Time to Boycott the Music Industry
The RIAA won a battle in the war of online music piracy this week. A jury found a Minnesota woman guilty who shared 22 tracks via P2P site Kazza, and as a result of the guilty verdict, she has to pay the RIAA $220,000. The RIAA hopes that this case will send a collective shiver down the backs of people who share music via P2P. It may scare some people into going legit, but it’s not going to be a widespread wakeup call to many.
I think the RIAA should keep suing people, and hopefully, some of those cases should make it to trial, like this case. I’m not saying that because I’m on the RIAA’s side. I’m saying that because I want the current music industry to shoot themselves in the head by continuously going after people. There’s nothing more genius that the RIAA can do to generate music sales - in an industry that’s dying - than suing your consumers. I think this is a great new business model…so we as consumers can bury the current music industry in a coffin, stake them in the heart, and seal them in a crypt. Right now, it looks like the RIAA has the power. It’s time to swing that momentum by boycotting the industry.
As I’ve already stated, the music industry’s business model is decayed, and music sales are in decline. While digital music sales are up (thanks to iTunes and millions of iPods), CD sales are declining every year. There was a time when artists were selling 10 million CDs and more. Now, many are lucky if they can sell 5 million CDs; in this day and age, that’s a lot. I love music. I live and breath music. I have even played and performed music. I think it’s an art form that’s a gift from God. That’s why it pains me to see subpar artists getting signed to deals, being repackaged into an image that sells, and are dropping albums full of F-list material with a focus on making four or five singles for crappy music videos. I haven’t purchased a CD in three years, and there’s a reason for that. Today’s music sucks! And it’s overpriced, which is why Trent Reznor says you should steal his music. I refuse to spend my hard-earned cash on mediocrity. So I say screw it. Screw the music industry. Screw the crap artists out there who are faking it to make it. Screw the RIAA! Let’s boycott them and not buy anything. No CDs. No digital downloads. Nothing. Show them who has the power. We do! The almighty dollar is what they worship, so if we don’t spend it on music, we reclaim the power. If we were to boycott the purchases of music for at least a year, the industry would be forced to change their business model.
I know some of you are saying to yourselves that a boycott would hurt the artists. That’s true and not true. Artists don’t make much off of music sales. That’s why they tour. You can still support the artists by seeing them live, and the money will go directly into their pocket. The labels, typically, don’t collect any tour money; however, that is changing in some cases because the labels are greedy. Support independent artists, those who are starting out and unconnected to labels and even some who’ve been around for a while who are sick of the industry. Check out their MySpace pages or web sites for free music downloads. Buy or download (for free in some cases) independently produced [label-free] albums, songs, and mixtapes by artists. You can also support independent labels who are using a new business model. They aren’t nickel and diming their artists and actually understand that overpriced and mediocre music is what’s killing music. Finally, I think a boycott of mainstream music would separate the real artists from the pretend ones. There are way too many “artists” who don’t deserve the title. This boycott will flush the pretenders down the toilet and to the sewers where they belong.
We need to reclaim the power from the RIAA, and we need to reclaim and save the music. So let’s start a campaign to get their attention. Hit them in only place where it will hurt the most: the pocketbook. I’m on board. Are you? If you are, then let’s organize and work together to save music. Sometimes the only way to save something is to let it die so that it can reincarnate in a different form. I think that applies to the music industry.
October 6th, 2007 at 7:50 pm
[...] unknown wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptThe RIAA won a battle in the war of online music piracy this week. A jury found a Minnesota woman guilty who shared 22 tracks via P2P site Kazza, and as a result of the guilty verdict, she has to pay the RIAA $220000. … [...]