Welcome to the MacNN Forums.

If this is your first visit, be sure to check out the FAQ by clicking the link above. You may have to register before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages, select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

You are here: MacNN Forums > Community > MacNN Lounge > Pirate Bay founders sent to jail

Pirate Bay founders sent to jail (Page 3)
Thread Tools
CharlesS
Posting Junkie
Join Date: Dec 2000
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 05:26 AM
 
Originally Posted by Chuckit View Post
You can't counter it with that. Doofy's anecdote had nothing to do with what I was just talking about.
Your anecdote was about a sale being caused by P2P downloading. Doofy's anecdote was about sales massively being lost due to P2P downloading. Your anecdote relies on everyone else being exactly like you. I find Doofy's much more convincing in this case.

Bah, you can complain about "anecdotal examples" when you have something better to present. IIRC, Radiohead's deal lasted several months, until the special edition box set it was meant to promote showed up.
It was only up for two months. If having the material available for optional payment was such a positive thing which boots sales oh so much, then why wouldn't it be kept up longer than that?

At any rate, if it were such great marketing to have all your work completely freely downloadable, then you'd think content providers would pick up on that and offer their stuff for free. The fact that virtually no one does this for long seems to counter that argument. Of course, regardless of whether this is true or not, it's not your responsibility to take other people's marketing into your own hands, so it's somewhat irrelevant.
Hearing the whole thing once is a sample of what the experience of owning it is like. I'm not being glib or argumentative — that's honestly how I look at it.
Really, I don't know what to say to this. Aside from the complete contradiction of what a sample actually is, this makes no business sense at all. Should movie studios show you the whole movie all the way through for free too, to give you a "sample of what the experience of owning it is like"? This doesn't strike me as being particularly reasonable. Do you really need to listen to every last second of every single track on an album to figure out if you like it or not?

Really. I would be extremely, extremely surprised if any appreciable segment of the P2P-using population were goody-two-shoes enough to actually buy an album when they already had sitting on their hard drives in its entirety.

I kind of like the way Klicktrack does it, where they have a player that will play as much of the song as you like in 30-second increments. That gives a good feel for it without giving away the farm.
Perhaps, but then we're not talking about P2P downloading anymore, and that's the topic of this thread. If the content providers want to let you listen to the whole thing for free, then that of course is their business. What is being discussed is people taking things into their own hands and downloading music for free against the wishes of the content providers, and that is wrong no matter what clever ways you come up with to rationalize it.

I understand why iTMS does the 30-second sample thing, but it's really useless to me.
Well, boo hoo? I'm not sure what to say. I'm sorry that the laws aren't specifically designed around your personal desires.
( Last edited by CharlesS; Apr 20, 2009 at 05:33 AM. )

Ticking sound coming from a .pkg package? Don't let the .bom go off! Inspect it first with Pacifist. Macworld - five mice!
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 05:49 AM
 
On the whole Radiohead thing:

They made no money off that, hence it was pulled. They figured that people would be honest and pay a decent price for their crap. Newsflash: People generally ain't very honest.

So, an established act brought into the limelight on the back of some very expensive traditional marketing decides to go all carey-sharey commie and let everyone pay what they want to can't make it work.
What hope for up and coming artistes who don't have the traditional marketing behind them?
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 06:03 AM
 
Originally Posted by Chuckit View Post
I admit I'm not privy to Trent's pocketbook. I know he's still making music, which ain't cheap, and he's not currently busing tables for extra cash (something a good percentage of musicians can't say), so I think his business model must not be dead just yet. What am I missing?
Trent's been fortunate enough to ascend before P2P became popular. During this period he not only stocked up on fame and popularity, but also gear - he's more independent than most artistes, since he's essentially a one-man band, and the first thing one-man bands tend to do is accumulate enough gear to do everything by themselves (through necessity - if you're on your own, you usually break the back of every album in your spare bedroom because you tend to record as you write - you have to in order to bounce parts off each other and come up with a cohesive whole). Thus folks like Trent, Moby and Fat Boy Slim are going to be less affected by this with regard to their ability to keep churning product out.
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
Wiskedjak
Posting Junkie
Join Date: Jun 2002
Location: Calgary
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 10:37 AM
 
And, then you get these studies which find that those who downloaded "free" music were 10x more likely to download pay music.
http://i.gizmodo.com/5219587/study-f...an-non+pirates

Of course, this is from an academic study, which should be enough for you to dismiss it out of hand.
     
starman
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jun 2000
Location: Union County, NJ
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 10:50 AM
 
Just remember that Ghosts I-IV made it to the top of Amazon's 2008 albums. That was a FREE download and it still showed up as #1

Hence, NIN > Radiohead

Maybe it's a simple question of quality vs. quantity?

http://arstechnica.com/media/news/20...les-charts.ars

Home - Twitter - Sig Wall-Retired - Flickr
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 10:57 AM
 
Originally Posted by Wiskedjak View Post
And, then you get these studies which find that those who downloaded "free" music were 10x more likely to download pay music.
http://i.gizmodo.com/5219587/study-f...an-non+pirates
Sounds like BS. One of the comments sums it up:
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that the reality of the study is that people that pirate music are 10 times more likely to SAY they buy leg music, but in reality...don't.
Originally Posted by Wiskedjak View Post
Of course, this is from an academic study, which should be enough for you to dismiss it out of hand.
Why would that be? Are we forgetting that Doof spent four years in a uni environment teaching the little wannabes how to make musak?
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 11:00 AM
 
Originally Posted by starman View Post
Just remember that Ghosts I-IV made it to the top of Amazon's 2008 albums. That was a FREE download and it still showed up as #1
One off at best. Gimmick factor sold it. Unsustainable.
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
starman
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jun 2000
Location: Union County, NJ
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 11:05 AM
 
Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
One off at best. Gimmick factor sold it. Unsustainable.
What "gimmick factor"?

Let me reiterate the point:

An album given away FOR FREE made the Amazon #1 list of 2008.

Let me reiterate it another way:

An album with NO AIRPLAY and NO MARKETING other than simple fan-based word of mouth beat all the other albums in heavy rotation on pop music radio stations.

Home - Twitter - Sig Wall-Retired - Flickr
     
shifuimam
Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: The deep backwoods of the PNW
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 11:11 AM
 
Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
Got news for ya hun. You're a communist, not a conservative.

The only people I've heard come out with what you've just come out with (and don't think for a second that it's an original thought) usually have a poster of Che on their wall.

Must be the educational institution you work in rubbing off on you.

Just sayin'.
Hold up. Not feeling sorry for celebrities makes me a communist?

Last time I checked, communism said that nobody owns private property and everything is shared by and distributed equally to the community.

Doof, hun, all I'm saying is that I don't pity some multimillionaire pop star or rock band bitching about some freaking torrents. Their lives aren't that damn hard. The entertainment industry is extremely lucrative.

That isn't communism, hun.

Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
Trent approaches bankruptcy about once every two years. Just because you think he's taking baths in $100 bills doesn't mean he actually is.
Do you have citation for this to prove that Trent Reznor is having massive financial problems on a near-constant basis? Have you talked to him personally? Are you going off tabloid articles? Did you hack into his checking account?

Or are you just assuming it, and we're all supposed to feel sorry for someone who made millions a year but was too stupid to manage his finances for the long haul?

You know what pisses me the hell off about people in entertainment? They're all financial retards. If I became famous from a few movies or a long-running TV show or a multi-platinum album, I'd invest all the profit I made and live off the interest. Most celebrities don't do that. Instead, they blow their money on ridiculously extravagant lives, and when their career dries up, they suddenly can't afford to live the high life anymore, and we're all supposed to pity them. Fsck that.
Sell or send me your vintage Mac things if you don't want them.
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 11:11 AM
 
Originally Posted by starman View Post
What "gimmick factor"?
You're not aware of the gimmicks Trent used to sell Ghosts? The whole giving it away for free under CC along with the simultaneous release of the Garageband poop and the Blu-Ray poop and the zillions of gigabytes of live footage poop?

I'll be impressed if anyone else can follow that, or indeed, if Trent can still do it two albums down the line.
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 11:19 AM
 
Originally Posted by shifuimam View Post
Hold up. Not feeling sorry for celebrities makes me a communist?
Comparing entertainers' (or anyone perceived to be richer than average. Bankers, for example) lives with those working in the mines is a staple of modern commie thought.

Originally Posted by shifuimam View Post
Last time I checked, communism said that nobody owns private property and everything is shared by and distributed equally to the community.
Ummm, isn't that what you've been saying about copyright expiration? You know, that crappy album from 1972?

Originally Posted by shifuimam View Post
Doof, hun, all I'm saying is that I don't pity some multimillionaire pop star or rock band bitching about some freaking torrents. Their lives aren't that damn hard. The entertainment industry is extremely lucrative.
Shif, hun, most folks in the industry ain't millionaires. And an awful lot work 18 hour days in sunless rooms for little thanks.

Originally Posted by shifuimam View Post
Do you have citation for this to prove that Trent Reznor is having massive financial problems on a near-constant basis? Have you talked to him personally? Are you going off tabloid articles? Did you hack into his checking account?
Friend of a friend.

Originally Posted by shifuimam View Post
You know what pisses me the hell off about people in entertainment? They're all financial retards.
Are we now?
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
Spheric Harlot
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Nov 1999
Location: 888500128, C3, 2nd soft.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 11:25 AM
 
Originally Posted by shifuimam View Post
Hold up. Not feeling sorry for celebrities makes me a communist?

Last time I checked, communism said that nobody owns private property and everything is shared by and distributed equally to the community.
You've been suggesting that this be exactly what the millions of musicians who AREN'T celebrities do.

Actually, you've been switching between expecting that, and claiming that musicians don't actually work for the money you're not willing to spend on the products they make.

You're angry at the few jackass publicity bunnies and musicians who do well and are pissheads about it, and completely ignore that whatever you suggest will rob everyone else of their existence.
     
shifuimam
Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: The deep backwoods of the PNW
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 11:58 AM
 
Originally Posted by Spheric Harlot View Post
You've been suggesting that this be exactly what the millions of musicians who AREN'T celebrities do.

Actually, you've been switching between expecting that, and claiming that musicians don't actually work for the money you're not willing to spend on the products they make.

You're angry at the few jackass publicity bunnies and musicians who do well and are pissheads about it, and completely ignore that whatever you suggest will rob everyone else of their existence.
Let me reiterate - I have no problem supporting independent bands. I have a problem supporting the RIAA.

Musicians who sign on with the RIAA get completely screwed. They end up owing the RIAA hundreds of thousands of dollars before they see a cent of profit. I'd much rather send Dave Grohl a personal check for $20 than buy his album. At least then I'm supporting the artists that actually make the music, instead of the billionaire CEOs behind the RIAA.

I'm not anti-corporate at all. Corporations have done amazing things for the global economy. The RIAA, however, has very questionable business practices and treats both their musicians and their consumers like total sh!t. I'm not going to give my money to corporation like that.

I have said several times that the people who have it easy are the people at the top - who are the very people claiming that their lives are being significantly hurt by the downloading industry. I'm sorry, but I just don't buy that the lead singer of Metallica is having a hard time putting food on the table right now.

I don't deny that small timers are being badly hurt by the whole business of pirating music. I'm not saying that downloading music doesn't hurt those people. I'm saying that the people who are whining the most about it are the people who are hurt the least by it, which is why it's so difficult to lend any credibility to the whole anti-TPB sentiment.

And Doof, a "friend of a friend" isn't enough for me to believe that the lead singer of NIN is having serious financial problems.

And, if he is, it's his own damn fault. The guy should have made enough in the last 20 years to not be constantly considering filing for chapter 11.
Sell or send me your vintage Mac things if you don't want them.
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 12:18 PM
 
Originally Posted by shifuimam View Post
And Doof, a "friend of a friend" isn't enough for me to believe that the lead singer of NIN is having serious financial problems.
Believe what you like. I don't care.
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
shifuimam
Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: The deep backwoods of the PNW
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 12:23 PM
 
Okay, honey. I'm just sayin'.."I heard it from a friend of a friend" is like saying "I heard from my sister's brother-in-law's cousin's hairdresser's mailman than Obama is dying of lymphoma as we speak!".

Find some credible sources of information, and I'll believe you.

Also: how do you feel about things like Napster Unlimited? Boyfriend pays $14.99 a month and gets as much music as he wants. He strips the DRM so that he can play it on more than three computers...is that wrong, too?

If musicians desperately need the royalties from individual song purchases, how in the world can Napster legally offer unlimited downloads for such a tiny price?

Do you think it's wrong to subsequently strip the DRM from those files? Boyfriend and I personally own a total of...nine computers (not counting the extra laptops I'm selling soon), and we each have an additional computer from our employers. Is it wrong to make it possible to play the files we've legally acquired on all of the machines we personally and legally own, or are you vehemently against that as well?
Sell or send me your vintage Mac things if you don't want them.
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 12:30 PM
 
Subscription downloads? My jury's out on that one - the sheer communalism of it doesn't sit well with my life outlook but I've yet to consider the implications.

DRM? Not sure I like the stripping it if you acquired the track off a subs service. If you bought the track outright off something like iTMS then I fully support you making as many personal copies as you feel you need.

And dammit girl, how do you expect to be taken seriously as a geek if you've only got eleven computers between two of you?
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
starman
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jun 2000
Location: Union County, NJ
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 12:32 PM
 
Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
You're not aware of the gimmicks Trent used to sell Ghosts? The whole giving it away for free under CC along with the simultaneous release of the Garageband poop and the Blu-Ray poop and the zillions of gigabytes of live footage poop?

I'll be impressed if anyone else can follow that, or indeed, if Trent can still do it two albums down the line.
You mean with "The Slip"?

Home - Twitter - Sig Wall-Retired - Flickr
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 12:38 PM
 
Originally Posted by starman View Post
You mean with "The Slip"?
The Slip is two albums down the line from Ghosts?
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
starman
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jun 2000
Location: Union County, NJ
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 12:42 PM
 
Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
The Slip is two albums down the line from Ghosts?
The Slip is the first after Ghosts. It did rather well considering it too was FREE.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nine_In...ls_discography

When the second album comes out, do you really think it'll do worse considering NIN's track record?

Home - Twitter - Sig Wall-Retired - Flickr
     
starman
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jun 2000
Location: Union County, NJ
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 12:45 PM
 
Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
Trent approaches bankruptcy about once every two years. Just because you think he's taking baths in $100 bills doesn't mean he actually is.
Riiiiiiight.

Home - Twitter - Sig Wall-Retired - Flickr
     
shifuimam
Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: The deep backwoods of the PNW
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 12:46 PM
 
Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
Subscription downloads? My jury's out on that one - the sheer communalism of it doesn't sit well with my life outlook but I've yet to consider the implications.
Yes, because sharing anything at all is immediately communism/communalism, and no self-respecting conservative right-wing type should ever support any kind of sharing at all. Even the legal kind.

DRM? Not sure I like the stripping it if you acquired the track off a subs service. If you bought the track outright off something like iTMS then I fully support you making as many personal copies as you feel you need.
Why not on sub services? Napster Unlimited licenses you to put the music you legally pay for on three computers and two MP3 players. While most normal consumers don't have that much hardware, I sure as hell do. I don't see any problem with using the songs I've paid for on the hardware I have. Why should I be forced to limit myself to certain machines? What if I have a desktop, a laptop, an HTPC, a netbook, and a Mini in the kitchen?

It's problematic when the music company tries to control the stuff you've bought. It just doesn't work, and it's anti-customer.
Sell or send me your vintage Mac things if you don't want them.
     
OreoCookie
Moderator
Join Date: May 2001
Location: Hilbert space
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 12:52 PM
 
I think all these anecdotes are useless. That includes possible bankruptcy of a singer (and it's not even clear if illegal downloads can be blamed for that).

From what I've seen, the artists are much more open to new models that the `music industry.' All their proposed solutions leave a bitter aftertaste, e. g. downloads by label (do they honestly think I remember what label artist ABC is associated to in a given year?) which are DRM-ridden. Or CDs that install rootkits that may cause problems on computers (fortunately only for the Windows people). And they're surprised honest customers feel screwed over? I cannot tell which of the new business models (e. g. subscription-based flatrate) will be profitable, but the industry isn't trying very hard. They're not promoting new products (I haven't really noticed a Napster ad), but rather fear (`if you copy our music, you are fined/go to jail'). They're going after the videos posted by teenagers who sing their favorite artist's songs (badly) … is this how they should spend their time? I don't think so.

Some people have mentioned radio: what you're missing is that services such as Pandorra are the radios of the web. I'd love to be able to use Pandorra here, but last I checked, only American IPs work (I know of a few friends who have rented a server in the US also for that reason).
I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it.
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 12:56 PM
 
Originally Posted by shifuimam View Post
Yes, because sharing anything at all is immediately communism/communalism, and no self-respecting conservative right-wing type should ever support any kind of sharing at all. Even the legal kind.
No, because if I sign up to distribute that way my work gets lumped in with all the other crap and due to the nature of the setup we all end up sharing payouts. Since my crap is way, way better than the other crap, I don't see why I should be on the same payscale that the other idiots are on.

Originally Posted by shifuimam View Post
Why not on sub services?
Because the minute you decide to stop paying the subscription all your de-DRMed files turn you into a freetard.
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 01:01 PM
 
Originally Posted by starman View Post
The Slip is the first after Ghosts. It did rather well considering it too was FREE.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nine_In...ls_discography

When the second album comes out, do you really think it'll do worse considering NIN's track record?
I guess we'll have to wait until Trent's earned more money from his previous albums which aren't free before we find out about that.
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
starman
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jun 2000
Location: Union County, NJ
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 01:10 PM
 
You just don't get it, Doof. Have you read ANYTHING that Trent has written about his business model? Anything at all? It's not just about the CDs anymore.

Home - Twitter - Sig Wall-Retired - Flickr
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 01:28 PM
 
You just don't get it, starman. Have you read ANYTHING that I've written for the last three pages? Anything at all?

Ooops.
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
starman
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jun 2000
Location: Union County, NJ
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 02:03 PM
 
^^ More anecdotal crap.

Home - Twitter - Sig Wall-Retired - Flickr
     
CharlesS
Posting Junkie
Join Date: Dec 2000
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 02:37 PM
 
Originally Posted by shifuimam View Post
Hold up. Not feeling sorry for celebrities makes me a communist?

Last time I checked, communism said that nobody owns private property and everything is shared by and distributed equally to the community.

Doof, hun, all I'm saying is that I don't pity some multimillionaire pop star or rock band bitching about some freaking torrents. Their lives aren't that damn hard. The entertainment industry is extremely lucrative.
What the hell, shif? What makes you think that most musicians are multimillionaire celebrities? The fact of the matter is, it's not a very lucrative field for the vast majority of musicians, and for most, life can be pretty hard. Have you ever heard the term "starving artist"?

Ticking sound coming from a .pkg package? Don't let the .bom go off! Inspect it first with Pacifist. Macworld - five mice!
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 03:12 PM
 
Originally Posted by starman View Post
^^ More anecdotal crap.
And here's some more anecdotal crap:

http://stereogum.com/archives/trent-...ax_007714.html

That's right, the bloke who stumbled upon the oh-so-profitable methodology of giving his crap away for free has decided that everyone's Internet connection needs to be taxed.

The bloke's a gallo*. It's that simple.

(* One day, I too will be linguistically similar to the resident flamboyant Danish bloke. But with a vineyard. And not flamboyant.)
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
mattyb
Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: Standing on the shoulders of giants
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 03:41 PM
 


Bizarre I know, but apparently, when Doof had more hair on his head than his back, people used these flat black pancakes to listen to music.

Wonder if it would help or hinder piracy if these things were used again.
     
starman
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jun 2000
Location: Union County, NJ
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 05:52 PM
 
I just bought 8 albums this weekend for Record Store Day.

And Trent's idea of an internet tax may not make that much sense to you youngins, but we had to pay a tax on blank tapes back in the day. Nothing new.

Home - Twitter - Sig Wall-Retired - Flickr
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 07:05 PM
 
Originally Posted by starman View Post
And Trent's idea of an internet tax may not make that much sense to you youngins, but we had to pay a tax on blank tapes back in the day.
No we didn't. You might have done over the in the land of the free, but we didn't. Which is just another reason why Trent is talking out of his botty.
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
- - e r i k - -
Posting Junkie
Join Date: May 2001
Location: Brisbane, Australia
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 08:42 PM
 
Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
On the whole Radiohead thing:

They made no money off that, hence it was pulled. They figured that people would be honest and pay a decent price for their crap. Newsflash: People generally ain't very honest.
Not sure where you get this from. The Radiohead In Rainbows experiment was an unequivocal financial success:

The most important information that was revealed in the NME report is that Radiohead made more money from In Rainbows downloads than all “Hail to the Thief” sales. Using this pie chart from Billboard magazine and the sales figures from Hail to the Thief Radiohead’s total profit from Hail to the Thief can be determined and thus, we know at least how much profit In Rainbows made. What I have compiled below, is a poor man’s (read: anyone who is not comscore or BigChampagne) method of determining the In Rainbows average price per download*.
http://enoughcowbell.com/2008/12/17/...e-part-1-of-2/

[ fb ] [ flickr ] [] [scl] [ last ] [ plaxo ]
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 10:36 PM
 
Originally Posted by - - e r i k - - View Post
Not sure where you get this from. The Radiohead In Rainbows experiment was an unequivocal financial success
Turn of phrase.
$1.97m split five ways = $394k each (assuming no other folks as sixth members, which there will be).
$394k each over two years (average time until next album) = $197k.
There's folks here on this site who earn more than that. And they don't have to sit in a tour bus with Thom Yorke.
Therefore, "no money".
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
- - e r i k - -
Posting Junkie
Join Date: May 2001
Location: Brisbane, Australia
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 10:56 PM
 
You forget that was downloads ONLY. Over two months. When people could choose to download it for free.

That's more money than Hail To The Thief made them over its whole run.

[ fb ] [ flickr ] [] [scl] [ last ] [ plaxo ]
     
starman
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jun 2000
Location: Union County, NJ
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 20, 2009, 11:07 PM
 
Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
Turn of phrase.
$1.97m split five ways = $394k each (assuming no other folks as sixth members, which there will be).
$394k each over two years (average time until next album) = $197k.
There's folks here on this site who earn more than that. And they don't have to sit in a tour bus with Thom Yorke.
Therefore, "no money".
So we've gone from "artists don't make enough" to "$197k isn't enough". WTF?

Home - Twitter - Sig Wall-Retired - Flickr
     
torsoboy
Mac Elite
Join Date: Mar 2003
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 21, 2009, 12:52 AM
 
Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
Turn of phrase.
$1.97m split five ways = $394k each (assuming no other folks as sixth members, which there will be).
$394k each over two years (average time until next album) = $197k.
There's folks here on this site who earn more than that. And they don't have to sit in a tour bus with Thom Yorke.
Therefore, "no money".
Wow, your "no money" definition is quite a bit more than my "no money" definition. $400k for a few months of work is not "no money."

And this was on top of the money they made on the tour.

I think you were just trying to save face with that ridiculous comment.
     
shifuimam
Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: The deep backwoods of the PNW
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 21, 2009, 01:49 AM
 
Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
Because the minute you decide to stop paying the subscription all your de-DRMed files turn you into a freetard.
Unfortunately, until sub services like Napster allow me to play the music I've legally licensed on all the hardware I personally and privately use and own, people like boyfriend (or me) have no choice but to strip the DRM from the songs.

Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
Turn of phrase.
$1.97m split five ways = $394k each (assuming no other folks as sixth members, which there will be).
$394k each over two years (average time until next album) = $197k.
There's folks here on this site who earn more than that. And they don't have to sit in a tour bus with Thom Yorke.
Therefore, "no money".
WHAT? $200k is "no money"?

What crack are you smoking, Doof? $200k is a crapton of money. It's not a crapton of money if you want a $4mil mansion in Malibu and a new car every year, but that's a damn lot of money. I only know a handful of people who make that (or more) - and they're doctors, lawyers, or top-level executives in Fortune 500 corporations.

I certainly would love to get $200k a year.

Originally Posted by - - e r i k - - View Post
You forget that was downloads ONLY. Over two months. When people could choose to download it for free.

That's more money than Hail To The Thief made them over its whole run.
There's also this. If they made $2mil in two months from downloads, they would have made $12mil over the course of the year. Split five ways is what...$2.4mil each?

Yeah. Poor Radiohead. They sure lead a hard life.
Sell or send me your vintage Mac things if you don't want them.
     
Spheric Harlot
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Nov 1999
Location: 888500128, C3, 2nd soft.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 21, 2009, 02:27 AM
 
Originally Posted by shifuimam View Post
WHAT? $200k is "no money"?

What crack are you smoking, Doof? $200k is a crapton of money. It's not a crapton of money if you want a $4mil mansion in Malibu and a new car every year, but that's a damn lot of money. I only know a handful of people who make that (or more) - and they're doctors, lawyers, or top-level executives in Fortune 500 corporations.

I certainly would love to get $200k a year.
I realize that you've been completely ignoring every single post I've made in this thread, but let me just point out that "Hail to the Thief" was released in 2003.

Of course, these guys were involved in other things, and there's royalties on past works (which you'd rather not give them), DVDs, and concerts in between, but $200k over FOUR YEARS makes $50k a year.

Before taxes.

Is that a "crapton" where you live?

Especially considering that these guys have no idea whether they'll ever be able to pull off this distribution model again?
     
Spheric Harlot
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Nov 1999
Location: 888500128, C3, 2nd soft.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 21, 2009, 02:35 AM
 
Originally Posted by shifuimam View Post
There's also this. If they made $2mil in two months from downloads, they would have made $12mil over the course of the year. Split five ways is what...$2.4mil each?
Jesus, girl, cut out the bullshit.

Seriously. That's just monstrously ignorant arguing.


Apart from the obvious (to anybody else) absurdity of initial album sales just continuing on into infinity, I'm not sure why you keep ignoring what everybody's been telling you:

There's maybe a hundred bands worldwide that work on this kind of a dimension.

There's maybe a hundred MILLION bands that find that selling seven HUNDRED albums over a three-week period is enough to chart, these days. And once the initial sales have dried up after a few months, you probably still haven't paid back production costs, let alone had a monthly income off the album AT ALL.
     
Chuckit
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: San Diego, CA, USA
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 21, 2009, 03:15 AM
 
Originally Posted by Spheric Harlot View Post
I realize that you've been completely ignoring every single post I've made in this thread, but let me just point out that "Hail to the Thief" was released in 2003.

Of course, these guys were involved in other things, and there's royalties on past works (which you'd rather not give them), DVDs, and concerts in between, but $200k over FOUR YEARS makes $50k a year.
The $200k was a "per year" number Doofy extrapolated assuming an album every two years. If we want to pretend they were working on this album for four years (rather than doing other stuff for two and a half, which is more likely), that would work out to about $100k a year, which isn't insanely wealthy, but it is around the 90th percentile. So even severely lowballing it, this utter failure made them richer than 90% of Americans. Going by more plausible numbers, it made them richer than about 98% of the US.

I'm sure they'd have loved to make more, but that's not nothing, and it's more than their previous album. Most musicians would love to have that kind of failure.
Chuck
___
"Instead of either 'multi-talented' or 'multitalented' use 'bisexual'."
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 21, 2009, 05:10 AM
 
Let's be clear here.

$200k per year at the time was about £100k. Revenue, not profit - they've still got people to pay out of that. And then there's taxes. So we can take that down to £50k, tops.
Usually, musicians can't get mortgages because of the volatile nature of "fame" - there's no guaranteed next payday. And a crappy little house in London will set you back minimum £500k. This is without paying anything into your private pension.

I often face this problem when talking to Americans, because of the disparity in salary levels and cost of living. See that car you can get new for $20k? That'd be $60K+ here for the same *cough* quality. You know when you're whining about a gallon of gas hitting $2? It's already $10 here.
This, of course, makes for an amusing read when presented with a web site such as "Seeking Millionaire", where the minimum entry qualification to this "exclusive club" is an income of $100k a year. My plumber earns more than that, and he's about as sophisticated/classy as Homer Simpson.

So, yes, $200k is "no money".
( Last edited by Doofy; Apr 21, 2009 at 05:17 AM. )
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
Wiskedjak
Posting Junkie
Join Date: Jun 2002
Location: Calgary
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 21, 2009, 10:15 AM
 
I *wish* I could make that kind of "no money" for a few months of work. Instead, I spend 11 months working and don't even come close to that amount of "no money".
     
ort888
Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Feb 2001
Location: Your Anus
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 21, 2009, 10:45 AM
 
That money is from just the album sales. Don't most recording artists make the bulk of their money by touring?

That's always been my understanding.
( Last edited by ort888; Apr 21, 2009 at 11:58 AM. )

My sig is 1 pixel too big.
     
starman
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jun 2000
Location: Union County, NJ
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 21, 2009, 11:13 AM
 
Yeah, but that would be more "no money"

Home - Twitter - Sig Wall-Retired - Flickr
     
shifuimam
Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: The deep backwoods of the PNW
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 21, 2009, 12:53 PM
 
Originally Posted by Spheric Harlot View Post
I realize that you've been completely ignoring every single post I've made in this thread, but let me just point out that "Hail to the Thief" was released in 2003.

Of course, these guys were involved in other things, and there's royalties on past works (which you'd rather not give them), DVDs, and concerts in between, but $200k over FOUR YEARS makes $50k a year.

Before taxes.

Is that a "crapton" where you live?

Especially considering that these guys have no idea whether they'll ever be able to pull off this distribution model again?
You're forgetting that the ~$50k each year was from ONE album in TWO months.

That doesn't account for royalties from other albums or the sales of In Rainbows for the other ten months of the year.

If all they made was $50k, then no, that's not a "crapton". It's also not "no money". I make less than that, and I live very comfortably, mostly because I'm not a financial moron.

However, that $50k number is only a small portion of the total amount of money each of the members of Radiohead made that year. If you added it all up, I imagine it would indeed come to a crapton of money.
Sell or send me your vintage Mac things if you don't want them.
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 21, 2009, 01:14 PM
 
Originally Posted by Wiskedjak View Post
I *wish* I could make that kind of "no money" for a few months of work.
Well, do it then.

Oh. I guess we forgot about the 10 years of sitting in a dark basement learning to play your instruments and how to write songs - while you were surviving by flipping burgers.
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
Doofy
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: Vacation.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 21, 2009, 01:16 PM
 
Originally Posted by ort888 View Post
That money is from just the album sales. Don't most recording artists make the bulk of their money by touring?

That's always been my understanding.
A few earn money by touring. A lot lose money by touring (but since it usually drives record sales, it's actually a loss-leader. Provided everyone they played to hasn't been at the torrents).
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
ort888
Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Feb 2001
Location: Your Anus
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 21, 2009, 01:28 PM
 
So who is making money?

If no one makes any money doing music why do they do it?

Drugs and ********?

My sig is 1 pixel too big.
     
Spheric Harlot
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Nov 1999
Location: 888500128, C3, 2nd soft.
Status: Offline
Reply With Quote
Apr 21, 2009, 01:31 PM
 
Okay, so we've gone from condoning piracy because

the record companies deserve it for being such criminal bastards


to condoning piracy because

the record companies aren't hurting for money because -
a) Atlantic made $10.1 billion in profits last year, which was shown to be i) the entire music industry in America - not just Atlantic - and ii) total sales, not profits, and c) that Warner, one of the biggest music corps in the world, made total WORLDWIDE profits of SIX million dollars in Q4 2008, and
b) there are plenty of big studios left in the world, except that there are plenty more that AREN'T left in the world


to condoning piracy because

the current industry business model is failing anyway; might as well steal it


to condoning piracy because

it's basically the same thing as listening to the radio (except that all commercial radio actually pays licensing fees for every single track played)


to condoning piracy because

musicians don't need money because studios no longer cost any money (which is pretty funny, really)


to condoning piracy because

musicians are complete pricks


to condoning piracy because

musicians don't actually work


to condoning piracy because

I've heard of these fifteen people in the "industry", all of whom were made massively famous via the "old" infrastructure, who actually managed to make a pretty fair income off a product that has found its way into literally millions of households (please compare to ANY other industry that makes things that show up in millions of households - from rubber bands to wall-to-wall carpeting), one of whom is so taken with his "success" that he's proposed a mandatory internet copyright tax to cover for the fact that people are complete bastards who'll grab anything they can get for free without giving a thought to the consequences (or rather, and here is the twist that makes it so difficult to grasp for most people, the *lack* of consequences).


ALL THIS WHILE purporting "full support" of independent artists, as long as they're cool and give away their music for free (though I'd really really pay for it if they wanted me to).


Am I missing anything?
     
 
Thread Tools
 
Forum Links
Forum Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts
BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Top
Privacy Policy
All times are GMT -4. The time now is 02:09 PM.
All contents of these forums © 1995-2017 MacNN. All rights reserved.
Branding + Design: www.gesamtbild.com
vBulletin v.3.8.8 © 2000-2017, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.,