RIAA Says No To Transferring Legally Purchased Music From CD To PC

Washington Post:

Despite more than 20,000 lawsuits filed against music fans in the years since they started finding free tunes online rather than buying CDs from record companies, the recording industry has utterly failed to halt the decline of the record album or the rise of digital music sharing.

Still, hardly a month goes by without a news release from the industry's lobby, the Recording Industry Association of America, touting a new wave of letters to college students and others demanding a settlement payment and threatening a legal battle.

Read the whole story: Washington Post

Comments

[ChiGuy]

Dear RIAA,

Blow it out your a**.

[Rog49Thomas]

Can anyone answer two questions for me?

If I play a CD, am I legally permitted to sing along?

Or should I leave the CD unopened in the shrink wrap to prove to the RIAA I've never listened to it or transferred a song to my PC?

I'm afraid I might get Scooter for a cell mate and he looks like a pretty rough guy.

[tinkaboutit]

Ummmm My opinion is that this entire issue doesn't really matter because I personally don't care. Go ahead and move it off the page now and put up more pictures of Olivia newton John.

[ultomatt]

The music industry has been a slimefest for a very long time, as in, many many decades. They've been screwing artists since time began, and now they're ramping up the attacks on the very people who made their business possible, the music fans. Great idea...piss off the people who pay your check! Fuck the music industry, and the RIAA...buy independent music only, and let the old farts stink fade in the wind.

I wonder, since they say that copying MP3's to your computers is illegal, what about humming their "intellectual property" aka songs? Will they start suing people for humming their favorite song, because they're not paying royalties? Whenever you whistle a tune while walking down the street, keep your eyes peeled for the music industry police, cause they'll site you, and then send you a bill for ten thousand dollars for copyright infringement!

All of this is tangential to the real issue, which is, simply, that the bastards in the music industry, won't adjust their greedy pricing schedules accordingly. When CD's first came out, the promise was that they'd be cheap and affordable once the manufacturing capability met demand. They lied. The price of a CD never came down, it only went up. And their sales have been dropping ever since.

This all looks like the last dying gasp/grasp of a drowning man who wants to take those who are trying to save him, down with him. They're flailing about trying to squeeze whoever they can get their filthy hands on, to get more money. And oddly, the harder they squeeze, the more it slips like sand through their fingers. And that's as it should be.

[mcnary]

Isn't it amazing how many leaches there are out there. It took so long for these maggots to set up their little money tree, they'd still be doing it sept they got figured out.

Quick put that internet back in the bottle.

[camcat]

The RIAA is working with the Bush/Gonzales playbook. They pull these corporate directives ( Executive privilige, presidential signings, etc) out of their rear ends and the peons are supposed to obey or what...? Their idea to try to force consumers to buy a seperate cd for each player is absolutely Rovian. People throw the term "Fascism" about pretty loosely, but this maneouver is really definitive--a corporation acting as an institution unto itself, with the corporate support of the government, declaring law what they see fit as it suits their bottom line.

[dexxjones]

one day they are going to sue the wrong person and get their asses handed to them.

[NChooseK]

What exactly will it take for there to be a peasant uprising in this country? Laws like this could easily be the start.

You don't own what you paid for. This is something people of every political stripe can understand as pure theft by greedy scumbags.

[Hirnlego]

How about RIAA tell the industry to quit damn MAKING EVERYTHING LOUD WITH THE STUPID LOUDNESSRACE

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/17777619/the_death_of_high_fidelity

[DrPaulProteus]

Its like they desperately want us to pirate music.

[PepperzMom]

Nothin' like cutting off your nose to spit your face.

Drive consumers to downloads...kill the CD industry.

[situationcritical]

That's it.

I'm never buying music again.

I really only purchased CDs. But now I will stop.

I'll accept it as a gift. I might listen to it on the radio. I might even preview it in the iTunes Store.

Record Companies, all two of them, have seen the last of my dollars.

The RIAA just lost a music buyer, and I'm sure I'm not alone.

[jasjohn128]

RIAA is a six- or seven-level deep bureaucracy of jumped-up accountants, marketing directors, clerks, typists, managers and "facilitators" that has nothing, nothing at all, to do with paying artists fairly for their work.

They protect no one but themselves. They sue on behalf of no one but themselves, and they seek to enforce those peculiar laws (that they've bought and paid for) merely to protect and preserve their own incomes and lifestyles.

RIAA plays the middle, snatching pennies from both ends (artists and consumers) while contributing next to nothing. And despite their public wailing, the truth is they believe that for their efforts they're entitled, in effect, to live lifestyles befitting successful arms dealers, drug smugglers, hedge fund operators or Bush campaign contributors.

RIAA sees the writing on the wall. They know their days are numbered because nobody f*ckin' needs 'em anymore. They see that their business model no longer works, that we can support artists on our own, so with these lawsuits they're just trying to cash out while they can and intimidate as many citizens as possible until their nasty little house of cards falls right down around their ears.

The tail's wagging the dog here, folks. RIAA is no friend of any artist, so what do they expect to get paid for? They don't create anything or protect anybody's rights - they don't even do any useful work. They're just another bunch of punks with money to throw at Congress, looking for a welfare check/handout from Uncle Sugar in return for campaign contributions.

Fuck the RIAA.

[midtown]

STFU, RIAA. You mean all those people who transfer their CDs to cassettes to play in older cars are doing something illegal?

Musicians of the world: pay attention: create your own record companies and sell on iTunes. Do these bastards in.

[wndrwrthg]

Once again I pose the question. If I buy industry recorded cds at swap meets or used record shops am I stealing their music? Are they going to go after these people next? These industry officials are fast making themselves irrelavent and driving away their customers. Everyone record your music onto cds, as a mix and then give them away or just leave them somewhere, like on a bus or at a restaurant. Anywhere will do. Just get the music out there and foil these bastards.