Reference is made to the recent articles you published regarding frivolous lawsuits filed against individuals who download music from the Internet. These so-called “victims” — the record companies, producers, musicians, etc. — make a weak case for any sympathy from the public.
Music producers have reaped billions upon billions of dollars every year since the dawn of the recorded sound. At first, their efforts resulted in sound quality improvements, such as going from amberol (cylinder) records to flat disks; from 78 rpm to 45 rpm. But today’s constantly changing methods of selling recorded music are nothing more than a clever marketing trick designed to separate honest people from their money.
The quality of recorded sound reached its peak in the 1970s. Since then, the move from records to eight-tracks, then from tapes to compact discs, has no more resolve than to keep an indentured, gullible public begging for more.
The recording industry — indeed, the entertainment industry as a whole — is now being bitten in the butt by the very technology they themselves used to tout as their newest, latest improvement.
The public has wizened up, too, by boycotting the purchase of overpriced compact disks — those same cheap, flimsy scraps of plastic AOL sends out every day by the millions for free.
There is nothing wrong with being in business and making a fair profit. But the music industry has abused its customers for far too many years. They deserve everything the future has in store for them.
Bravo to the American public, who have finally awakened to the arrogant, unending greed of the U.S. music industry.
What was that someone once said about “payback” being?
JASON HOUSTON, BC student