Re: Article on FileSharing, the RIAA, the MPAA, and YOU Fini
I disagree that it's possible to make a top-quality recording for $1000. If you already a pro studio set up and everything, sure but that would cost much much more in the first place. I'm glad you got over "it only costs a few cents to make a CD so charging $15 is ridiculous" though...
Re: Article on FileSharing, the RIAA, the MPAA, and YOU Fini
Quote:I disagree that it's possible to make a top-quality recording for $1000. If you already a pro studio set up and everything, sure but that would cost much much more in the first place.
Well I can play a CD that was developed in a local studio for my friend's band, and he paid about $1000 for the time it took to record the tracks and the burning, etc. I can play that same CD and there is no way I can tell the difference between it and a professionally produced CD, he even covers Radiohead songs, and they sound almost identical to the original tracks except slight differences in the voice of course cause it's not the same vocalist. There is no loss or degredation in quality. You don't realize how good digital recording equipment is. The guy who bought the equipment, I think he said he's got about $15,000 invested, but he makes it all back just from people coming to his house to make CD's, and trust me, if I didn't see someone making the CD, and it was playing in my car or Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound with DTS, I wouldn't know the difference that it wasn't done by AOL Time Warner or John Porth's garage studio, no difference trust me.
Re: Article on FileSharing, the RIAA, the MPAA, and YOU Fini
Now when I say something like a CD costs the RIAA pennies, it has a lot of truth to it. Follow me:
If local band pays $1000 for a master CD, which all other CD's will be exact duplicates of, then the cost to produce 1 CD is $1000.
Now the cost of a box of 200 Blank CDR's is 25.00.
If you want Jewel Cases, 200 Jewel Cases are about 50.00.
Now suppose my friend burned 10 CD's, now his cost per CD dropped to
A little over $100 Per Disc.
Now suppose my Friend Burned 100 CD's, now his cost per CD dropped to
$10.37 per disc.
Now me makes 200 CD's
$5.75.
Now me Makes 1000 CD's
$1.37
Now He Makes 10,000 CD's
.14 Cents. Per Disc in manufacture cost.
Now in the case of the RIAA Label they may have more expensive equipment, probably $100,000, however dillute the cost of CD manufacture down incredibly because they can mass produce them in a factory, and that work is subcontracted so there is a marginal cost per disc but it amounts to pennies per disc. Distrobution, again probably about a quarter per disc, and finally merchandising, maybe closer to a dollar, and the stores buy the CD's and mark them up like a buck over. If you pay 14.99 for a CD the store pays about $12.75.
re: CD
Ignoring the larger issue of recording costs, I bet $5 it's a shitty record.
Anyway, Video Gamer X, that aside, even if your friend's band's current setup works for them, it still is only a small-time sort of set-up at best, and it only works on a very limited scale.
What about people who want to be bigger than just selling CD-Rs to the local community? What about people who have the talent to find fame and fortune? How would you recommend that they do so, without the publicity and promotion and distribution apparatus of a major record company?
Or do you simply feel that musicians should not be able to make large profits from their work? Do you feel that people should not be able to become famous from their music?
And if so, why do you deny the possibility of fortune and fame to musicians?
Quote:What about people who want to be bigger than just selling CD-Rs to the local community? What about people who have the talent to find fame and fortune? How would you recommend that they do so, without the publicity and promotion and distribution apparatus of a major record company?
About 95% of talent that approaches an international record lablel get's rejected, and these artists or bands, or whatevers are left with either trying to get noteriety by touring locally then regionally, then nationally, or signing with an indie label. As well file sharing allows for possibly original and talented nobodies to get known without having to cow tow to the RIAA to push their "product" on Radio and CDs.
Quote:Or do you simply feel that musicians should not be able to make large profits from their work? Do you feel that people should not be able to become famous from their music?
First of all, I certainly feel that people like musicians and atheletes are way overpaid in our society. A person who can sing into a microphone on key (many don't even write their own lyrics for crying out loud) or worse scream loud incoherent nonsense get paid more than the people that save our lives like Firefighters, Police, and provide us with everything we need to exist in society, Teachers. It sickens me to see some @#%$ on a stage making millions of dollars while Teachers get layed off or a guy whose working in a Steel Mill his whole life to feed his family and try to make an honest living gets layed off from a company that moves all of their manufacturing to China where they can hire laborers at a fraction of the cost of an American. The profitmongering has to stop somewhere. Companies can make profit in America, however it's not enough and shareholders and the people at the top are not satisfied. Back to musicians, I don't see a logical reason to pay a musician millions of dollars to sing or dance, or play an instrument, they should receive a standard of living that allows them to do what they do and pay for what they need in life not rediculous extravagancies like Hummers, Mansions, Yachts, Gold Chains, and Boob Jobs for their Girlfriends or Wives.
re: that
Yes, and what you have to realize is that a lot of them suck. Certainly, there are brilliant bands in there who are just victims of the unadventurousness of the labels - but there's also a lot of shit bands in there, too, who just don't deserve success.
And besides, if you sign with an indie and put out some good records and build a fanbase, you'll get signed to a major sooner or later.
BUT, MORE IMPORTANTLY, you dodged my main question - do you, on a philosophical level, believe that musicians should be able to get extremely rich and become superstars based on their music?
Re: re: that
For crying out loud, I had a friend come back from serving in Afghanistan in Operation Enduring Freedom and he was almost killed twice, and they give them I think an extra $150 a month combat pay. WTF!? While this guy puts his life on the line for this country and takes a bullet for the US, and gets paid less than most middle managers do here, and in fact lives in a small one bedroom apartment in the same country some thug from the ghetto listens to snoop dog CD's and can make up ebonic lyrics to a beat and gets signed by Death Row Records and becomes a millionaire and has his own personal orgies at his mansion in California, and he gets all his teeth "Platinumized" That's fu<king insane! Why does it persist to exist, because people either like the music (I use the term loosely) for it's shock value in some cases, or the idolize the musician or star because they live their own lives vicariously through the success of those people. It's a sickening cancer of this society, and also a contributing factor in psychological distress for intelligent people who have to endure this BS, and can do nothing while they themselves get layed off by the company they work for because its cheaper to hire Part Time Teenagers, or Indians in Bangalore, or Chinese in Bejing.
See, that's the problem here - you don't believe in a meritocracy - you don't believe that people should be able to get large rewards for high achievement. That's really all I need to know - you have no respect for talent or creativity, and believe that all musicians exist at basically the same level of talent, which you call, "singing and dancing" or whatever it was you said.
Combined with your posts on the "This might be insensitive" (or whatever it was called) thread, I can see that your essential problem is a resentment and even hatred of successful, high-achieving people. Don't pretend you're defending musicians against the RIAA - you're not doing that at all. Essentially, you're saying that they should be reduced to serfhood, with no ability to better their incomes beyond a certain point. You're saying that musicians should always stay at an average or low income level, with no ability to earn wealth.
Look, Video Gamer:
In our society, there will always be people who have wealth. Many inherit it, some earn it. I understand if you're pissed off at the idea of inherited and unearned wealth - aristocracy, essentially - but you have to understand that unless you lead some sort of bloody revolution (are you planning to?) it will i]always[/i] exist.
Now, the best way to counter this socioeconomic unfairness is to provide - for ordinary, average, low-born people like you and me - some opportunity to be able to rise into the ranks of the wealthy. Otherwise, we're all stuck down here with nowhere to go. You need to allow there to be earners, as well as inheritors.
When you deny musicians the ability to raise their income through higher achievement - or, really, when you deny any ordinary working person the ability or opportunity to ascend to a point of wealth - you only contribute to the dominance of the aristocratic/inheritor class. When you eliminate the ability to become an "earner", you create a situation where the only wealthy people are the inheritors and the only way to be wealthy is to inherit.
Basically, the only way to soften the unfairness of society's economic inequality is to create a meritocracy wherein an average person can become a rich person. If there is no such opportunity, than the world becomes separated into two permament classes, the haves and the have-nots, and no one has an opportunity to move in between them. A man who has no opportunity to become an "earner", or to become rich, is nothing more than a serf.
You may hate the rich, but there is no way to bring them down to your level - except, of course, revolution.
The only solution is to create a system where you can rise to their level.
You want to destroy that system, and knock down the ladders that a man can climb. You're shooting yourself (and all of us) in the foot. Nice.
Re: re: you
If you are really wanting to look closer at the distribution of wealth, look up the Gini index. The index for the USA has risen since it's lowest value in 1968. Lower is better if you want everyone to have the same dough. If you are pissed off that the rich get richer and poor get poorer, go get the data to support it. While you're at it, read up on the factors affecting wealth redistribution.
Re: re:Gini
Are you an idiot? Have you somehow ignored what I've said on EVERY SINGLE THREAD ABOUT THIS when the cost of manufacturing CDs comes up? You have to pay lots of people for making CDs, which all comes out of the retail cost.
I know how good recording technology is these days, being quite the serious musician, and I know that first you have to build the studio (like you said, $15000? I bet that's not a top-quality one either), and unless someone in the band is an engineer, and a good enough multitasker to serve as a producer, you'll have to get people from outside to do this, and I doubt good ones are going to come cheap. You might come up with a decent-sounding recording if you engineer it yourself (I know from my limited experience that it's not hard at all to come up with something that sounds listenable), but it won't sound like the ones done by the pros will. If your friend can come up with something of that quality though, good for him.
Mystere IX Better than a cup of cold sick
(11/8/03 7:36 am) Reply
Re: re:Gini
Technology issues aside, I wish you'd acknowledge that there's more to the value of a CD than the financial cost of creating it. Music isn't written by machines.
(Please don't bounce back at this with another remark about black guys with a ton of gold chains rapping about hoes. They're not typical examples of anything, and anyway enough people seem to like them so they're doing their job.)
post Gorbachov Eastern bloch gini's
Me too, Chilton. I suspect that since the answer to USSR hard currency issues has been the relentless privatization of resource management, the gini's are going up as the currency flows towards the gatekeepers of those resources.
Ain't globalization grand?
(yes, I was talking to the lego-loving pseudo-socialist)
and another thing
OBTW, I was hoping that by looking at the ordering of the index, the composition of the index, and the countries in comparison, that the idea of wealth distribution would be put into perspective. It ain't all about that so Veeg's angst about "other people's money" is only a small component of a larger picture. Dig?
Re: and another thing
Speaking of Globalization. Recently I received a statement for my American Express card and there was some kind of $55.00 "Membership Fee" added to the statement, where this card had previously had a 0 balance, I personally refuse to pay interest on credit cards if I can help it, however I've used credit cards to leverage my credit score enough to buy a house at 22 years old because I know how the system works I know about messing around with the credit score by manipulating credit cards i.e. charing and paying off, and cancelling and opening new and canceling. Anyway, so they charged me this fee, and I wasn't at all happy about it.
It states no where on the statement what the fee is for, so I call the 1-800 number on the statement and sure enough, some chick named Parmi with an Indian accent answers. First of all I'm in a rare mood as it is, having been charged for nothing but the privlage of having that card, and the company is basically stealing money from me for no reason whatsoever, and this is apparently legal.
First thing I ask is, "Is this Bangalore or New Dehli" and this chick with the Indian accent responds yes, Bangalore. And I'm ready to become livid, just knowing in my head that this scab is working in a foriegn country trained to deal with American customers for a fraction of the cost the company would pay for an American Employee. That's fu<king sick! I was about to get angry and irate but rather figured what good would it do, I'm talking to someone who was recruited by their aggressive recrutment personnell over there in INdia and she's just doing a job for a multibilliondollar company that could give I $hit what I think anyway. So I talked and explained how discusting the company she worked for was, and how I didn't blame her for stealing money and employment from an American, but explained that I did not approve of what was being done to Americans by profitmongering corporations like the one she worked for. I said that even in Hinduism, Islam, or Christianity, treating people dishonestly and underhandedly and persuing greed over integrity was something that was of moral impropriety. She explained that they go to special schools there and everything is taught in English to work for American companies. She said that many American companies have been going to colleges and recruiting there.
There wasn't anything she could do about the 55.00 fee and explained that it was because I had a Charge Card, and I explained, yes it's a charge card, but all my other Charge Cards have no fee, and she explained that because it was a Charge card there was a fee and I should get a Credit Card, and I explained that Charging and Crediting are the same thing over here in America, but I think she failed to understand. I assume she was saying that that kind of card I had was some kind of special card that's not a credit card. I asked if I could "charge" a million dollar house on it, and she said that I could not, so I explained then it's a credit card with a limit. She could not explain to me what the fee was for, it was just a Membership Fee, Membership to what, It's not like Im getting anything by having that card, I could just as well not have it and notice no difference.
AMEX annual fee
it's $75 for the Amex gold, as of several years ago. It's been that way forever so I'm not sure why you'd be surprised.
I don't use Amex. It's too much to pay for a credit rating.
In 2001 when I bought the Texas house, my rating was 803. That's supposed to be impossible. It went down after an unscrupulous mortgage company made dozens of loan inquiries.
ain't that a stinker? If you even apply for a loan or a credit card, it sends you credit rating down.
Topic Commands
Click to receive email notification of replies 
Click to stop receiving email notification of replies