Just PAY for it!

[lacey]

I am opening a can of worms here, and this is probably going to be one of those posts where the ground is scorched and no one says anything afterwards, but I don't give a shit. I'm fed up.

NOTE: This is not directed specifically at anyone. Especially you, Jason... of course you had to post something about it right when I was working up a post

Comments

[debg]

You know, I'm a big fan of paying royalties. I write books for a living, and I kinda need my royalties

[lacey]

Bootlegs are different. And things not available anywhere else are different. Neither of those I have problems with, because how else would you get it? I think it's a shame when you have to resort to it, especially when theoretically the bands could work with the bootleggers to bring cuts of dates they've played to the public. Maybe take the recording, bring it to the studio and bring the quality up, and either group the recordings into an album and sell it, or place it on their site for download. Maybe for nothing, maybe for a few bucks. Who knows. Doesn't matter. What does matter is that I have a feeling that a lot of downloading cases are just like yours... the material simply isn't available anywhere else. And that's a shame. Missed opportunity all around.

[debg]

Well, to be fair and honest, if they (the big general "they") took a few of those live shows and cleaned them up and released them, they'd likely be missing most of what I treasure, as much as I treasure the music itself: all that in-between chattering, Nicky talking, joking around, occasionally - very, very occasionally - with me audible. The entire Fairfax show, for instance; I don't think an actual soundboard recording was ever made of that, and that means the only version in existence is the incredibly scratchy and Dolby-proof audience tape that the guy sitting at the table next to ours made of it.

With a tape quality that poor, even digital re-encoding won't help it. It would never be a high enough sound quality for them to sell.

And if they did, you wouldn't hear the three-way buzz and chatter, and Tim at our table saying something to Nicky and then something to me, and my voice, clear as a bell, suddenly ringing out: "I KNOW!"

[lacey]

LOL

Yeah, that's something I didn't consider. That interplay, the random chatter and "I KNOW!" and people hollering random stuff is one of the things I enjoy most about live recorded media. And doesn't that sound like the biggest oxymoron? I know some don't care for it, but I know I like it, and you're right, assuming the material could be cleaned up, chances are that would be lost. Big "do not want" to that.

[foxfirefey]

That is why we live in the sort of society we do, where you can obtain certain things for free but most other things are sky-high to compensate. If we didn't steal, and it is my firm belief that is exactly what that's called, it wouldn't have to be that way.

I'm not sure that's quite true--I thought companies had to increase profit margins to satisfy shareholders, as well.

[lacey]

Yeah, that's true. And I don't think there necessarily has to be a reason at all for prices on some things to stay high... if they really wanted the prices to be low, they could make them that way. It doesn't have to be this way. But that would never ever happen, although I'd like to live on the world that it did!

[foxfirefey]

I guess I just think that if every person who downloaded bought instead, the first instinct of big media corporations would not be to lower prices. It'd be more along the lines of a party with hookers and blow, except more...fiscal.

[lacey]

Yeah. Because what I said kind of assumed that that isn't exactly what they'd do. Which is stupid because if we know anything about media corporations, anything at all, we know that they're going to gouge the hell out of the consumer and the artist and anyone else they can. That's just how they are. Which is kind of what I meant in the comment (I think?) you just replied to, it doesn't have to be this way. But I made the assumption they'd just reduce it if more people bought, which in reality, the opposite is probably true.

[teacuptempest]

I download tv shows that are on free to air television so that I can watch them at a different time. To me, that is no different than anyone recording it on a VHS tape or tivo. Being free to air- its free to air, so...they get no profit? I know about ratings and stuff but psht. TV shows are fine by me. The tv shows I download are either deleted after I watch them, or I stream them a lot so I don't have to store them. Or they are the ones that are lonnng gone and have never been released. I usually buy the dvd box sets anyway because its easier to have it in one box with the nice artwork than have a folder on a laptop somewhere.

I never download movies. NEVER. And any music I download are either legal downloads (itunes, bigpond music etc), or replacements for cds I've already bought but damaged or lost (like I downloaded a david bowie song because that particular track on a soundtrack wouldn't work cause I scratched the shit out of it somehow).

[lacey]

I'm not sure what you mean by free to air... is that like public domain? It sounds kind of like the same, in which case that's fine and dandy by me. And to hell with ratings. That's the networks' problem. Screw them. And if it's like you mentioned, they're long gone and were never released, I don't see why not. It's like I was talking about above with debg, if it hasn't been released officially so you can get it, but someone else has it for download, how the hell else are you going to get it?

And something else you mentioned... the box sets. I'm a completist h0r. I like having all the little cases and all the artwork and packsinging and shit. And my most important music, the shit I really care about, I buy physically, in DVD form, so if something ever happens to my computer, I can just pop in the CD. That's the number one reason why I'd still buy my shit instead of downloading.... if my hard drive shits itself, all my downloads are gone.

[teacuptempest]

Lol well here...there are 5 tv stations that are free to air for every tv set...then if you have a HD topbox you get the HD channels, and then you have Austar/Foxtel which is cable/pay tv. So free to air shit goes to every single tv with an aerial...yeaaaah I don't like watching tv at night, I watch my tv shows when I am waking up in the morning to make me relaxed for the day. So I 'steal' them and watch them later.

I seriously have about 3200 cds by now. Thousands. Not so many dvds, probably only a few hundred, but still, a massive collection. So people who are like 'noooo dont steal music', I only steal the bad shit that i'd never pay for anyway.

[lacey]

Oh, I see what you mean! We have those! The few you get without bunny ears or cable or sattelite or anything. We can't see a lot of those worth a shit here, but we do have them!

I have... maybe 1% of your CD collection lol. And not that many more DVDs, although I have quite a few now that I've got this Stargate dependency. hee. There are 5 DVDs to every season, and I have 6 seasons now, so that alone is 30 DVDs, not to mention the others, which there are like 7 of or some ridiculously low amount.

[indelikatt]

I buy a fair amount of music usually, so i'm not going to get uptight if I download 10 songs from different artists, especially when I wouldn't want to buy the whole album.

I think a lot of it is a toss up between getting one's music out there and still getting paid for it. I find it telling that there are several artists out there who are for downloading.

It all gets very complicated. Very very complicated.

[lacey]

I agree with you. You brought up a dichotomy I hadn't thought of. Especially with younger/smaller bands, they need the money that your buying their album would generate most of all... but people won't buy the album if they don't know about it, and the only way you're going to hear about it is exposure, which you oftentimes can't get much of on traditional mediums when you're a new band. So that does mean downloading. I think in that case I'd try to mostly go by what stance the band had on it, if any. I don't really know, though.

We sort of need to make some new rules for a new world.

[capybyra]

I followed you home from madameenilef

Re: We sort of need to make some new rules for a new world.

[lacey]

I can agree. Even when people do try to do the "right" thing (as defined by the RI/MPAA, who are certainly suspect) the actual artist that created the content gets hardly any money at all. So, really, what the hell is the point if they don't even get much money from it? A shame.