Many of us buy CDs and rip the music to our computers so that the songs can be put on a portable device like an iPod, Zune, etc. Many of us also do the reverse and purchase songs online, and then burn them to a CD so that they can be listened to in the car, or anywhere else. Neither of those situations in my book, is considered stealing. However, according to the head of litigation for Sony BMG, Jennifer Pariser, it is and the term “stealing” music needs to be redefined.
When Pariser was asked if it was wrong for consumers to make copies of their music which they have purchased, even just one copy, she replied “When an individual makes a copy of a song for himself, I suppose we can say he stole a song. Making ‘a copy’ of a purchased song is just a nice way of saying ‘steals just one copy’.” Her belief is that music labels are suffering due to piracy and that when people “take music without compensation, we are harmed.”
Under her definition of “stealing,” even making a backup of the songs that you own, even if they don’t get used and they’re strictly for backup, is considered stealing! I’d think consumers at least have the right to make one copy of the music that they own, particularly songs that were purchased and downloaded online. Before we know it, people will be taken to court by the RIAA for copying the music that they own. Ridiculous.
Source: Ars
If this is true, I owe WAY more money due to backing up my music files than from Napster/Kazaa.
I figure that if I pay so much money for the music in the first place, I should be able to make sure I don’t lose it.
I refuse to buy 2 cds just to have one as a backup. According to dictionary.com:
Steal; to take (the property of another or others) without permission or right, esp. secretly or by force.
The cd is our property, so we have a right to make a backup copy of it. Sony needs to go back the Elementary school…
According to probably any recording company: Yes it is.
According to me: “Ridiculous” fits the bill exactly…
We are talking about an industry that sold up LPs, 8 tracks, cassetes, and now CDs – all of the same music, not to mention Video to DVD to Blue Ray. Pretty sweet deal for the industry to repackage something and sell it under another format!
My God, that’s insane! This is actually crazy by their standards. Honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised if Sony retracted this statement. And they wonder why people choose not to play their charade and pirate.
By her definition, CD burners are just pirating devices. None of this manure was around back when people mixed tapes of their favorite songs. Back when technology was less advanced, people weren’t punished for purchasing their media. Had I purchased all my songs, I wouldn’t have been able to put them on my Zune. They threaten those who do bad, while they punish those who do good.
Technically, synchronizing with portable media players involves creating a copy on that unit’s Hard Drive (or flash drive). You really only buy one copy of your media? You make me sick. Thanks to you, some rapper’s son may not get that tropical island for his birthday. How do you look at yourself in the mirror?
I’ve got my music backed up on my iPod, my laptop, and two hard drives on my server. If I ever lost it all I would cry since it is days worth of downloading back from the dial-up Napster days. You know, when it took 20-minutes to download a song when you were going at full speed. Yeah, there’s no way I would give that up.
*sigh* I know, I’m a terrible person. I’ll go crawl in a corner now.
They’d probably just say we are leasing it or something.
If Sony were in Elementary School, the teacher would tell them to quit tattling for something so stupid. :)
When you buy a CD in the store, you also pay for the license, not just for the media itself. So when the CD breaks and you haven’t made a copy (because that’s what they consider “stealing”), you still have the license. Shouldn’t we consider it “stealing” then too when we go back to say Sony to request a new, working CD for the price of producing the media (i.e., without paying for the license again) and then hear Sony tell us “Sure, here’s a new CD, but the costs to replace your broken one are as high as buying one incl. license costs!”…
As netster007x said: “They threaten those who do bad, while they punish those who do good.” As long as this is true, the music industry will never get the consumers to support their case.
Let me add another word which is more apt. ” Preposterous”
This Jennifer Pariser is utterly bullshit with her definition of stealing. She should check up the dictionary instead of rattling off with such comments. If I don’t own the song that I bought, what’s the point of me buying it then? I might as well download it on the Internet.
My feelings on the matter? If a person pays for a song, they should have free non-commercial use of that song without additional charges.
What they suggest is not only ridiculous, but greedy. I can only hope that nobody believes them.
This is all a bunch of Toro Caca…all these legal battles these labels get into just cost us the consumer more. Especially in cases where they don’t win or it is thrown out of court (like these would if they try to take legal action on their definition of ‘stealing’). They need to re-coop the legal costs somehow…which means increase the price of a CD a couple bucks every couple months. They think we are too dumb to notice that the price is slowly going up, but consumers are not dumb and are going to catch on as to what is happening. They will look for other ‘ways’ to get their music.
That’s actually a really good way of putting it. It would actually be nice if they offered some sort of replacement program for CD’s at the cost of production, but then you would have to have some sort of proof that you owned it.
I’m sure every record company is going to listen to them unfortunately, but it’s gotta be the fans who force them to see this as ridiculous.
Consumers are definitely aware of that happening, and I remember all of the complaints I heard while working at Target a few years back. It was already happening then and it continues to get worse.
[michaelgeist.ca]
You may be interested to discover that the Canadian Government has recently undertaken a massive survey to determine the effect of P2P downloading on music sales and the results may come as a surprise (though not if you already use P2P services for your own music appreciation). The nutshell version – P2P actually results in an increase in music sales according to this new canadian survey.
I am an RSS subscriber to Cybernotes, and I am dismayed that your usual stellar coverage has made no mention of this new survey over the past week.
Hey Sean, thanks for pointing that out. While we sift through a lot of news in a days time looking for newsworthy content, it’s impossible to catch it all. That’s why tips to the editors are so helpful. If you come across something like this again that you think is newsworthy, feel free to send an email our way using the “contact” button above. :)