These are the guys that are ruining the Music business and all the blame is on the government's that issue the Copyrights. Because they out-source the policing of a government function. They pass vague laws so that business's that do the enforcing simply screw the public and make up fees as they go along.
As a composer and an Artist I've had enough. None of these fees ever get paid to the Artist's. As the part-owner of an Online Radio Station I can testify that in 5 years of being a legal Radio Station and paying our fees on time to ASCAP, BMI and SESAC, we have never been asked to send a list of songs played on the station. When we asked about this the answer was that all songs on the Radio is covered by one of the above agencies. That's a lie. My music gets played on the Radio Station and I don't get paid because ASCAP, BMI and SESAC don't recognize anyone but the big 5 as being registered. Go to one of their web-sites and try to sign up as an indie. Hah!!! What a joke. The entire system is corrupt and will die a flaming death after enough people get sick of it.
I want the government that I paid a Copyright fee to to actually protect me. The way it works now is a shell game. The government takes the money and then leaves you hanging. The backlog in the Copyright Office in the United States is a joke. It takes months to actually get a piece of paper proving your copyright, thus leaving us with the only option which is the poor man's copyright. When I called the Copyright Office after waiting 6 months I was told to use the poor man's copyright by the guy on the phone and was told it was legal.
My point is: Why do I need the Copyright Office when all I need to do is burn a write-once, read-many CD or DVD. It burns the file date on the CD/DVD and I can find no way to change that date once it is burned into the CD/DVD. So using the poor man's copyright by burning a CD/DVD of your work, sealing it into an envelope and then mailing it to yourself to get the postmark. This is an almost immediate copyright and allows easily for revisions.
Why would I wait 6 to 9 months to pay an agency who doesn't even protect me?
Wow talk about privacy. When you are underage you have no rights and definitely no right to privacy. Do you see the word privacy anywhere in the U.S. Constitution? The phone company should be able to offer an absolutely private service if you want to pay for it. But the governments of the world wouldn't stand for it. The reason we have no privacy is because of the Intelligence Agencies having a stupid need to justify their existence by scanning everyone's calls and texts. Remember you paid for this! You bought this government that is putting you on trial for being free with your friends. The only place I feel like I am alone anymore is in my old, old car. But who knows.
Naughty, Naughty. No one likes a bully.
I'll remember that name and will never buy their brand.
Where are the Equal (Civil) Rights Lawyers when we need them?
All copyright and trademark cases should be reviewed for merit by the organization we paid the money to protect us.
The Copyright and the Trademark offices are government agencies that we pay to protect our rights, but we have to put up with unregulated private companies enforcing the laws we paid the government agencies to protect. Meanwhile politicians steal any song or visual aid they can get their hands on without the permission of the Copyright or Trademark holders because they know that the government cares less and will do nothing to protect the rights of the Copyright or Trademark owner. Thus if you don't have the money to sue or hire an agency to go after the thieves you are out of luck.
Is there something wrong with that thinking?
Why would I pay the government to protect me when they obviously do not?
We need to get it through our heads that the government or the police do not and will not ever protect us. They always come in after the fact and bungle the cleanup. The sad thing is that we have to pay for this!
Why do you keep glorifying Murdoch by even paying attention to him? He's a thief. Period. Haven't you figured it out yet? If you acquire more money than other people you obviously had to steal it from them. It's simple math, one person gets more, other people get less. The more millionaires there are, the more poor people get ripped off.
But in reality the consumer does rule if only they band together. I don't buy Murdoch's products. Why would I support a thief? None of the rich guys are on your side and none of them give a damn about you. Check Bill Gates the great philanthropist, all of his money got stolen from us by selling a buggy product and then it gets sent to help a foreign country. Granted they may need help, but we have starving children in the US also.
Did you ever consider that 'Green Freaks' resent being called freaks. What's with you!! You think you are better than anyone else to be be able to call us freaks!! In Europe this can be construed as hate speech and hopefully we will pass these laws in the United States.
Get real!
Did you ever consider that 'Green Freaks' resent being called freaks. What's with you!! You think you are better than anyone else to be be able to call us freaks!! In Europe this can be construed as hate speech and hopefully we will pass these laws in the United States.
Get real!
Isn't it legal under the Copyright law to make a backup of any product owned for archival purposes? If not didn't it used to be? I lost track somewhere. As an IT administrator we were told that it was legal to make an archival copy of our software and then put the original into a locked safe or other secure area. If I am wrong then under our support we were responsible for making thousands of illegal copies for thousands of major corporations (we had 3500 corp customers on the books) OOPS!!
Of course we were advised on the backup law back in the 90's and it has probably changed. So many of our laws in the US have been amended and we (the public) hear nothing and as a result we simply hope we are not breaking the law.
Our company bought a corporate copy of Windows XP and made an install copy. Now the copy is wearing out. I am glad I installed all 450 of our computers with a copy or I would have to buy another corp copy and spend thousands on it again. Good for Microsoft but not good for me as a consumer. I don't want to buy another copy of anything just because it wore out.
With the Draconian copyright laws being passed in Europe and Australia it has become time for the rest of the world to stop doing business with them. I refuse to let my company do business with any country or Union that is so shortsighted that it puts corporations before their people.
Who needs them anyway? Europe contributes nothing to the well being of the world. They can't even man and fund NATO properly. They are just a cop out and let other countries carry the load. They can be cut off. I can think of no products that I need from Europe. It really seems that the MPAA and the RIAA are working overtime bribing European officials. Man they must be getting rich!
As Cars Get More Complicated, Maybe Open Source Is The Way
Absolutely!!! A case in point is the difference between Linux (open source) and Windows (not open source). Linux runs flawlessly. I only shut it down to clean the computers. As to Windows it crashes just because. Who knows why? It's a mystery. I can count on Flash (not open source) crashing any system I use it on. Yuck!!! But I digress.
My biggest concern is the code that is in the cars. I have been a programmer for over 30 years and it is true that we leave back doors in to whatever apps we work on. Especially the managers of a software product, they always leave a way in. But my main concern is that terrorists have been polluting the code for years. I mean do you trust anyone anymore? Be real! It seems everyone has an agenda and is pissed off about something. Call me paranoid but the idea of my car being controlled by software and now that we have internet access installed in that software allows hackers a scary platform. The idea of my car being controlled by another party and causing massive pileups all over the world is now a reality. The larger the codebase gets the easier it is to insert subroutines. Remember Jurassic Park? That was only 2 million lines of code Ha Ha.
UK Court Says It Has Jurisdiction Over Racist Material Stored On California Server... If Content Created In The UK
Yes in the UK and the EU you are no longer allowed to use the free speech mantra to disguise hate speech. No more N word and no more preaching against gays. No more calling a sonofabitch a Sonofabitch except in private and I'm sure they are working on a way to stop that.
NBC's Delayed Telecasts Show A Company Living In The Last Century
I haven't been able to watch it since we no longer have free television because I haven't bought a digital set yet. But all my friends are complaining that the coverage sucks.
Really you need to go out and enjoy the world. Not to put you down or anything but you have way too much time on your hands since you respond to every new item I read in TechDirt. Maybe you should do something else. I worked IT for 30 years and got out of the corp building and went into outside support. You know the guy the IT dept calls when none of their guys can fix it. You know real network stuff. Too bad you got stuck in the corp building. I saw outside support as being the only way to get around the corp bull and still get their money. You know man! be a consultant. Get a couple of certs (MCSE, MCSI, Novell Linux, Cisco) there are lots of ways out. Kinda like being in the slums, it only takes the amount for bus fare to leave.
Have fun.
Incumbents Blocking Broadband Stimulus Efforts Because They Don't Like Competition
Hey I got ComCast and as long as they are the fastest pipe I can get for my business then I will buy it. But when something faster comes I will leave them hanging in the wind. You see I have NO product loyalty anymore. I figure the bigger the company the more restrictive they are. Competition is very real and scares the shit out of big companies. Like I said I get 25MB speed for my internet from Comcast, but if Google rolls out 1GB, screw Comcast.
To stick to the subject the incumbents really need to worry about the next election in the US. I am personally voting against every incumbent in my district. It's time to put new blood in Washington. It's time to get some politicians who feel indebted to their people rather than being indebted to lobbyists for Insurance companies.
I don't get it. How do you make 10 times the cost of the film if it's free. And if it's not then why are you saying it's free? Which is it?
I'm not being a jerk. I am trying to capitalize on the idea. How do you make money from free?
I totally agree that the cost should be lower. I think as low as 0.30 a track. 3 bucks for a 10 track CD is cool and you can still make money on it.
The main problem with online sales is the banking system and credit card checkout companies because a credit card transaction can cost as much as 0.30 plus 3% of the total.
That's PayPal's fee. For a business to even process credit cards on the cheap is still close to .15 per transaction. So if you sell a single at 0.99 the credit card processing can be up to 30% which is prohibitive. It sounds like a loser to me and the only way the cost will ever come down is to be able to get rid of the credit card processing fees.
If there was a way to batch process single track sales it would be cheaper. But the problem is that each credit card has to be approved and the companies sock you for it.
I haven't heard anywhere how much the Record Company gets out of each .99 sale, so it's really hard to figure total cost of sale.
The sad thing about immigration is that unless you have lot's of money and can go through the hoops here in the United States with an attorney and a support system here you will have a lot of problems.
Case in point: I called my local house cleaning service and got 2 wonderful people who spoke broken English, but well enough to understand. The couple was around 45 or so and had ran away from a dictatorship in their South American country.
The man was a Medical Doctor in his country with a thriving practice. He told me the story of making the mistake of agreeing with one of his patients that the current government was corrupt. The next thing he knows is he is running for his life.
What's the point? You ask. I thought it was really sad that a trained Medical Doctor was cleaning my house. Only because the immigration dept. and the AMA decided that the colleges he went to were not certified by them so his Degree didn't count. Wha????
He was good enough to practice medicine in his country but not good enough to practice here? He could not even test his skill and prove that he was a trained physician in the land of the free.
On the post: ACS:Law Now Using Dubious Legal Theories To Threaten Slyck.com
ACS
On the post: Irish Collection Society Wants Hotels To Pay Performance Fees For Music Played In Guest Rooms
Performance fees
As a composer and an Artist I've had enough. None of these fees ever get paid to the Artist's. As the part-owner of an Online Radio Station I can testify that in 5 years of being a legal Radio Station and paying our fees on time to ASCAP, BMI and SESAC, we have never been asked to send a list of songs played on the station. When we asked about this the answer was that all songs on the Radio is covered by one of the above agencies. That's a lie. My music gets played on the Radio Station and I don't get paid because ASCAP, BMI and SESAC don't recognize anyone but the big 5 as being registered. Go to one of their web-sites and try to sign up as an indie. Hah!!! What a joke. The entire system is corrupt and will die a flaming death after enough people get sick of it.
I want the government that I paid a Copyright fee to to actually protect me. The way it works now is a shell game. The government takes the money and then leaves you hanging. The backlog in the Copyright Office in the United States is a joke. It takes months to actually get a piece of paper proving your copyright, thus leaving us with the only option which is the poor man's copyright. When I called the Copyright Office after waiting 6 months I was told to use the poor man's copyright by the guy on the phone and was told it was legal.
My point is: Why do I need the Copyright Office when all I need to do is burn a write-once, read-many CD or DVD. It burns the file date on the CD/DVD and I can find no way to change that date once it is burned into the CD/DVD. So using the poor man's copyright by burning a CD/DVD of your work, sealing it into an envelope and then mailing it to yourself to get the postmark. This is an almost immediate copyright and allows easily for revisions.
Why would I wait 6 to 9 months to pay an agency who doesn't even protect me?
On the post: Court Rejects PA DAs Attempt To Charge Teens For Sexting Themselves
Sexting themselves!!
On the post: As Expected, Ridiculous, Wrong, Exaggerating And Misleading Report Claims That 'Piracy' Is Killing Jobs
Piracy killing jobs
On the post: When You Try To Figure Out Who Owns Imaginary 'Property,' Things Get Confusing Fast
Imaginary Lover?
On the post: Williams Sonoma Nastygrams Blogger Who Helps People Build Their Own Furniture
Williams Sonoma
I'll remember that name and will never buy their brand.
Where are the Equal (Civil) Rights Lawyers when we need them?
All copyright and trademark cases should be reviewed for merit by the organization we paid the money to protect us.
The Copyright and the Trademark offices are government agencies that we pay to protect our rights, but we have to put up with unregulated private companies enforcing the laws we paid the government agencies to protect. Meanwhile politicians steal any song or visual aid they can get their hands on without the permission of the Copyright or Trademark holders because they know that the government cares less and will do nothing to protect the rights of the Copyright or Trademark owner. Thus if you don't have the money to sue or hire an agency to go after the thieves you are out of luck.
Is there something wrong with that thinking?
Why would I pay the government to protect me when they obviously do not?
We need to get it through our heads that the government or the police do not and will not ever protect us. They always come in after the fact and bungle the cleanup. The sad thing is that we have to pay for this!
On the post: Overwhelming Majority Of EU Parliament Votes Against ACTA
Election Time?
On the post: Murdoch's NY Post Continues To Source Articles From Bloggers With No Credit
Of course
But in reality the consumer does rule if only they band together. I don't buy Murdoch's products. Why would I support a thief? None of the rich guys are on your side and none of them give a damn about you. Check Bill Gates the great philanthropist, all of his money got stolen from us by selling a buggy product and then it gets sent to help a foreign country. Granted they may need help, but we have starving children in the US also.
On the post: Netflix, Warner Bros., Sued In Class Action Lawsuit Over Delayed Movie Window
Re:
Get real!
On the post: Netflix, Warner Bros., Sued In Class Action Lawsuit Over Delayed Movie Window
Re:
Get real!
On the post: RealNetworks Agrees To Pay $4.5 Million In Legal Fees To Hollywood Over RealDVD; Gives Up
What's the big deal?
Of course we were advised on the backup law back in the 90's and it has probably changed. So many of our laws in the US have been amended and we (the public) hear nothing and as a result we simply hope we are not breaking the law.
Our company bought a corporate copy of Windows XP and made an install copy. Now the copy is wearing out. I am glad I installed all 450 of our computers with a copy or I would have to buy another corp copy and spend thousands on it again. Good for Microsoft but not good for me as a consumer. I don't want to buy another copy of anything just because it wore out.
On the post: Incredible: Google Execs Found Guilty Because Of YouTube Video; Given Six Month Suspended Sentences
Incredible:
Who needs them anyway? Europe contributes nothing to the well being of the world. They can't even man and fund NATO properly. They are just a cop out and let other countries carry the load. They can be cut off. I can think of no products that I need from Europe. It really seems that the MPAA and the RIAA are working overtime bribing European officials. Man they must be getting rich!
On the post: As Cars Get More Complicated, Maybe Open Source Is The Way
As Cars Get More Complicated, Maybe Open Source Is The Way
My biggest concern is the code that is in the cars. I have been a programmer for over 30 years and it is true that we leave back doors in to whatever apps we work on. Especially the managers of a software product, they always leave a way in. But my main concern is that terrorists have been polluting the code for years. I mean do you trust anyone anymore? Be real! It seems everyone has an agenda and is pissed off about something. Call me paranoid but the idea of my car being controlled by software and now that we have internet access installed in that software allows hackers a scary platform. The idea of my car being controlled by another party and causing massive pileups all over the world is now a reality. The larger the codebase gets the easier it is to insert subroutines. Remember Jurassic Park? That was only 2 million lines of code Ha Ha.
On the post: UK Court Says It Has Jurisdiction Over Racist Material Stored On California Server... If Content Created In The UK
UK Court Says It Has Jurisdiction Over Racist Material Stored On California Server... If Content Created In The UK
On the post: NBC's Delayed Telecasts Show A Company Living In The Last Century
NBC's Delayed Telecasts Show A Company Living In The Last Century
On the post: Do IT People Hate Their Jobs?
Do IT People Hate Their Jobs?
Have fun.
On the post: Incumbents Blocking Broadband Stimulus Efforts Because They Don't Like Competition
Incumbents Blocking Broadband Stimulus Efforts Because They Don't Like Competition
To stick to the subject the incumbents really need to worry about the next election in the US. I am personally voting against every incumbent in my district. It's time to put new blood in Washington. It's time to get some politicians who feel indebted to their people rather than being indebted to lobbyists for Insurance companies.
On the post: Indie Filmmaker Hits It Big With Free Film Online
Indie Filmmaker Hits It Big With Free Film Online
I'm not being a jerk. I am trying to capitalize on the idea. How do you make money from free?
On the post: Econ 101: Study Shows That If Record Labels Lowered Prices On Music, They Would Sell A Lot More
.60 per single track
The main problem with online sales is the banking system and credit card checkout companies because a credit card transaction can cost as much as 0.30 plus 3% of the total.
That's PayPal's fee. For a business to even process credit cards on the cheap is still close to .15 per transaction. So if you sell a single at 0.99 the credit card processing can be up to 30% which is prohibitive. It sounds like a loser to me and the only way the cost will ever come down is to be able to get rid of the credit card processing fees.
If there was a way to batch process single track sales it would be cheaper. But the problem is that each credit card has to be approved and the companies sock you for it.
I haven't heard anywhere how much the Record Company gets out of each .99 sale, so it's really hard to figure total cost of sale.
On the post: Sometimes Protecting Free Speech Means Protecting Speech You Don't Like
Free Speech
Case in point: I called my local house cleaning service and got 2 wonderful people who spoke broken English, but well enough to understand. The couple was around 45 or so and had ran away from a dictatorship in their South American country.
The man was a Medical Doctor in his country with a thriving practice. He told me the story of making the mistake of agreeing with one of his patients that the current government was corrupt. The next thing he knows is he is running for his life.
What's the point? You ask. I thought it was really sad that a trained Medical Doctor was cleaning my house. Only because the immigration dept. and the AMA decided that the colleges he went to were not certified by them so his Degree didn't count. Wha????
He was good enough to practice medicine in his country but not good enough to practice here? He could not even test his skill and prove that he was a trained physician in the land of the free.
Next >>