The much-anticipated White Stripes single “Icky Thump” was of course ripped from a web-radio stream and passed around last night before iTunes could release it exclusively at midnight, which was the plan. It’s just the latest swipe in the thousand-cut battle against the dominant recording industry business model, a model based on copyright law that generated gazillions in profits over the past century but that is increasingly seen as a self-serving relic of the pre-digital era, to put it nicely. If you haven’t been following this debate for the last decade or so, even some industry insiders will now give you the straight story.
Imdat Solak, new media head at Axel Springer, a major-huge European publishing company, says that copyright has to be changed. As he puts it, copyright law was based on scarcity, the fact that it cost money to make copies and to distribute them, so there was a limited supply. Now, though, “with the internet available everywhere, there is no need for copyright as we know it. Why would an artist need to give a company exclusive copyright if he/she can copy, ‘package’ and distribute their content by themselves?”
“Internet ninja” Jasper at Web Vomit put it like this last night: “We’re only about twelve hours away from the new White Stripes single hitting the nets. I really don’t understand why I have to wait for iTunes to release something… The circles I travel in are too snobby for iTunes-quality music files… It’s actually killing me inside that iTunes and NME have been chosen to release ‘exclusives’ for the new album. I couldn’t think of two worse representatives of MUSIC.”
Meantime, the Library of Congress Copyright Royalty Board this week decided to triple licensing fees for internet radio webcasters. (”Royalty” is right. Who do they think they are?) Tim Westergren of Pandora sent out a mass email in response, saying “The new royalty rates are irrationally high, more than four times what satellite radio pays. Broadcast radio doesn’t pay these fees at all.” Westergren and friends founded the Save Net Radio coalition to challenge the decision and go head to head with the RIAA bloated lobbyists, who of course fully support the new ruling as infinitely just and the best outcome for music lovers everywhere.
“Icky Thump,” by the way is killer, a thumping good romp that features Jack calling out citizens on immigration hypocrisies:
Americans want nothing better to do
why don’t you kick yourself out
you’re an immigrant too
who is using who
what should we do
you can’t be a pimp and a prostitute too
Go hit that stream while it lasts!
