As an independent musician I would just like to offer my heartfelt support to the unfortunate children, senior citizens, women, and men who have had their lives disrupted by frivolous lawsuits from the profit mongering fat cats of the RIAA. As an independent artist and small record label owner I just have to say I am completely disgusted by the medieval approach this organization has taken in the last few years. The RIAA’s draconian and out of date attitude towards file sharing and music downloads is in my opinion simply a tactic to bilk the public out of more money by taking advantage of a loop hole in the fair use concept of copying music for personal use. Maybe, if the companies that make up this “unholy union ” would present music of high caliber and quality, the buying public would want more than just that “one song” off the recording. It is my understanding that the status quo recording industry had similar cries of lower sales after the fair use laws were put into effect allowing people to record LP’s to tape for their own personal use. If back in those days those recording companies had had the same ability to track how many times people checked out LP records from a library to record them for their personal use, I’m sure they would have tried to sue as well.
The most insulting aspect of the actions by this group is they did not initiate these lawsuits to defend artists' rights, but to protect corporate profits so they can continue to exploit the artists they OWN by contract. Maybe the RIAA should be thinking about the quality of music instead of their over-inflated profit margins. The real reasons for lack of purchase support is low quality mundane uninteresting music by neutered artists just wanting the “deal”, market driven cookie cutter images, the same formula used over and over again, and an economy to big for its pants. Not to mention the long term abusive over-inflated $20 CD price in stores. Oh yes, some of the larger corporate insects have decided to slash their prices at the walking dead mall rat record stores, but that brings my point home. How is it they are able to do this unless they were price gouging from the beginning?!