cheaper. its a win-win situation, except for the recording industry, but to hell with them anyway.

[22pepsi22]

An attorney for the recording industry, Tim Reynolds, said the greater weight of the evidence showed that Thomas-Rasset was responsible for the illegal file-sharing that took place on her computer. He urged jurors to hold her accountable to deter others from a practice he said has significantly harmed the people who bring music to everyone.

 

 

 

 

 

For a price... And significantly HARMED? "Hey, Snoop! There's no more bud-light in your kitchen-sized refrigerator!"

 

 

 

"Sue the hell out of them!"

 

 

 

 

 

But, seriously, the people who make the song probably make a crap-load more in publicity and royalties from merchandise etc. The only people it "significantly harms" is the RCIAA.