[Trombone-l] Copy protection/DRM

[Jeff Albert]

On 10/2/06, Charles De Paolo <chuck at hickeys.com> wrote:
>
> >> When are record labels going to realize that selling products that
> >> do less than the consumer expects is not a way to grow
> >> customer loyalty?
>
> Yes.  But what's the point of customer loyalty if noone is buying the
> product?
>
> Might as well sell shoes at Wal*Mart instead of making your art and
> actually
> (imagine this) getting PAID for it.
>
> Remember that "ripping" derives from "ripping off."  And generally, that's
> what happend when copies are made.
>
> Too bad, really.
>
> --Chuck


I'm not sure that the derivation of ripping is as you state.  It's like the
pianist who thought that comp was short for compose.

Back to the point, I am keenly aware of the idea that the artists and
producers finances need to be protected.  I have personally financed several
recording projects, and most of them are still in the red at this point.  I
stand to not only not get paid, but actually lose money when my stuff gets
ripped off, because I am the one ht put up the financial capital to begin
with.

I just don't see how making things difficult for the law abiding consumers
who want to pay for my art puts me in any better position to get paid.  Any
protection schemes that the industry come up with are merely inconvenience
schemes, and in as much only harm the paying customers, and those are the
last people I want to harm.

If you can make it come out of speakers, you can copy it, so unless we are
going to start selling CDs that can't be listened to by anyone, why bother
the good guys, because the bad guys have the technology to get around the
inconvenience-ware.

I see a better business model, where I give my loyal fans and customers an
easy way to do the right thing.  My CD costs $12 plus shipping fom the
label's website, and we usually sell them for $10 at the shows.  There is no
DRM, so you can listen to it however you like.  You can download 256k mp3s
of the whole CD for less than $7.  They are plain old unmolested mp3s, so
you can listen to them on your iPod or iRiver or whatever you like, or burn
a disc and play it in your CD player.  The way I see it, if you are cool
enough to do the right thing and pay for the music, I should be cool enough
to do the right thing and make it easy for you to listen to the music THAT
YOU PAID FOR in whatever way you please.

I have a friend that used to own a grocery store.  He said that pilferage is
a part of the business.  You budget for it and try to keep the number as low
as possible.  Part of keeping the number down is treating your emplyees
well, so they will want less to steal from you.

Some people are no good bastards and will steal music regardless of what we
do.  Some people get it, and realize that buying music is the only way that
new music gets made in the long term.  I don't want to penalize the good
folks in an unsucessful effort to stop the bad folks.  I want to make it as
easy as possible for the good folks to be good, and make it impossible for
the bad folks to use the "he charges too much" blah blah blah BS excuses. If
you steal from me, it was a conscious decision to do so, because I have made
it easy to do the right thing.  If you can live with that, I can.

Jeff


-- 
www.jeffalbert.com

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