i'm not a pussy for not stealing a cd. i'm just not stupid enough to do so. if i could put a cd in my bag and walk out, with no alarms going off etc, i would do.
if the artists want money - be talented. if i enjoy the album, i'll buy it, whether to keep it for myself or to give to a friend etc. might buy it on vinyl, or a poster, or other merch etc. i don't want people to earn money for making shit music that's been recommended stupidly to me.

Here's the balance sheet: MAJOR LABEL

Artist iTunes Royalty (with wholesale markup)
$0.99 download single song price to the consumer
less $0.29 to Apple
left $0.70 / 130% (distributor markup) $0.53
x 5% (of net to artist - subject to significant balance subtractions due to costs of production, advances, travel, promotions, expenses etc etc by label) = $0.026 per download MAXIMUM. Until your balance sheet is clean, you've repaid the advance & production costs, you won't see a penny. This has to be paid back from your royalty rate, not gross income BTW. This may also have publishing deductions if you've sold the publishing to get some money.

Producer iTunes Royalty (with wholesale markup)
$0.99 download single song price to the consumer
less $0.29 to Apple
left $0.70 / 130% (wholesale markup) = $0.53
x 0.3% (producer rate) = $0.00016 cents per download. (FLAT, based on gross label revenue, so will be paid without balance subtractions)



GO TALK TO APPLE IN PERSON (not allowed if you're signed to a major).

Artist iTunes Royalty selling direct to itunes:
$0.99 download single song price to the consumer
less $0.29 to Apple
remaining $0.70.
Taxed on income by the government. Album made on a laptop in artist's home. Currently accounts for under 1% of music available on itunes. Most pays out like the above two.

Put it this way. If I'm an artist and I'm on a major, and I made $10,000 last year, my label pocketed *at least* $190,000 and apple took $115,000. Go figure. Which is a decent salary? Who had to tour?

PS:

Home taping is killing music!

Home fucking is killing prostitution.

umm, thing about digital music is that if I take a copy, you still have one. Therefore it's replication, not theft.

The correct analogy is taking your wallet, doubling the money, and giving it back to you with your money still in there.

Same as software can be either paid or freeware, but the commercial software industry will never be able to compete with free, so the natural properties of digital networked media and cavernous storage costing under £1 per gigabyte have eroded the cost of media at market rate gravitate naturally to near-zero. You will never sell it for more unless you can prevent people from publishing for free.

The music business will be fine, music still sounds good. But it's not healthy to think that record sales are a viable source of income for the music industry, because they aren't. Try gig tickets, try t-shirts, sponsorship, endorsements, limited edition vinyl, make a movie, put ads on your site, etc etc.

You won't be seeing more beatles multi-billionaires overnight though.

overdosing on money is very bad for musicians anyway, just look at michael jackson.

The other thing that you need to get your head round is that the common royalty schedule for artists is very slender indeed, usually under 1% of the cover price of the record, that's a penny in the pound, and that's after the record breaks even... until then you get jack shit. Giving money to EMI is not paying for musicians. When you buy from itunes, the money just doesn't go to the musicians, the MCPS forms & contracts which the musicians sign have no mention of "digital download", so the musicians don't get LP/cassette royalties (the 12% of the net rate, singles often are more like 1% to 5% of the net, you get a different percentage for different types of sale, and they don't specify "download", it can be classed as "whatever" even "radio play" and buried in the small print that it's on 0.1% payment under "other".). It's a legal grey area what the labels should qualify a download as in existing contracts which pre-date the internet and don't include specific mentions of downloads, so the royalties are paid out on the poorest royalty rate for the artist under "other". The artists don't get to re-sign, especially not to a different label for downloads, they get what the label gives them, which is often nothing. The money made off itunes therefore goes to fill in the hole of debt (corporate borrowings) in the label's name by its new corporate owners, the rent of their 40 floor tower block in kensington, the interest on their billion dollar overdraft, and the boss's private plane. This is why the beatles didn't want to go on itunes, the label would screw them for the proceeds. That asian pirate is doing much the same thing as the labels. Not one exec has released their own record of their own music.

The situation of the music business is a bit more complicated than you might imagine, it's an industry issue more than a consumer choice issue, and the simple fact is that 95% of musicians signed to a label in the past 50 years have lived in poverty despite their records making money for somebody else. That's the somebody else asking for more money today.

Effectively old-style record labels with copyright lawyers on six figure salaries are as relevant in todays world to music as a gun slingin' deputy was in the wild west circa 1920. Out of date, and rather cowboyish & immoral.

Bullshit. Downloading an album is not the same as nicking the physical product. That anti piracy "you wouldn't steal a car" advert unwittingly gets it right - no I wouldn't steal a car, but if I could magically copy a car at the flick of a switch then who wouldn't do it?

I'm not defending the 'anti-copyright' movement, but the music industry operates at totally inflated costs and the average price of an album reflects this. Why should I pay £15 for the new Lily Allen album? She's never going to notice the difference. And yes, other people go into the production of an album, but very few of them are paid on royalties.

yes mate spot on! fuckin pussys...

I Really Enjoyed Reading This Mainly because it summarises my own thoughts very elegantly. I think the under-made point is that the music industry is screwed regardless - there's so much free music out there anyway - via myspace, hypemachine, blogs, a proliferation of on-demand radio stations, that physical product is doomed even if they plug 90% of all leaks.

Your swiss army knife is in the post.

"In short, the reason you "In short, the reason you wouldn’t steal from HMV is not a moral one. It’s just that you’re a pussy" - BINGO.

You wanna see real balls? Sell a band into lifetime exclusive contract slavery by A&R-ing them. £5k a pop finders' fee. Steal peoples' futures.

not really sure but this sprung to mind http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=GB&hl;=en-GB&v;...
however, none of you will ever know the comedy of it's true content BECAUSE:
"this video contains an audio track that has not been authorised by WMG. The audio has been disabled."

in conclusion, copyright has pretty evident downfalls

what are you on about? what are you on about?