The RIAA Doesn’t Want My Money
All right, we’re required by federal law to have a discussion of the whole Napster fiasco, so let’s get it done and move onto more enjoyable musical topics. I really want to discuss the issue, though, because not only are there plenty of interesting intellectual-property-in-the-Internet-era questions to try and answer, but the Recording Industry Association of America’s actions so far are one of the readiest examples of not thinking things through that I can find. I’ll confess to a bias right now: when I see a large number of extremely well-paid people completely failing to use their common sense, I start rubbing my hands together and head for the word processor. Having followed this issue for the last year or so, my hands are almost chapped.
For just a moment, let’s assume that the big record companies are right, and downloading an MP3 file without somehow paying for it is morally and legally equivalent to shoplifting a CD single out of your local record store. There are plenty of reasons to argue that it isn’t, and I promise I will get to them, but for right now let’s give the benefit of the doubt and see where we go from there. It seems fairly straightforward to me that, if people downloading MP3s for free is bad, record companies (and all law-abiding citizens who support them) should pursue a course of action designed to stop people from downloading MP3s for free. Anything else is essentially making a donation to the American Trial Lawyers Association.
So, are the record companies pursuing a course of action that will stop these pilfering downloads? Well, let’s assume for a moment that they succeed in shutting down Napster. The first thing that will happen is, the financial and the entertainment and the legal media will all run stories about the case. Three quarters of them will discuss how in response to this shutdown, a dozen new forms of decentralized file exchange have sprouted up to replace Napster, and that in most of these cases, there is no one in charge for the record companies to sue. Stopping these new exchanges will be like trying to kill a Hydra – with each severed head, two more sprout up. In fact, this has happened already – witness the press given to Gnutella, Freeserve, and similar services. If the RIAA kills Napster, it doesn’t kill MP3 exchanges – it just kills the one company that had set itself with a clear, obvious, centralized structure dedicated to MP3 exchanges and hoping to make a profit on it. It creates an inconvenience, but not one that won’t be overcome – people will continue to download MP3 files for free. So in the end, the record labels are pursuing a strategy that will fail even if it succeeds.
What kind of strategy will succeed, then? Well, if you can’t beat them, join them. The only way record companies are going to survive digitalization is to use their resources to provide a compelling service that people will be willing to pay for. I love Napster as much as the next guy, but it’s slow, it’s unreliable, you can never count on the tracks you want being available, and there’s always the chance that you’ll get 90 percent through a download and the other guy’s PC crashes. The record labels, meanwhile, have access to tremendous libraries of music, thanks to their history, and tremendous financial resources, thanks to their price gouging and one-sided recording contracts. It does not strike me as beyond the realm of possibility that over the next several years, the labels could release their entire libraries in digital form, and set up a top-notch network to handle all the user traffic. I would gladly pay such a service 50 cents or a buck for each song I downloaded. I would even pay a substantial annual subscription to be able to go to such a site at any time and download whatever I wanted.
In fact, as I was researching and writing this article, I remembered hearing that They Might Be Giants was distributing some of its music under just such a format. Sure enough, I did some searching and found EMusic.com, where I replaced my Napster-acquired copies of “Don’t Let’s Start” and “Ana Ng” for $1.98. From here on out, if I’m at Napster and I see someone trying to download these tracks from me, I’ll cancel the download, because I don’t want to penalize a band and a company that are doing the right thing. If all the other bands who have a song or two that I like would follow suit, I’d delete Napster from my hard drive in a second. I am not particularly trying to download stuff for free, but the record labels won’t give me any choice.
Of course, pirate networks and file exchanges will continue to exist. Some people are going to want to try and do it for free on their own, if for no other reason than to stick it to the man. Some people like the idea of hunting around for the music they like. More power to them. But the majority of the public like centralized service, selection and convenience, and they’re willing to pay for it — not to mention that they would like to do the right thing. Record labels and recording artists could take the lead in providing such a service, and provide themselves with a lucrative revenue stream and customer good will well into this century. Such a strategy would require some hard work on the part of record labels, and a realization that the easy profits that CDs provided over the last 20 years are over. But at the end of the day, it would reduce the number of people downloading MP3s without paying for them – so it would be a success, unlike what they’re doing now. Like I said, it’s a matter of thinking things through.
I haven’t gotten a chance to dissect the issue of whether or not the record labels are right to say that people shouldn’t download MP3s for free. That’s OK, because there are a lot of people who have done that, and probably done it better than me. So, for your reading pleasure, a guide to some other interesting discussions:
- MP3 files exchanged on a not-for-profit basis may be an allowable practice under existing fair use standards of copyright law: In Court’s View, MP3 Player Is Just a ‘Space-Shifter’ (New York Times Online; requires free registration)
- Trying to contain the sharing of information (which is all that a digital file is) may be completely futile in the Internet era, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t viable business models for creating and distributing original material: Making Money in a ‘Copyright-Free’ World (liberzine.com)
- Record labels may have been gaining unfair profits due to their ability to manipulate prices: U.S. States Sue Labels Over Price Fixing (Rolling Stone Online). In light of this, perhaps we MP3 sharers are just making up for what we’ve been overcharged.
- Unless the artist whose work you’re downloading is really lucky and/or powerful, odds are you’re probably not taking much from his or her pocket, if you’re taking anything at all: Courtney Love Does the Math (salon.com)
- Finally, some humor on the MP3 and intellectual property controversies: Fire, Work with Me (The Brunching Shuttlecocks) and Kid Rock Starves to Death; MP3 Piracy Blamed (theonion.com)
Postscript: As we were putting the finishing touches on this update, record company Bertelsmann (owner of labels like Arista and BMG) broke with its fellows and made an agreement with Napster to develop a file sharing service that would charge users a fee, with some of the money going to the labels and artists. So it looks like at least some of the RIAA wants my money after all. Good for them.
About Dave Thomer
Born and raised in Philadelphia. Studied philosophy at Fordham University in the Bronx, where I made many great friends and met my wonderful wife. We moved back to Philadelphia, where I studied philosophy some more and became a teacher. Online and off, I'm looking for ways that we can be better citizens and build stronger communities.