See, Tom Waits is one of those artists I'm talking about. Waits would actually be more successful if it weren't for the entertainment industry. as it is, his music has always had to compete with the billions of dollars of promotion given to people like Britney Spears who pump out teen trash. I mean think about it - how many Waits songs have made it high up the charts when covered by a 'name' artist? 3 or 4 I can think of, and I'm no Waits scholar...

and even Ella Fitzgerald made a few crappy recordings, that should be (and mostly have been) forgotten... Nobody's perfect. :D

Here's Techdirt's take on "Free", i.e. no DRM.

Found this

http://arstechnica.com/journals/appl...cbook-near-you

I'm not talking OS here, but hardware. The article posited that Apple intends to DRM constrict at the hardware level, just like it's new Powerbook. That is what HDCP is. Windows XP doesn't even support it yet. Vista does, but it still requires the hardware to do so as well.
So actually, yes I could buy a PC motherboard without this built-in in the future.
I don't want to one day pop in the "Clone wars" Blu-ray for my kids to watch on the computer, only to have a message pop up "sorry, you can't watch this you pirate!" Of course, they'll surely find a way to software fark it as well, I'm sure.

What they're doing is merely going to push people to download more and more.
If I cannot watch my legally bought media, then I'll stop buying the media, and just download it to start with. I'm not alone.
I have never bought anything off iTunes, and probably never will.
I'll also never buy any content off of XboxLive marketplace.

>>>Music can and should be priced at $0.

That's beyond "no DRM". That's just retarded.
(Guess I've met too many musicians in my life... they gotta eat and pay bills too ya know.)

Ever read this?: "Thoughts On Music"

Read the article. Basically he's saying that there are other business models than selling the individual songs. As I understand it, from an artist's perspective there isn't a whole lot of money in selling albums/cds/songs anyway, since the labels use all kinds of accounting tricks to screw the artists. That's why they tour.

Royalties aren't something that just has to be. They can make money going on tour, selling t-shirts/autographs/used socks, playing bar mitzvahs...many other ways to get paid.

Maybe this means the days of producing a few tracks in a studio and sitting back and scarfing peanut butter and banana sandwiches while the millions roll in are over.

Time will tell.

And *because he says so* therefore, all music should be free? :D


But if artists didn't get screwed by those same "accounting tricks" they wouldn't have to tour, to get their fair share. They could tour when they wanted to. This is already happening, as bands (like Radiohead) have said goodbye to big record companies... and market their songs online.

C'mon... the Internet has opened up a huge online store where millions can purchase at will. Why break your back touring (with all the expense involved) to play for months to audiences numbering only thousands. Sure, they do it to help promote future music sales... but not 'tour' as the *only* means of income. Crazy? Maybe big name (famous) bands can do that... but not unknowns. When they "tour" it's small nightclubs... and yes, they sell their CDs by the stage when they go on break. And they keep 100% for the CDs they sell that way, not any 5 or 10%. (i refer to 'originals' bands, not 'cover' bands).

All composers reading this who want to give away their songs for free
(forgoing all 'royalties' as well), and sell t-shirts instead... say "AYE".

:rolleyes:

oh...its hdcp, most things have that now a days, hdtv's, and almost anything with a hdmi port like game consoles etc. It also means, say you want to use a dvi monitor on a console etc through the hdmi port, that monitor has to have hdcp to work. But now apple have upped what it can do. At least with windows pc's you can usually hack around these problems

If the movie studios are successful with it, then it's just a matter of time before you can't find any monitor that doesn't have it.
:(

iTunes Store: Sign on the indy labels and artists!
 

.
Here is what I would like to see Apple do with the iTunes Store:

1. Sign on every indy label in the world that wants to.
   
2. Sign on bands that wish to distribute their music directly, without having to deal with a record company -- providing, of course, there is no breach of contract.
   
3. Add a section for uncopyrighted music, such as historical stuff (for starters)...
   
4. Up the DRM-free quality to optional lossless downloads.

.
Two more things:

• I still cannot for the life of me figure out why there should be DRM on music sold via the Internet -- the same music that is sold without DRM on physical CDs in any music store.
  
• And I still cannot figure out why online music doesn’t come with a loss-less option. The way it stands now, consumers who buy online are paying a lot for an inferior product. The only thing that varies is how much inferior.

By all means tell me if I’m missing or misunderstanding something here.

-- ArcticStones
.

This would be an extremely small section--just a few things recorded by the Smithsonian, governmental agencies, or similar (and deliberately placed in the public domain). Copyright in the US keeps getting extended by the lobbying efforts of the Disney Corp. (and no, I'm not joking or exaggerating), so at this point copyright extends for far far longer than the original writers of copyright law ever intended. Historical recordings, in large part, still retain full copyright.

Trevor

It's the other way round - the only reason we DON'T have DRM on cds sold in stores is the legacy base of CD players.

i completely agree. happily - itunes is not the only media provider out there. if it ever comes to the point that one can ONLY play stuff purchased in itunes on a mac - then yeah thats the moment to dump apple. meanwhile there are so many other things about mac's that i love - i would not want to give up using them just because of drm. what seems so absurd is that the tighter they try to control things - the stupider they seem to get.

i was reading yesterday about the new identity cards they want to bring in in the uk. not only will one have to pay for the pleasure of carrying one - if one doesnt update ones details as they change, one risks being fined up to £1000 for not being honest. sorry i got a bit off off post here but maybe an identity card is just another form of drm !!!

Agree, agree! Then the 70¢ of the 99 could go directly to the artists.

Here's an article from back in 2000 that I find very interesting, mostly on the subject of this thread:

Courtney Love does the math

Trevor

That is nothing new, bands make all their money on tour. The ticket sales, the merch sale, including CD sales on tour is where it is at. I have done work with many independent recording studios, bands, and record labels and I generally charge them nothing or a 12 pack of premium beer for my support, which is damn cheap. I also accept free merch for helping them too. Got plenty of free CDs and band shirts doing this as well. Mainly, because I love music and I know they make absolutely nothing. I have never done any work for any major studio and if I did I wouldn't have a single problem charging them my full contract hourly rate, plus expenses.

How do you get rid of the middle man and the big 4 (since sony + bmg merged there are no longer the big 5)?

The internet?

The Internet is the answer, but too many consumer hate being locked into products. Or give it away for free but put a paypal link up and you can pay what you think its worth?

Radical ideas but I think it may work.