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Music Businesses Media Apple

Apple and Pepsi Ad Sports RIAA Targets 683

eefsee writes "USA Today is running a story about Pepsi's Superbowl ad for their iTunes promotion. The ad will apparently feature teens sued by the RIAA, including one young woman who holds out a Pepsi and says, 'We are still going to download music for free off the Internet.' The RIAA response? 'This ad shows how everything has changed.'"
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Apple and Pepsi Ad Sports RIAA Targets

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  • Re:Good. (Score:3, Informative)

    by webslacker ( 15723 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @04:42PM (#8069363)
    iTunes Music Store only helps the RIAA.

    RIAA gets a cut of almost every song sold on iTMS, just like when you buy most CD's.
  • Not what you think (Score:5, Informative)

    by DreadSpoon ( 653424 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @04:42PM (#8069372) Journal
    The ad's line "We're still going to download music for free" is in regards to the iTunes give-away. i.e., those who earn the points/prizes from Pepsi's promotion get to grab a limited number of songs off iTunes for free, with Pepsi footing the bill paying the artists/labels.
  • Sign the petition!!! (Score:2, Informative)

    by edalytical ( 671270 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @04:50PM (#8069462)
    Please Sign [moveon.org] this petition to have the commercial aired during the Super Bowl.
  • by jhunsake ( 81920 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @04:54PM (#8069512) Journal
    Sorry, you're wrong. Copyright law is very clear, I suggest you read up on it.

    For example, it is perfectly legal to borrow a CD from a friend, copy it for your own personal use, and then return the CD. However, it is not legal for your friend to copy their CD and then give you the copy.
  • Re:Good. (Score:2, Informative)

    by Iaughter ( 723964 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @04:59PM (#8069567) Homepage
    I can't find the story now, but a month ago or so, I read that Apple is barely meeting cost with the $99 cent download. They're trying to make it up with $300 iPods.
  • by GillBates0 ( 664202 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @04:59PM (#8069579) Homepage Journal
    No wonder the DMCA and other such laws get passed. The RIAA folks have (as we already knew) substantial government influence. This guy is a staunch Republican. From the RIAA About Us Page [riaa.com]:

    Bainwol had worked closely with then-National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) Chairman Frist during the 2002 campaign cycle while serving as Executive Director of the NRSC.

    With an undergraduate degree from Georgetown University and an M.B.A. from Rice University, Bainwol began his career as a budget analyst in President Ronald Reagan's Office of Management and Budget (OMB). He went on to become a U.S. Senate leadership staff director from 1993-97, chief of staff of the Republican National Committee in 1998, and then a top lobbyist for the management consulting firm Clark and Weinstock in 1999.

    During his career, he has managed two successful statewide campaigns and advised on numerous others. Before forming The Bainwol Group in 2002, he also served as chief of staff for U.S. Senator Connie Mack (R-FL) for nine years (1989-1997). Mack praised Bainwol's "ability to manage an organization, fully appreciate all the nuances of issues, and grasp in a very short period of time the essence of a debate."

  • Re:Good. (Score:2, Informative)

    by illcare ( 635543 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @05:00PM (#8069586)
    I don't understand how you think corporate forces are targeting the RIAA.

    The ad encourages the use of legal medium(iTunes and others) to download music, while it shows that the kids sued by the RIAA learnt their lesson.

    ilker
  • by zippity8 ( 446412 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @05:03PM (#8069614)
    If you sell your CD, you lose your right to have that music.

    That means that you have to remove it from your iPod.

    When you sell the CD, you sell your rights to listen to it. Fair use only allows you to do so much.

    IANAL, yadda yadda ya.
  • Re:Controversy (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 23, 2004 @05:04PM (#8069636)
    No political ads have ever aired during a superbowl. This isn't new. The people at moveon.org bid for airtime knowing that they would get turned down and that would get them publicity. Not a new tactic, but still a good one, considering how shrill people have been about it.
  • by AKAJack ( 31058 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @05:08PM (#8069669)
    The article is wrong. The only people who were sued were not just downloading they were offering up files to be downloaded. That's why they got sued and agreed to settle. Becasue they had no legal ground to stand on. Oops.

    It's a tough lesson for a kid, but one they're going to have to learn as if you think it's going to get any better you're living in a dream.

    With the economy tanking corporations are looking for unclaimed revenue streams to bring their profits back up and areas they didn't really care about are now the core of their thinking.

    Look at your supermarket - only prepackaged meat, not a butcher in sight. He's mowing lawns now. Wallmart being sued for not paying overtime to employees were too scared to report the violation out of fear of losing even *that* job. It's a buyer's market when it comes to employment and a litigator's market when it comes to IP.

    It's just reality. Sure try to change it, go ahead. I prefer to be practical about it and just not buy the products and I don't take them either. If you stopped buying them AND taking them they'd go out of business in a MONTH.
  • Re:Good. (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 23, 2004 @05:09PM (#8069674)
    Once again: RIAA members are like banks. They've loaned large amounts of money to bands for the purpose of recording, buying equipment, eating, etc. in exchange for distribution rights to the songs produced.

    You forgot the part where the bands have to pay back the RIAA members that loaned them the money.

    So consumers pay and the bands pay back the RIAA members, so RIAA gets paid both ways.

  • Re:Good. (Score:5, Informative)

    by Dwarfgoat ( 472356 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @05:11PM (#8069698) Homepage
    Actually, dummy, for those of us independent artists who sell on iTunes (over 6,000 artists, including my band, Crooked Crow), we get roughly 60 of each 99 cents. Apple takes a cut, and then our distributor takes a small cut.

    Try doing a little research before you just blithely talk out your ass about something you know nothing....oh, wait. Riiiiight. This is slashdot.
  • Re:Good. (Score:3, Informative)

    by somethinghollow ( 530478 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @05:18PM (#8069784) Homepage Journal
    Here is the article [cdfreaks.com] I was looking at. It was a quick search as I said. It could be invalid, but it supports the claims made on /.

    You can get income and still be in the hole. Profit happens when you make more than you sped. Apple is making money, but maybe be spending more than they make, which equals a loss.
  • Re:Good. (Score:3, Informative)

    by somethinghollow ( 530478 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @05:21PM (#8069826) Homepage Journal
    Here is the site [azoz.com] I was looking at. Like I said, it was a quick search, so the source might be completely wrong. I'm at work, so I can't delve into it for a few hours.
  • Re:Good. (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 23, 2004 @05:37PM (#8070036)

    Actually, dummy,

    No matter how right you are, this is no way to begin a reply to anything. It's the end of the day on Friday, I'm just as crabby as you, but unless you're one of the panelists on "Tough Crowd with Colin Quinn", name calling is not cool.

    ~jeff
  • Re:Good. (Score:2, Informative)

    by djtripp ( 468558 ) <djtripp AT gmail DOT com> on Friday January 23, 2004 @05:44PM (#8070115) Homepage Journal
    From what I understand, the "Music" CD-Rs aren't that much more special than regular CR-Rs, the RIAA was able to put that blank tape tax on them to get more revenue. A marketing ploy, which worked to some extent.
  • Re:Good. (Score:5, Informative)

    by Tom7 ( 102298 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @05:50PM (#8070174) Homepage Journal

    The RIAA is a trade organization, not a record label. They do not provide studios or producers. Record labels do those things, and I might also argue for their irrelevance--but not as soon as the RIAA.

    The reason why I said established artist is that the marketing (which to a large degree is really just distribution to record stores and radio play) aspect is actually hard for a band to do on its own. I think that pull-based collaborative filtering like audioscrobbler or even garageband.com can work to obsolete push-based recommendations like clear channel, and I think the resulting system would be better for both artists and listeners.

    I challenge someone to name one band that has gone gold without an RIAA marketing push.

    Both of Liz Phair's albums on Matador went gold, and Matador is an independent label that's not a member of the RIAA.
  • by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 23, 2004 @06:19PM (#8070511)
    Mascots? You can watch the mascots. Give me the cheerleaders! Mmmmmmm... cheerleaders!
  • Re:Good. (Score:0, Informative)

    by ElleyKitten ( 715519 ) <kittensunrise AT gmail DOT com> on Friday January 23, 2004 @06:23PM (#8070546) Journal
    Actually, Ani Difranco's label (Rightous Babe Records) is unfortunetly part of the RIAA.

    Check out RIAA Radar [magnetbox.com]
  • Re:Good. (Score:3, Informative)

    by proj_2501 ( 78149 ) <mkb@ele.uri.edu> on Friday January 23, 2004 @06:26PM (#8070567) Journal
    You may have not heard of Sub Pop, but I'll bet you've heard of Nirvana, and Sub Pop was their first record label.
  • Re:Good. (Score:4, Informative)

    by worm eater ( 697149 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @06:29PM (#8070612) Homepage
    You put forward a lot of questions here... but I'll try my best to address them...

    1. iTunes does not deal with artists directly, therefore if you sell through the iTunes store you need a label.

    2. However, this label does NOT need to be a member of the RIAA. Independent labels/distributers (e.g. CD Baby) have deals with iTunes and the other online music stores.

    3. Some of these distributors have the same contract with every artist and sell through a variety of channels (mail order, iTMS, Napster, MusicMatch, etc.). For instance, CD Baby has this deal [cdbaby.net] where the artist gets 91% of the money the music store pays out.

    SO, it is very possible to have a distributor that has no relationship with the RIAA, but does have a relationship with ALL the major online music stores.

    Now, say what you will about Apple, they definitely have faults, but I certainly applaud Steve & Co. for coming up with this model and making sure that the indie record labels and distributors can strike deals with the exact same terms as the RIAA.

    Although I have much more respect for the guy who runs CD Baby.
  • by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 23, 2004 @06:38PM (#8070707)
    Canada's copyright act allows this.

    80. (1) Subject to subsection (2), the act of reproducing all or any substantial part of

    (a) a musical work embodied in a sound recording,

    (b) a performer's performance of a musical work embodied in a sound recording, or

    (c) a sound recording in which a musical work, or a performer's performance of a musical work, is embodied

    onto an audio recording medium for the private use of the person who makes the copy does not constitute an infringement of the copyright in the musical work, the performer's performance or the sound recording.
  • by arose ( 644256 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @06:40PM (#8070720)
    Quite true [unheardbeethoven.org].
  • by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 23, 2004 @06:40PM (#8070727)
    Dude, get your facts straight: It was at that time when we should have gotten a balanced budget.

    There was something better than a balanced budget back then, there was a SURPLUS.

    If we can't pay off our deficits in a boom, then when can we?

    You're confusing deficit [reference.com] with debt [reference.com]. In the simplest of terms, debt is what you owe. You run a deficit when you can't even pay off the interest on what you owe, so that you owe more and more each year. I'm Canadian, so I don't keep close attention to US statistics, but I recall Clinton having surpluses at least for most of his last years, and was at least matching the interest on debt. Even Bush had that luxery when he first started.

    The right way to manage deficits is to shrink them in boom cycles, and allow them to grow in down cycles

    Bullshit! The right way is to pay of DEBT in boom cycles, and at least make sure there is no defecit in all other cycles. In down cycles you borrow, but you don't borrow beyond your means. If the United States had a Master Card, it would be cut in half by now.

    Bush has faced a lot of problems in his presidency that Clinton was fortunate enough to not have, and it is unfair to criticize him for not balancing the budget in a recession when Clinton couldn't do it in the midst of the dot-com bubble.

    I won't argue that Clinton had it better than Bush, but Bush knew just as well as anyone else that the bubble had burst, and could have better managed the TRILLION DOLLAR surplus he had, rather than stuffing his fat friends pockets with your hard earned money.

    I believe that the deficit is too big an issue to try and blame it on any one person or party.

    Yup. But when I think of lack of fiscal responsibility, I think G E O R G E W. B U S H

  • Re:Good. (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 23, 2004 @06:42PM (#8070755)
    Noo...

    They get $1 per album. THEN the label recoups.

    And the labels ALWAYS recoup. They recoup advertising, 'experimental media' costs (CDs are still experimental, didja know that?), tour costs, and really whatever else they feel like.

    Oh, and that $1 per album? That's for relatively well established artists. For less established artists, drop that figure a bit.
  • Re:Better than pot. (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 23, 2004 @06:44PM (#8070772)
    but even I was appalled about the Marijuana commercials telling me that pot funds terrorism.

    Anyone who thinks that pot doesn't fund terrorism, without meaning insult, is completely ignorant of it's supply chain.

    On the flip side, however, marijuana tends to fund terrorism in South America, not the Middle East (as the ads seemed to imply). The drug money in the Middle East tends to come more from opium and/or heroin. And, of course, it should also be said that purchasing GASOLINE probably funds Middle-Eastern terrorists more than drugs do!

    steve
  • Re:Good. (Score:4, Informative)

    by colanut ( 541823 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @06:52PM (#8070841)
    From the site:
    (12/17/03) Righteous Babe Records has been taken off the Radar! Yes, yet another label is incorrectly part of the "official RIAA members" list. This brings the total to nine, and I'm sure there are more. All I need is proof from the label, so you might want to check with your favorite record label!
    The idea that Righteous Babe is a RIAA member was beyond laughable.
  • by hoggoth ( 414195 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @07:18PM (#8071088) Journal
    Hey, that was no troll.
    For 364 days a year commercials are vapid annoying forgettable disco-balls of bad taste.
    For one day the ad agencies are allowed free-reign to showcase their best funniest attempts to get our attention, even if the brand they are advertising is hardly mentioned if at all.
    I for one LOVE watching the commercials during the superbowl, and I make sure to go to the bathroom and get more munchies during the game so I don't miss any good commercials.

  • by Dirtside ( 91468 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @07:31PM (#8071196) Journal
    Well, Section 106 of 17 USC states:
    Subject to sections 107 through 121, the owner of copyright under this title has the exclusive rights to do and to authorize any of the following:

    (1) to reproduce the copyrighted work in copies or phonorecords;

    This says nothing about who owns it or who makes the copy: by default, only the copyright holder may make a copy. It's possible there's something in 107 through 121 that would allow people to make copies in the manner you describe. Can you please point out exactly where it is?

    Section 107 doesn't: that's fair use, and making a personal copy of a copy that a friend legitimately owns is not allowed.

    Section 108 doesn't: it covers copies made by libraries and archives.

    Section 109 doesn't: it covers transfer of ownership of copies, not making copies.

    110 has to do with performances, 111 with secondary transmissions over cable systems, 112 with ephemeral recordings, 113 deals with visual arts (sculpture, graphics, paintings).

    114 talks about music recordings but there's nothing in there that says that you can make a copy if you don't own the copy you're duplicating. Mostly it talks about performance rights.

    115 talks about "nondramatic musical works," but again, there's nothing allowing you to make copies in the manner you describe.

    116 involves public performances, 117 is about software, 118 is about noncommercial broadcasting, 119 is about secondary transmissions again, 120 is about architectural works (e.g. copyrighted building designs), and 121 is about reproductions for blind or disabled folks.

    Nothing in there appears to confirm what you said, and given that section 106 contradicts it, do you have any actual evidence that it is legal under U.S. law to make copies in the way you described?

  • by clubin ( 542806 ) on Friday January 23, 2004 @11:01PM (#8072577)
    For those who don't recognize the mentioned labels, you might be more familiar with the following artists that have been featured on them.
    • Afghan Whigs*
    • Nirvana
    • Amon Tobin/Cujo
    • Funki Porcini
    • Kid Koala*
    • The Cinematic Orchestra*
    • The Herbaliser
    • Up, Bustle & Out
    • Thievery Corporation
    • Cat Power
    • Dizzee Rascal
    • Guided by Voices
    • Interpol
    • Matmos
    • Mogwai
    • Boards of Canada
    • Pizzicato Five
    • Plone
    • Pole
    • Sleater-Kinney*
    • The Decemberists*
    • Elliot Smith*
    • Xiu Xiu*

    For those of you who don't recognize the artists either... ouch! I suggest you take some time to sample their music, TODAY (go ahead, hop on Soulseek and download a few tracks-- nearly all of the above artists won't mind). You may find that there is a world of great music that you haven't been exposed to; I did.

    P.S.: Finding it odd that WARP wasn't mentioned among the other labels, I feared that the RIAA have a hold on them. Thanks to the RIAA Radar link in a sibling post, I now know they're "RIAA-safe". Be sure to check WARP Records out, too!

    Oh, and, uhh... I was too lazy to hyperlink anything. May Google and/or /. karma-whores treat you well. :)

    * - I, personally, haven't yet gotten a chance to listen to a significant amount of music from this artist. They're probably on my to-do list, though.

  • by Dubber ( 101609 ) on Saturday January 24, 2004 @01:47AM (#8073262) Homepage
    And then runs this Pepsi ad? Oh, wait, it's a corporate client so it's okay?! No anti-president shite on during the SuperBowl so we don't piss off the football fans (who, of course, are all dubya voters) by accident.

    In case you missed it, CBS is refusing to run the bushin30seconds ad, "Child's Pay," during the Super Bowl.
    Watch the ad and see if you think it's funny or worthy enough to be seen during the SuperBowl.

    I found it and several of the otehrs hilarious. Especially the Mac Desktop ad.
  • Re:Good. (Score:3, Informative)

    by 4minus0 ( 325645 ) on Saturday January 24, 2004 @02:55AM (#8073502)

    From my small part of the world: Sub Pop, Ninja Tune, Eighteenth Street Lounge, Matador, Kill Rock Stars, That Ann DiFranco lable (can't think of it now) and many more.

    Let me add Dischord [dischord.com] and Southern Records [southern.com] to your list, two more really great non-RIAA labels.

"I've seen it. It's rubbish." -- Marvin the Paranoid Android

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