No More RIAA Lawsuits Against Online Music Sharing & Warner Music Won't Renew Contract

The Recording Industry Association of America, also known as the RIAA, announced recently that they will no longer be filing lawsuits against people who share music illegally online. I would also note, however, that the RIAA is following through with the lawsuits already pending. The decision, as most in business is mostly for monetary reasons. First, the average settlement in these music copyright infringement cases has been between $3,000 and $6,000. The legal fees of the RIAA has had an average cost much higher than the settlement amounts. Second, Online music has now a well established legal system of distributing music online. The music industry is finally feeling like more people are buying music online than stealing it. Thank you, Steve Jobs. Despite where you download your music, it was Apple that made the initial breakthrough with the record companies years ago, getting them to agree that it was possible to distribute music legally online. Finally, suing your customers and fans is just a bad idea. All this considered, the RIAA finally decided it was no longer to their benefit to file lawsuit against people who illegally share music online.

Next, Warner Music has refused to renew their contract with YouTube. Warner Music was dissatisfied with the amount of compensation they were receiving for allowing their music to be used on YouTube. In addition to posting advertising next to videos which contained Warner music, every time a video which contained their music was played, Warner Music received money. Unfortunately, the payment amounted to less than a penny per song, which is ultimately why Warner decided not to sign a new contract with YouTube. This is a blow to YouTube and Google, as I would not be surprised if the other major record companies followed Warners lead. I know a lot of partners who would love to receive even a portion of a penny for every view, rather than just when the advertising is clicked on. Also, I now understand why YouTube never provided a database of songs that could be used in videos, as if they had, there would be a lot of upset people who used music from artists whom were once on the list, and now would have to be removed. I was just about post a vlog questioning why they hadnt done that. It all makes sense now.

Thanks for reading.
RIAA Is No Longer Suing People Who Share Music Online & Warner Music Refuses to Renew Contract with YouTube.
By Chris Corsello
www.YouTube.com/NorCalCorsello
December 2008

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• RIAA
• music
• sharing
• online
• lawsuit
• Warner
• contract
• NorCalCorsello

[garycuk]

I'm about to post a vlog on this....I'm peeved! x

[NorCalCorsello]

Which part? Warner Music not renewing the YouTube contract?

[garycuk]

Yup - one of my videos has vanished...a cover of a Frank Sinatra song...suspiciously it had just started getting thousands of hits and then it went...hmm x

[NorCalCorsello]

I now know why they don't encourage and promote derivative works. I didn't realize the contracts with the record companies were so short. Chris Crocker got his, thanks to the Viacom lawsuit. The day after Britney blew it on MTV, YouTube knew the world would be searching for the clip... and had to make sure they didn't infringe on Viacom... enter Chris Crocker. The jester, the fool, something people could get a chuckle from... with no infringing content. Work the system, man. (Vlog preview)

[Supermassively]

@freakylocz14 Looks like I was right. You are illiterate. Life must be hard.

[freakylocz14]

@Supermassively You didn't state a crime that fits the act you are protesting.

[Supermassively]

@freakylocz14 Fairly sure I stated it quite clearly several times. Or are you functionally illiterate?

[freakylocz14]

@Supermassively You've yet to identify the crime.

[Supermassively]

@freakylocz14 Yeah, most criminals don't believe they did anything wrong.

[freakylocz14]

@Supermassively In order to be a criminal, one has to commit a crime. There is no crime committed here.

[Supermassively]

@freakylocz14 You're only trying to protect your fragile conscience from the admission that you really are a criminal piece of shit.

[freakylocz14]

@Supermassively Learn law, please. Even the court do not define illegal downloading as theft. It isn't even a crime. It's a civil issue over copyright infringement.

[Supermassively]

@NorCalCorsello You don't have much of a grasp on logic, do you? That's a completely irrational analogy that has absolutely no relation to this situation whatsoever.

[Supermassively]

@kirby4d Actually, it's more like a restaurant suing a criminal asshole who goes in the kitchen and steals the food and hands it out to people who also didn't pay for it.