Would u pay $5/month to download as much music as you like from anywhere u like?

[Don Rizzle]

I think this seems like a good idea...

heres the basics

The Premises

First, artists and copyright holders deserve to be fairly compensated.

Second, file sharing is here to stay. Killing Napster only spawned more decentralized networks. Most evidence suggests that file sharing is at least as popular today as it was before the lawsuits began.

Third, the fans do a better job making music available than the labels. Apple's iTunes Music Store brags about its inventory of over 500,000 songs. Sounds pretty good, until you realize that the fans have made millions of songs available on KaZaA. If the legal clouds were lifted, the peer-to-peer networks would quickly improve.

Fourth, any solution should minimize government intervention in favor of market forces.

The Proposal: Voluntary Collective Licensing

EFF has spent the past year evaluating alternatives that get artists paid while making file sharing legal. One solution has emerged as the favorite: voluntary collective licensing.

The concept is simple: the music industry forms a collecting society, which then offers file-sharing music fans the opportunity to "get legit" in exchange for a reasonable regular payment, say $5 per month. So long as they pay, the fans are free to keep doing what they are going to do anyway—share the music they love using whatever software they like on whatever computer platform they prefer—without fear of lawsuits. The money collected gets divided among rights-holders based on the popularity of their music.

In exchange, file-sharing music fans will be free to download whatever they like, using whatever software works best for them. The more people share, the more money goes to rights-holders. The more competition in applications, the more rapid the innovation and improvement. The more freedom to fans to publish what they care about, the deeper the catalog.

read the full article here http://www.eff.org/share/collective_lic_wp.php

[Don Seer]

sounds brilliant

[Suga Foot]

I'd do it.

[[sepehr]]

I think I would

[virtuoso]

On the surface, it sounds like an absolutely terrible deal for the artists, I already have learnt they get screwed with royalties with downloads so god knows how this is going to benefit them, this will instead surely just benefit the cartel which runs music.

[h cottie is bac-tive?]

i dont feel comfortable talking about illegal file sharing....big brother is watching

[Don Rizzle]

On the surface, it sounds like an absolutely terrible deal for the artists, I already have learnt they get screwed with royalties with downloads so god knows how this is going to benefit them, this will instead surely just benefit the cartel which runs music.

How does this help artists?

Artists benefit in at least three ways. First, artists will now be paid for the file sharing that has become a fact of digital life.

Second, independent artists no longer need a record deal with a major label to reach large numbers of potential fans—so long as you have any fans who are sharing your music online, others will be able to access your music on equal footing with major label content. In other words, digital distribution will be equally available to all artists.

Third, when it comes to promotion, artists will be able to use any mechanism they like, rather than having to rely on major labels to push radio play. Anything that makes your works popular among file sharers gets you paid. There would still be a role for the record industry—many artists will still want help with promotion, talent development, and other supportive services. With more options for artists to choose from, the contracts will be more balanced than the one-sided deals offered to most artists today.

[Leggy Hendrix]

i would

[BadBoyKILLA333]

i would do it as longas the music files arent virus infected

[gav09]

Sounds Good!

[Trauma-san]

Horrible idea for a musician.  You wouldn't get paid shit, $5.00 a month and you can download as much as you want?  LOL you've got to be fucking kidding me.  So let me get this straight.  For $5.00 a month, Sony music offers unlimited bandwith to me.  I can download gigagigs or whatever the hell the biggest measure of bandwith is, because after all, I can download whatever I want as often as I want.  Sony alone would go out of business paying the bandwith charges.

Now, multiply that by every available record company, and then tell me what's left over for the artists.  This shit was drawn up by kids with absolutely no common sense.  Sure it'd be great for people jacking files off the net for free... but for anybody in the business of music it would put them OUT of the business of music. 

[coola]

^^ $5 is'nt really fair... but it's better than the artists/record label getting nothing at all... a realistic cost would be like 30$ p/m with like a 500mb limit...

[Don Rizzle]

Horrible idea for a musician.  You wouldn't get paid shit, $5.00 a month and you can download as much as you want?  LOL you've got to be fucking kidding me.  So let me get this straight.  For $5.00 a month, Sony music offers unlimited bandwith to me.  I can download gigagigs or whatever the hell the biggest measure of bandwith is, because after all, I can download whatever I want as often as I want.  Sony alone would go out of business paying the bandwith charges.

Now, multiply that by every available record company, and then tell me what's left over for the artists.  This shit was drawn up by kids with absolutely no common sense.  Sure it'd be great for people jacking files off the net for free... but for anybody in the business of music it would put them OUT of the business of music. 

did u even read the article? record companies wouldn't have to host the files themselves, although they could if they wanted too. The idea is decrimilising things like p2p let the users share files and it doesn't cost them a penny turning the internet into the equivilant of radio, even with all the litigation thats gone on in the last few years people still download more, record companies could take the opportunity to net 3 billion a year in pure profit and that would only grow as more people start using the internet as its still in its growth stage, and then you've other countries joining up which just adds to it all..........

for an artists its brilliant they don't even need a record label, distributors, shops to take away the lions share of the revenues from their product, you know u can have a platinum record and still be broke as an artist? because of the way contracts are drawn up u have to recoup the record label costs before u make any money, so say they spent 200k on production, promotion ettc.  and the artist generally recoups at about 15% so the record company would have to make about 1.5 million off the record before the artist gets any money

[Noname]

Fuck that i aint payin shit. These mothafuckers makin enough money already.

[Trauma-san]

Horrible idea for a musician.  You wouldn't get paid shit, $5.00 a month and you can download as much as you want?  LOL you've got to be fucking kidding me.  So let me get this straight.  For $5.00 a month, Sony music offers unlimited bandwith to me.  I can download gigagigs or whatever the hell the biggest measure of bandwith is, because after all, I can download whatever I want as often as I want.  Sony alone would go out of business paying the bandwith charges.

Now, multiply that by every available record company, and then tell me what's left over for the artists.  This shit was drawn up by kids with absolutely no common sense.  Sure it'd be great for people jacking files off the net for free... but for anybody in the business of music it would put them OUT of the business of music. 

did u even read the article? record companies wouldn't have to host the files themselves, although they could if they wanted too. The idea is decrimilising things like p2p let the users share files and it doesn't cost them a penny turning the internet into the equivilant of radio, even with all the litigation thats gone on in the last few years people still download more, record companies could take the opportunity to net 3 billion a year in pure profit and that would only grow as more people start using the internet as its still in its growth stage, and then you've other countries joining up which just adds to it all..........

for an artists its brilliant they don't even need a record label, distributors, shops to take away the lions share of the revenues from their product, you know u can have a platinum record and still be broke as an artist? because of the way contracts are drawn up u have to recoup the record label costs before u make any money, so say they spent 200k on production, promotion ettc.  and the artist generally recoups at about 15% so the record company would have to make about 1.5 million off the record before the artist gets any money

If the record company didn't host the file, they would have no idea what got downloaded.  Just like it is right now.  So basically you're theorizing you should pay 5 bucks to get the law off your back.  Come on man, think about it a little bit.  Don't just be in it for what's good for you.  You must be a horrible fuck, i'll ask your girlfriend.