RIAA = EVIL spelled backwards.
Badly.
The Recording Industry Association of America is an evil, evil entity. It's not quite as important that you be regaled with my tale of how I came upon this startling revelation that was previously oh-so-bloody-obvious to pretty much anyone else with a website on the internet... as you simply understand that the RIAA is evil. At least as evil as evil can be in hyperbole-- no, they don't eat babies, and no, they don't actually kill kittens. But there are some seriously wrong things with the RIAA, and much of what's wrong today in the music industry is due to the somewhat sinister influence of this entity of corporate entities.
The RIAA is as if Voltron was formed, not of friendly and colorful mechanical lions, but of intellectual property lawers, executives, and other folks who are bent on making more than a buck in the music industry-- who somehow don't actually make any music.
I was trying to find Titus a copy of Untitled Hymn (Come To Jesus) on mp3, so he could listen and figure out how to play the song, as my lovely pianist on Sunday. And instead of my admitted usual habit of Kazaa-ing the thing and being done with it, I decided to venture into the uncharted territory of following Copyright Law. Everyone seemed to be doing it. Mike's been buying his tunes off iTunes, and Wendy's been talking about letting her broken computer, chock full of tunes by any remotely listenable artist known to man, stay dead... and not bothering to recover all her Kazaa'ed and Napster'ed booty.
I thought, hey, why not? A buck (99 cents really) is a pretty good price to pay for integrity-- personal character, on sale. Heck, why not go one further. When mailing Titus the song attached, I'll even delete my own copy as soon as I hit send... so I only pay for one copy. And only one copy exists for my buck paid. What a saint I be! Let's give it a go... so I thought.
Couple clicks later: iTunes, Music Store, go download bar go.
Then it occured to me that iTunes only lets you download in AAC format-- Apple's proprietary copy-protected format with whiz-bang (read: annoying) technology. So now, in order to get the music to Titus from my office, I'd actually have to go over to his place, login in as me on his copy of iTunes, and unlock the song on his computer. Which well, please correct my logic... but sort of defeats the whole purpose of me sending him the song over the net in the first place. Plus I wouldn't have been able to go over that night, and practice was tomorrow.
And even if I were able to do so, I only get to unlock the song on five computers. Again, AAC's copy protection scheme... which is managable-- except that previously, it was only three. Which means... that after unlocking the song on his computer, I'm left with one unlock-- on my home computer. If I ever upgrade or switch PC's, well, kiss the song goodbye. I'll have to buy it all over again. So much for "my" music. I know with the increased five computer limit it's not a big deal... but bear with me, I'm on a roll here.
So I thought, okay... no problem. I'll convert it to mp3. Mp3's play on just about anything-- just gotta find an AAC to mp3 converter, right? Right.
A quick net search later points me to a little neat application called Hymn (aptly named). Good deal. Buy the song, obey the law, get the song to Titus. No sweat.
Except that the website reads... that by executing Hymn on my little iTunes song, I'm violating yet another law. It's called the DMCA. No, not the Villiage People song, but just about as fruity. Remember the DMCA. And that it sucks. You'll be quizzed later.
But in essence, it's a random, vague law, that says that pretty much any attempt at circumventing any sort of digital copyright is breaking the law. And not only that, but a federal offense. You know, the sort of offense that ranks right up there with serial murders, bank robberies, and eating babies. Killing kittens is a crime largely within local jurisdiction, I understand.
So by trying to obey the law, having paid for my music, and even intending to delete my copy as soon as Titus receives his-- I'm faced with yet another law. I can't even convert the danged thing to mp3! Then I realized what an abomination iTunes was:
AAC is only playable in iTunes and on iPods. Nowhere else. So if I want to send the song to a friend, even as a paid gift-- it's just simply not possible. Unless I tinker with it in a way that makes me a federal criminal. Go one further. If you simply want to use another sort of portable music player other than the iPod-- you know, because there are such things and they do exist in legend... guess what? Bzzz.. You've violated the DMCA.
I guess you're saying... what's the big deal? Pay the buck, "break" the law, get it over with. Still feel good about yourself in the morning, because hey, you paid for the freaking thing.
But the point here is that even intending full obedience and respect to the law, even wanting to remain fully ethical, beyond reproach-- it's simply not possible to do what you want-- with your own music that you paid for. The laws are set up in this convoluted way that just doesn't allow you to do with your music what makes sense-- you can't even decide that you like Winamp better and would rather play your fully paid song there. And woe be to you if you don't own an iPod and you actually care to listen to music away from your computer.
So now, I ask you... from iTunes' perspective-- what's the incentive in this situation, for the law-abiding citizen, of even paying for the music? If you're going to be breaking one law anyway, because your intended (and very sensical) use of the music would require you to violate the DMCA-- then you might as well just illegally download the thing, break still one law and save yourself the buck. Not only that, I'm willing to bet that iTunes' business is heavily funded by those wanting to pay for their own music, who then resort to running an application such as Hymn, so that they could actually use their music on their Rio or Nomad, or play it through WinAmp or Windows Media Player. In a constrained way, iTunes and the stinking DMCA force some of their most loyal and good-intentioned customers into violating copyright law, and then profit off their violation. If you were absolutely adamant about legality, and you owned something other than an iPod, you simply could not and would not download from iTunes. And iTunes would not get your money at all.
But I ask, only from iTune's perspective-- because if we're folks after true integrity, we'd pay the buck anyway. Actually, if we're after perfect integrity, we'd probably find any means of avoiding breaking whatever silly or dumb law they can come up with, in search of being perfectly beyond error, beyond fault...
Not wanting to waste a buck and lose the integrity I'd already paid a dollar to keep... I thought... fine. Let's go all the way. I remember hearing that Napster's now a pay-for-song, legal service. I can still do this... now it's two bucks... but I can gnab an mp3 totally legit from Napster.com, and get off and get this done... all guilt and federal conviction free. I don't really like sharing cells with baby eaters.
Moments later, and a new download in progress-- turns out it's .WMV format... no biggie. That plays on nearly anything. I'm happily listening to it in Windows Media Player-- until I realize again -- that WMV itself is also copy protected! Same deal, can't be played on another computer than the one you bought from. I'm now stuck back at square one. Even worse, I couldn't even find a method for converting .WMV to mp3. It's apparently a tricky enough format not to already have been hacked into oblivion.
I gave up. Frustrated. Did what was left to do in getting the song to Titus on time. I ran Hymn, hacked the AAC version of the song, and sent the mp3 to Titus... then deleted my copy.
The score sheet? Two bucks spent, trying to be perfectly law-abiding. One law broken. Not a good trade off. I ended up the day irrate, annoyed, breaking the precious DMCA, and feeling a good amount of self-righteous indignation about it... indignation that hasn't subsided yet (This entry's written December 2nd, the incident occured at the date above.)
The Book of ButtTank- Chapter 3, verse 2: "If I don't buy from iTunes, I breaketh the law. And if I buy, then I buy only to breaketh the law. For I rather that I not pay a dollar to breaketh the law, then to pay a dollar and fall under the same judgement. Oh wretched is me, who will save me from the body of this death? Grace be to Jesus Christ! *downloads*"
And this here is why the RIAA is evil. The RIAA, the coalition of recording companies, controls the distribution of much of popular music today... almost all if not all of the bands you've ever heard of. They control the distribution-- how the music gets on shelves... they control the promotion -- what bands get advertising, what bands get known-- they control the marketing.
They essentially as an organization have near total monopoly on how music gets to the fans. If you want to be heard, reach out to any hope of a large audience, you sign with a major label. But the way that contracts are made, the way money works out in the end... is that large amounts are spent, and large amounts are made... and it's totally conceivable that a new band actually ends up seeing very little of the money in their pocket at the end. It's hard to believe, but that's how the math often works out. The royalties often barely cover the expenses, and that's why you hear of some big names and bands dissapearing... working somewhere they have to wear a name tag, with the artists seeing little of the profits raked in by millions of listeners and buyers.
The RIAA is a giant, blood and money sucking gate between a fan and an artist. And these corporations... middlemen with a stranglehold on music's moneyflow, suck up an overwhelming percentage of the dollars involved in the whole market. So where does the DMCA play in all this? Here it is:
The DMCA and laws like it are conceived by the RIAA, in order not to really protect the intellectual property of the artist and make sure that all royalties and dues go back to them-- but in fact, are conceived so that every last penny that can be imaginably made from the use of music will be made. Does this go back all to the artist? Not hardly. In the name of "protecting artists' intellectual property" (that they sometimes right out buy from an artist, so that a musician doesn't even have rights to his own song), the RIAA absorbs most of the cash involved out there, and these laws are proposed, so that they can tighten their control and hold on to any new flows of cash that might be slipping through the cracks.
Ew to the RIAA.
Cue a somewhat akward transition to more important realities
Okay... it just struck me, that this whole ordeal, this whole escapade of trying at first to obey the letter of the copyright law, being goody two shoes about it-- paying a buck for music... and just ending up with running into yet more laws to break-- is such a weird parallel with us, and trying to be "good people". I mean, we'll try to be perfect, or at least decent... straining to acheive some sort of rightness, goodness-- righteousness-- just by doing "good things"... but we never really make it.
Every rule we follow, every real standard we hold onto for a little bit will eventually just show us another one we've broken. We manage to avoid outright adultery, at least I would hope... but our eyes aren't exactly where they belong, our hearts have already done the deed and then some. We manage to avoid stabbing someone on most days, but we dislike so vehemently-- hate's an apt word-- that our hearts might only be different in shades, but not different in nature, from someone who might have.
Instead, the Law-- the absolute uncompromising standard of total goodness-- and our efforts to live up to it... will only continually reveal the imperfect in us. In heart, in attitude, in the straying of our minds and hearts from perfection, from love. The harder we try, the more clear it shows up to us-- hey, call it sin if you will. Our efforts will just make it that much clearer that we're really full of this sin... that we're sinful folk... in need of something greater than deeds to make us alright again. And if we don't try at all, well, our sinfulness's pretty danged glaring and evident too.
And I think we all end up doing one of two things... we'll try to reason it out to ourselves, maybe convince ourselves that it's not that big a deal. The things we do hurt no one. Or that they're not nearly as bad as say... the next guy. You know, the guy indulging in infant cuisine. And I don't mean Gerber's. Or... we just suffocate our consciences enough, so that we don't and won't care.
Or maybe... the moment we're really aware of its voice, that nagging... we keep paying that occasional buck. We try and make things up, somehow... as if a good thing, a buck paid, could cover the blemishes at our core, that only grow more and more stained with each moment and each mistake. Some accidental. Most not.
That buck we grudingly pay can't make us right. Our debts go way deeper than that. And it's not ceasing to sin that makes us okay-- we've already stored up enough sin, that if we're ever judged against perfection and against purity, the distance between ourselves and this total purity stretches and spans an eternity.
So... where's that leave us?
His forgiveness. His subsitution. His sacrifice. Our acceptance. And our repentence.
Our only hope's Jesus, really. He died to pay for us. Died to pay for a punishment, a judgment we pretty much deserve. It's all just a little too plain the moment we dare to glance at our hearts and our thoughts in the mirror of perfect and absolute goodness.
The only real way. The only real hope. Only with Him, in love, in faith, in turning away from our sin... our selves... will we be made right. And only through Him will we be made His own-- following in heart, following in faith, that results in following in deeds. And well, in this strained analogy... it's our new rightness, our new trust in Jesus, and our new longing of God and the things that bring Him a smile... that makes us pay up that buck.
Anyway... as much as I'd ranted about the RIAA... don't get me wrong. Pay for your music. Just know that the RIAA has two too many A's, one too many R's and was brought to you by the letters E, V, and L. | 
