Where Do I Send The Money?

Someone really is robbing musicians, and it's not who you'd think. That's why I would gladly donate $10 to this woman, and so would a lot of other people:

NPR.org, October 5, 2007 · A federal judge ordered a Minnesota woman to ante up thousands of dollars for violating copyright laws by sharing music illegally downloaded, marking the first time such a suit against an individual had gone to trial.

Jammie Thomas has to pay $222,000 for the dozens of songs she pulled from the Internet.

Now, once again, I'll recommend you read "Courtney Love Does The Math" and tell me exactly who are the real record pirates:

The record is a big hit and sells a million copies. (How a bidding-war band sells a million copies of its debut record is another rant entirely, but it's based on any basic civics-class knowledge that any of us have about cartels. Put simply, the antitrust laws in this country are basically a joke, protecting us just enough to not have to re-name our park service the Phillip Morris National Park Service.)

So, this band releases two singles and makes two videos. The two videos cost a million dollars to make and 50 percent of the video production costs are recouped out of the band's royalties.

The band gets $200,000 in tour support, which is 100 percent recoupable.

The record company spends $300,000 on independent radio promotion. You have to pay independent promotion to get your song on the radio; independent promotion is a system where the record companies use middlemen so they can pretend not to know that radio stations -- the unified broadcast system -- are getting paid to play their records.

All of those independent promotion costs are charged to the band.

Since the original million-dollar advance is also recoupable, the band owes $2 million to the record company.

If all of the million records are sold at full price with no discounts or record clubs, the band earns $2 million in royalties, since their 20 percent royalty works out to $2 a record.

Two million dollars in royalties minus $2 million in recoupable expenses equals ... zero!

How much does the record company make?

They grossed $11 million.

It costs $500,000 to manufacture the CDs and they advanced the band $1 million. Plus there were $1 million in video costs, $300,000 in radio promotion and $200,000 in tour support.

The company also paid $750,000 in music publishing royalties.

They spent $2.2 million on marketing. That's mostly retail advertising, but marketing also pays for those huge posters of Marilyn Manson in Times Square and the street scouts who drive around in vans handing out black Korn T-shirts and backwards baseball caps. Not to mention trips to Scores and cash for tips for all and sundry.

Add it up and the record company has spent about $4.4 million.

So their profit is $6.6 million; the band may as well be working at a 7-Eleven.

But we're supposed to feel bad for the artists because Jammie Thomas downloaded some tunes?

I don't think so.

Comments

[OtayPanky]

As I recall, it's not just the suits that are on the hunt.

It's Metallica, Greg Allman, etc. - musicians who choose to be part of the current system - whether you think it sucks or not - and don't want you ripping their CD's for free.

The suits don't have an independent existence. They exist only because the artists (some of them, at least) keep the suits in business to protect their interest.

So while you're writing that nastygram to the RIAA, write another to Lars Ulrich, OTAY?

[Where is Jesus?]

Someone once said something like,"You could swim a mile upstream in a filthy, stinking sewer and then there is the music industry...

It has been this way for decades. That is why getting a contract with a major label is often the beginning of the end for most bands. If you get signed for a multi-record deal (at least 2)and the first does not do extremely well, then the record companies often put your contract on the shelf and the band just flounders, unable to make more records but unable to get out of their contract because they are in perpetual debt to the company.

This is business as usual for the labels. So the advice for the young musicians with stars in their eyes--beware! Do your music, find alternative routes, make a plan to do your own recording at a good independent studio, build your local following by by setting up your own tours on a tri-state route. Sell as many records as you can via internet, at tours, local music stores in the tour areas.

After you have sold a few thousand records, then go to a label and show them what you have done. They will see that
1. You have some business smarts
2. You have demonstrated that you can sell records--people like your product
3. You are road ready for bigger tours
This way you have more leverage than an untested band and this means generally that there will be less headache for the label in dealing with the band. It also means that you may not need them as much as they would like for you to think. You have better negotiating position. And don't take the first contract they dangle in front of you.

Even then, there are no gaurantees orhter than the labels are most interested in their bottom line and they are not that concerned with yours. Be smart and educate yourself about all this before you jump into a contract. Good luck...

[rabidAtheist]

Nice post! And I second your willingness to send this woman 10 bucks to help defray the cost of this stupidity. A national campaign to do so might just teach the record companies that they can bring these suits all they want, but that it won't make a difference. Perhaps then, they'll stop wearing their own behinds as hats.

[realitytrumpsbull]

When will we ever see another Scorpions, or
some of the other really GREAT bands? How much
more of this electronic video game soundtrack
CRAP are they going to keep trying to pawn off
on us? Does ANYbody really honestly play MUSIC
anymore, or is there just a Cray computer set up
in someone's basement hooked up to a MIDI interface? Yes, composing and then performing
music is actually a form of WORK, but, maybe
if they got started, in a decade or so we'd
see some bona-fide recording artists again.
Less with the Britney Spears, more with
the Yngvie Malmsteen, please...

[godlessclif]

Intellectual property is theft. Repeal the Dole Bayh law.

Under socialism good artists would be rewarded by the state for their artistic contribution, and recorded music would be free for all.

[meandmagoo]

XM is my only connection to music nowadays.I don't download and I don't purchase cd's.

In my younger days,I spent insane amounts of money
on music.But We now live in a time when the music sucks so badly that it creates its own vortex,and the recording industry has intentionally turned into the 'entertainment gestapo".

[Charity]

this has never been about the recording industry trying to recoup any losses by so-called "music pirates."

this has, from the day the music industry was made aware of napster, been all about stealing the napster model and making it their own to the exclusion of anyone else.

and in that, the recording industry has nearly suceeded.

i buy about one CD a year now, if that; i never download any music. my record (vinyl) collection totals more than 2,000; my CDs - not so much, maybe a couple hundred or less.

when napster was alive, i BOUGHT many many new CDs off the shelf or ordered them from amazon - artists i'd never heard of before napster, artists from the U.S. and from europe. it felt good to be back "into" music again.

now? hahahahahahahahahahaha. one CD a year.

you listening, RIAA? nah. of course you aren't.

[CriminallySane]

I for one have trimmed my recorded music purchases to virtually zero. I don't download, I don't have an MP3 player.

I just don't care anymore. I'll go see a very few performers live now and then, as for buying recordings, rarely if ever. And then used, if at all possible.

And whatever the ultimate outcome of this (and we're nowhere close to done here), the paradigm is changing - out from under the RIAA. The little early mammals are eating their eggs.

[ricr]

agreed; I got a kick out of the music business attorney preaching about teaching this woman a lesson; an entertainment attorney talking about morality is sort of like a hooker talking about chastity. It's an upside down world we live in.

[BlackJAC]

At the same time, though, how does intellectual property theft by the Napsterites teach the music label not to screw over the musicians? Whatever you may think of the business ethics courses that the music label CEOs may or may not have taken, it doesn't change the fact that 18 USC 501 and 18 USC 506 makes intellectual property theft a crime. It's one thing to break into the CEO's office and make off with whatever artwork he may have hanging on the wall; it's completely another to deny someone their livelihood, especially in an industry with zero job security.

[ImmanuelGoldstein]

Its hard to feel guilty about downloading when inf fact the industry systematically rips off the talent the way it does. I'd rather paypal money to a performer's tip jar that spend money in a music shop, at least all the money will go to the performer.