Preface
“Damn you. Damn you all to Hell!” This seems to be the stance of RIAA and MPAA now that they won some legal battles over the recent months. It seems every day passes, the RIAA and the MPAA want to put more of a stranglehold on all types of file sharing networks.

Decentralized = RIAA/MPAA scared s***less
Ah the Gnutella network, what a wonderful creation. Originally coded by some AOL/Nullsoft programmers, the Gnutella network is a system of decentralized file sharing comuters that come together to share ANY type of file. But naturally the RIAA and the MPAA feel threatened by the free will of individual users to share data. It has gone so far now that the MPAA is going after each individual users:

While many Gnutella users assume they are anonymous when using the software, in fact, they reveal the “IP” number of their PCs, roughly analogous to its telephone number. Anyone with a court subpoena can trace an IP number to a specific person, by name, since the information is stored by Internet-service providers.

That’s the tack taken by the Motion Picture Association of America, which has begun sending out legal notices to the Internet-service providers of Gnutella users caught exchanging pirated movies. - (WSJ)

So Road Runner is going to shut down my IP at the behest of the MPAA? I don’t think so. They get their $39.95/mo from my checking account and they shouldn’t care what traffic is going over my coax. But then if you consider Road Runner in this area is controlled by AOL/Time Warner, then I become a little mad. Mad because a media giant can theoretically control what IP traffic I send and receive, what movies I watch and what music they can force down my throat and over the airwaves.

Arrrrrr, Pirates!
So now they come after the users. The consumers. The people that spend billions of the hard earned money on their products. Most people that download mp3’s or mpeg’s/avi’s ultimately buy the licensed copy.

I personally have a collection of over 500 CD’s. I personally haven’t bought any new CD since 12/31/1999 because of my ongoing boycott over their price gouging and mostly crummy music coming out as of late.

So they label me and millions other pirates. “Kill one person, label me a murderer, kill a million, label be a conquer”. I hope that these millions of pirates, including myself, overtake the RIAA and the MPAA and force better music, movies at REASONABLE prices. I am sorry, but Eden’s Crush new LP is not worth $17.99.

I bet if the RIAA started charging $9.99 for CD’s there would be less file sharing use of the masses. Not everyone, but many would flock back to CD’s.

As for the MPAA, they shouldn’t fear the Gnutella network that much. Most people don’t have the patience to spend hours downloading a very inferior copy of a movie. I personally don’t have any, so don’t try to go after me.

Sales figures. An illusion?
RIAA’s quote on numbers not too long ago show stated a huge decrease in album sales but what they fail to mention is the details of the sales:

Despite a very strong first half of the year, the market for recorded music, measured by what manufacturers ship to retail, sharply declined in the last six months of 2000. However, the mainstay of the recording industry, the full-length compact disc, continued to grow in dollar value, according to a report released this week by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).

While full-length CDs increased 3.1% in dollar value over last year, manufacturers saw their bottom line drop nearly 7% in unit shipments, while the dollar value of those units declined 1.8% from $14.6 billion in ‘99 to $14.3 billion last year.

This decrease is largely attributed to a dramatic reduction in shipments of CD singles which fell 38.8% in 2000. This one-year decrease in CD singles shipments is preceded by a 200% growth between 1995 and 1997 and flat growth in ‘98 and ‘99. - (the full RIAA sales article)

So who cares if Full length CD sales slipped slightly. Overall prices rose 3.1%. RIAA overall lost three million in total value. How RIAA came up with this “huge decrease in sales” was in sales of CD singles down 50%.
This is a great thing for consumers because CD Singles are priced from $2.99 - $8.99, for one song! Outrageous! If $14.3 billion in sales is hurting, sign me up, I want some of that money.

RIAA also fails to take into account that overall consumer sales in the 2nd half of 2000 were miserable. So combine all those factors, and their outright hatred against file sharing and volia, they come out with a scathing report that Napster is killing CD sales. How nice. Maybe I should send them a food basket while they weep over their $3,000,000 loss this year.

Conclusion
If all honesty, I hope the RIAA and the MPAA come after individual users. This way the government can see how these industries are bulling the common consumer and take action directly against them.

Personally I hope both the RIAA and the MPAA die a most horrible death.