My iPod is almost entirely filled with MP3 files that I converted from my existing CDs using iTunes, perfectly legally. The result is that less than 5% of my MP3 files were bought as MP3 files.
You could perfectly legally have converted *all* your iPod MP3s from CDs you already owned. So the problem you describe simply doesn't exist.
The real problem is that people want to be able to routinely steal music without paying for it. The howls of protest that are heard anytime someone suggests that music should be paid for demonstrate that.
Yes, and these are checked against the returns made by the people to whom the PRS pay a small amount of money to listen to those radio stations and note down what is played. It works well, and has done so for decades.
Indeed - the level of copyright theft is absolutely appalling. And it is easy to see why, judging by the number of people on here who clearly believe that they should not have to pay to listen to music.
Then I suggest that you go and attempt to fix your faulty powers of reasoning and/or language skills, because no where did I say that or even remotely allude to it.
You'll find very few tears shed for the record companies among jobbing musicians - we've long known what a rip-off the whole system is. The key word in the phrase 'music business' is business. Talent and fresh ideas are only ever brought to the table if there's a chance that someone can make a fat wadge of cash out of it - and that's unlikely to be the artist.
I did a gig a while back where I was fortunate enough to find myself rubbing shoulders with the likes of Eric Clapton and Bryan Ferry. We all had nice big portacabins each and there was a free 24 hour buffet and bar and lots of nice men to pick and carry for us. I'll admit I very much enjoyed it and certainly didn't turn my nose up at the extravagant hospitality - but did any of us need or deserve it? At the end of the day it's just a job, like any other that requires a skill - but aside from a need for some extra security to keep some of the less sane fans at bay there's really not much else that I or any other musician needs over and above anyone other skilled worker. Ultimately its the punters who foot the bill, and that's reflected in the price of CDs.
Prices stay high because people are stupid enough to pay them - and if you think that increased sales will result in lower prices then more fool you. Take a look round any 'record' shop and see which artists sell at premium prices and which artists only go for budget prices - it's the big sellers who command the highest prices. The new U2 album will sell by the skip-load and should therefore be a prime candidate for a reduced price. I won't bet on it.
There are quite literally millions of artists out there would who jump at the chance have their music recorded and distributed - and who would do so quite cheaply - but the record industry is about generating mass-appeal and then feeding it...and usually with talentless bores or regurgitated and banal pap.
How many artists do you listen to ( one the radio, on telly etc. ) and 'quite like' but would never consider shelling out 10 or 15 quid to buy any of their albums simply because you're not that interested in their music or you only like a selected amount of it? Would a fiver an album change your mind? Would you bother downloading a highly compressed poor-quality track at
50p when you could have the real deal for the same price? Sure, there will always be freeloaders - and always have been ever since the dawn of the cassette tape - but the vast majority of listeners actually do want to buy albums...and they'd buy more if they were cheaper.
The entire business needs a long-overdue reality check, but it's not going to happen as long as people are prepared to pay over the odds for albums while they watch artists being pampered like royalty - and the easier it becomes for unknown artists to prepare and distribute their work via the new communications technologies that are still evolving, the harder the record companies are going to fight to keep their hands on all that filthy lucre. They make the banks look like charities.
So are those hanging around in the local garage listening to the wireless while their waiting for their tyres to be changed not listening to it personally?.
This is really bollocks its a gut reaction by PRS to the losses caused by file sharing..
And why has it suddenly got to be a problem -now- after all these years?.....
Yes then those possibly around 3 or 4 and then you can hardly hear it!..
Not a -very- big issue is it?.
Its a silly argument really .. so what happens now our local garage is having to pay for the "public" to listen to the wireless they have on for themselves?...
No, not a big issue in the scheme of things, but the difference between personal use and playing it for more people to hear it is fundamental.
They have the option of playing non-copyright music for free. But people get far, far more pleasure from listening to copyright music, and that doesn't come free.
In nearly all cases, both the performance and the song are copyright. You often find a CD has a C in a circle for the copyright of the song and a P in a circle for the copyright of the performance, often with a different year on each.
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