A recent comment by NBC/Universal lawyer Rick Cotten has him stating:

“Our law enforcement resources are seriously misaligned. If you add up all the various kinds of property crimes in this country, everything from theft, to fraud, to burglary, bank-robbing, all of it, it costs the country $16 billion a year. But intellectual property crime runs to hundreds of billions [of dollars] a year.”

It’s good to know that should I ever have to resort to breaking and entering but get caught, I can make a semi-valid claim in my own defense that hey, at least I’m not ripping off the entertainment industry. So how about going easy there on me, your honor?
While this article is mainly focusing on copyright infringement in regards to movies and other creative properties owned by the MPAA, it’s pretty transparent that this is an attitude that seems to be growing amongst music-industry representatives and executives who stand to get fat loot (yo!) supporting the likes of the RIAA. Off the backs of college students (their supposed primary market), small children, and of course, the dead.

I don’t think it stands as a surprise to anyone anymore to see this sort of shit getting espoused, though those of us who stand against it should be aware of a growing ripple effect that groups like the MPAA and RIAA are triggering to protect their interests, rather than say producing superior entertainment mediums that people will actually pay for. I don’t know about you, but I only buy shit I like and don’t waste my time on crap, hence why my hard-earned dollars go into beer and Chinese food, rather than paying for crap music that’s not worth the plastic it’s recorded on.

Thanks to Consumerist.com on this one.)

A recent editorial from our friends at the RIAA. Basically, the gist here is that their recent actions and aggressive stands against music downloading stems from a genuine concern to maintain jobs and artistic rights, as well as a moral obligation to teach a generation of college students (the primary target of the article) to steal for everything.

First off, where’d the focus on the elderly, the crippled, and the recently deceased go? If you don’t know what I’m talking about, go look up some of the recent news regarding people targeted with legal actions by the RIAA.

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The RIAA has had a busy week. They started to offer out of court settlements for college students to stop downloading music. Apparently so busy with that, they even set up an automated system for people to settle their lawsuits online. Now, it appears they have set their eyes on their next “threat”; music blogs.

According to Idolator, the RIAA has started coming after various music blogs.
” Last week, Side One, Track One had its account suspended by its hosting provider because it posted a few Kaiser Chiefs MP3s–even though by the time the blog’s account had been suspended, the blogger had replaced the MP3s with links to streams sanctioned by the Chiefs’ management company, Cornerstone.
· Shameless Complacency posted some Wilco tracks today; shortly after, the blog was taken down “for a violation of [Wordpress'] Terms of Service” by its host, WordPress.com, although there’s no confirmation yet that the RIAA was involved.”

It’s not a surprising move in any way. If anything, it’s shocking it’s just happening now. The funny part of this is that blogs are probably one of the few sources out there helping to get people to actually buy music. When, oh when, will the RIAA dinosaur finally go extinct?