RIAA: Great Moments in Spending

July 19, 2010 -

Last week The Recording Industry vs. The People blog uncovered financial documents that showed the RIAA - the trade group that represents the music industry - spent around $16 million in legal fees on a handful of cases in 2008 to recover $391,000 USD from P2P lawsuits. Ouch.

This week the Denver Westword blog highlights the industry's proclivity for wasting cash with ten tongue-in-cheek (mostly) examples. Among their examples are Sony-BMG's DRM on the Neil Diamond album "12 Songs," and Jive Records' $1.5 million investment in hip-hop artist Papoose who was supposed to give them enough tracks for an album (it never happened).

Want more? How about these: MCA Records' $2 million investment in the late 80's glam rockers Pretty Boy Floyd, Def Jam's $3 million dollar two-record deal with NAS that fell flat, the debacle that is the Beach Boys' "Smile" album, Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and Reprise Records' horror at how bad it was, and the $13 million spent on Guns n' Roses' "Chinese Democracy."

Fun stuff.

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Comments

Re: RIAA: Great Moments in Spending

Submitted by ZippyDSMlee on Tue, 07/20/2010 - 15:53.

Nothing like spend millions to gain thousands in profits...... I think the media mafia is a part of government....its as wasteful and inept.....

I have a dream, break the chains of copy right oppression! http://zippydsmlee.wordpress.com/2010/05/21/cigital-disobedience/

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Re: RIAA: Great Moments in Spending

Submitted by airford on Mon, 07/19/2010 - 21:37.

To be fair, this is actually common for big companies to do because the investment is for the rulings, not the money. Ten years from now the RIAA (or their successor) can simply point back to these cases as proof and scare most poeple into paying outside court. What bothers me is that the RIAA should have already got to this point some time ago.

With that said, the RIAA is a joke.

Re: RIAA: Great Moments in Spending

Submitted by Thad on Tue, 07/20/2010 - 10:14.

If it were about rulings, they wouldn't push so aggressively for settlements.

As Murdats noted, this has been more akin to extortion than pursuing legal precedent. Accept this unfair but comparatively small fine, or we'll sue you for a grossly disproportionate amount.

Now that a couple of people HAVE said "Go ahead and sue me," we're starting to see a different pattern emerge: they get convicted, but judges throw out the maximum fine. (Frankly even the reduced fines are excessive, but they're still not exactly a big win for the RIAA.)

And there are still appeals to be seen. This isn't over, but it's already very clear that this has not been a winning strategy for the RIAA.

Re: RIAA: Great Moments in Spending

Submitted by hellfire7885 on Tue, 07/20/2010 - 01:59.

The RIAA, Really self-Important Assholes Association

Re: RIAA: Great Moments in Spending

Submitted by Murdats on Mon, 07/19/2010 - 22:21.

got to what point? the point where they can freely extort money from people with 0 repurcussions?

they did get to that point ages ago.

or the point where they can then sue people, with no evidence, if they refuse to pay up?

yeah they have had a bit of a hard time with that one but they are getting there.

Re: RIAA: Great Moments in Spending

Submitted by jedidethfreak on Wed, 07/21/2010 - 07:50.

Anyone can sue anyone with no evidence. That comment doesn't mean anything.

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With the first link, the chain is forged.

--- With the first link, the chain is forged.

Re: RIAA: Great Moments in Spending

Submitted by Thad on Wed, 07/21/2010 - 12:37.

Anyone can sue with no evidence, yes. But only somebody with a tremendous amount of resources at its disposal can threaten thousands of people with suits and pressure them to settle.

Re: RIAA: Great Moments in Spending

Submitted by Thad on Mon, 07/19/2010 - 18:23.

In before irrelevant "FILESHARING IS STEALING AND STEALING IS WRONG" post.

Shout box

james_fudge: he'd die if he couldn't talk about Wii U :)10/20/2014 - 9:16am

Michael Chandra: By the way, I am not saying Andrew should stop talking about Wii-U. I find it quite nice. :)10/20/2014 - 8:53am

Michael Chandra: 'How dare he ignore my wishes and my advice! I am his boss! I could have ordered him but I should be able to say it's advice rather than ordering him directly!'10/20/2014 - 8:52am

Michael Chandra: If GP goes "EZK, do not talk about X publicly for a week, we're preparing a big article on it" and he still tweets about X, they'd have a legitimate reason to be pissed.10/20/2014 - 8:52am

Michael Chandra: If GP tells Andrew "we'd kinda prefer it if you stopped talking about Wii-U for 1 week" and he'd tweet about it anyway, firing him for it would be idiotic.10/20/2014 - 8:51am

Michael Chandra: Legal right, sure. But that doesn't make it any less pathetic of an excuse.10/20/2014 - 8:50am

ZippyDSMlee: You mean right to fire states.10/20/2014 - 8:50am

james_fudge: some states have "at will" employee laws10/20/2014 - 7:50am

quiknkold: It says in the article that being in florida, you can get fired regardless if its a fireable offence10/20/2014 - 7:19am

Michael Chandra: If your employee respectfully disagrees with your advice, that's not a fireable offense. If they ignore your order, THEN you have the right to be pissed.10/20/2014 - 6:49am

Michael Chandra: I... Don't get one thing. If you do not want your employee to do X, why do you tell them it's advice or a wish? Give them a damn order.10/20/2014 - 6:48am

james_fudge: A leak that had me worried about being swatted by Lizard Squad.10/20/2014 - 6:03am

james_fudge: It should be noted that the author leaked the GJP group names online10/20/2014 - 6:03am

MechaTama31: I mean, of the groups being bullied here, which of the two would you refer to collectively as "nerds"?10/19/2014 - 11:30pm

MechaTama31: But that's the thing, it doesn't sound to me like he is advocating bullying, it sounds like he is accusing the SJWs of bullying the "nerds", who I can only assume refers to the GGers.10/19/2014 - 11:21pm

Andrew Eisen: Interesting read. Unfortunately, too vague to form an opinion on but at least now I know what faefrost was talking about in James' editorial.10/19/2014 - 10:39pm

Neo_DrKefka: Breaking GameJournoPros organized a blacklist of former Destructoid writer Allistar Pinsof for investigating fraud in IndieGoGo campaign http://blogjob.com/oneangrygamer/2014/10/gamergate-destructoid-corruption-and-ruined-careers/10/19/2014 - 8:57pm

Neo_DrKefka: Only good thing I seen come out of the Biddle incident was the fact a professional fighter offered to give 10k to an anti bullying charity for a round in the ring with Biddle.10/19/2014 - 7:49pm

Neo_DrKefka: Even after all the interviews she is still on twitter making fun of people with disabilities (Autism) yet she is a part of the crowd that is on the so called right side of history...10/19/2014 - 7:48pm

Neo_DrKefka: Which #GameGate supports are constantly being harassed and bullied. Brianna Wu who I told everyone she was trolling GamerGate weeks ago with her passive aggressive threats was looking for that crazy person in the crowd.10/19/2014 - 7:47pm

All shouts

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