RIAA To Curb People From Talking About Music

[DudeAsInCool]

The Popularity of Music is Becoming a Major Headache For the Music Industry

Los Angeles (Beatking) - As the recording industry tries to block file trading of songs across peer-to-peer networks, blogs and other viral distribution channels, the major labels suddenly have a whole new piracy concern: music videos. And even worse, people are reading music articles on the web and talking to their friends about their favorite performers.

The rise of user-generated content sites like YouTube, MySpace, Google Video and iFilm has sparked a revolution in the viral sharing of music videos across these Web communities. The problem is, much of the distribution taking place -- outside a select number of promotional deals -- is happening without the approval of record companies. The horror.

Worse yet, more and more people are using the internet and congregating at music forums like Beatking and MySpace, and Music Blogs like Stereogum and I Guess I'm Floating, and talking about their favorite musicians and songs. Record industry officials agree that these activities lead consumers to harder activities like taping music off the radio, or even putting the music they have already bought on their IPods.

"It's a problem," said one RIAA official. "These kids used to be good kids. Now they are even playing music in their homes for their friends, or letting them listen to it on their IPods. That generally leads to file-sharing and outright piracy. This has caused major losses for the music industry, which used to rely on double- dipping to remain profitable."

In recent weeks the Recording Industry Association of America has been stepping up its efforts to stop the sharing of popular videos on such sites, particularly on the rapidly expanding YouTube. The site, which now claims more than 6 million visitors and 40 million streams daily, has become a haven for unlicensed music videos, which users are capturing with TiVo and other digital video recorders and then posting the files to the Web. Much of the material is coming from recorded MTV broadcasts. Now the industry plans to take an even bigger step: enlist law enforcement to help them stop people from talking or reading about music and its performers on the internet.

The RIAA recently issued cease-and-desist letters to YouTube users sharing videos from the likes of Nelly Furtado, Beyonce and Rihanna. Now it plans to work with the NSA to see if they can get permission to tap phones and find out who is talking about music and the RIAA's performers.

The music industry is keenly interested in protecting its revenues. They know the web is a key ingredient to music piracy, but their efforts are not going to stop there. They aim to stop piracy before it begins - by going after the consumers and make sure they stop talking about music altogether.

[Excrement_Cranium]

Sourced from the Onion?

Though... it really wouldn't surprise me to be truth.

[Malicious Intent]

[method77]

nice one Dude

[rainbowdemon]

[KiwiCoromandel]

dude..am i allowed to read about this... ??

[DudeAsInCool]

dude..am i allowed to read about this... ??

Only if you buy music - so the answer is No.

[KiwiCoromandel]

bugger it...fucked again by the fickle finger of fate..and the RIAA.... :(