Major pwnage about Filesharing

Numina

As I'm a part of Roadrunners (record label of Trivium, Megadeth and so on) street team, we all get e-mails regulary from the person who runs the Street Team, recently, they put up files from Stone Sours new album, that was exclusive to the Roadrunner Site, someone leaked them heres the email everyone on the street team got. Most importantly, if you want to get to the point, just read the bolded part, it's a copy of the email that was sent to the guy who leaked the tracks

HEY Colum!,

(PLEEEEZE, DO NOT REPLY TO THIS EMAIL WITH AN EMAIL !!!
Instead, go to http://www.roadrunnerrecords.co.uk/streetteam/
Log in and Respond to the task named below!
ANY REPLIES TO THIS MESSAGE WILL BE AUTOMATICALLY DELETED
(So do not waste your time))

IMPORTANT NOTICE- THE LOUNGE
It has been brought to my attention that the 5 Stone Sour tracks that were
loaded in the Street Team lounge for you last week have been leaked onto the
internet. They are marked with the STREET TEAM watermark I mentioned in the
task, and I have traced the culprit. This person has been sent the following
email today. You should all read this. Should the lounge ever be reinstated
(it is currently no longer in operation) this will happen to YOU if you leak
music files. It is illegal to share files in this way, and so I will ALWAYS
take appropriate action.

I also take it very personally when a teamer betrays the bands in this way- I
know all of our bands personally, and consider a lot of them friends. They are
folks just like you and me and all but 2 or 3 of our bands do not make mega
bucks doing this ****. Selling their music is how they pay the bills. The less
they sell, the less they have to live on. You may as well take food off their
tables by taking their music and making it available for free, and as street
teamers you are supposed to be here to help them not hinder them. I know MOST
of you know this, but there was at least one f*cker on this team who didn’t and
I am therefore sure there will be more. You have been warned. And if any of
the good teamers here (which I know is most of you) suspect anyone else, you
know where to find me. On to that email:

*******************************************

"...You were trusted, as a street teamer, to be someone who is here to help the
bands you love. It would seem however that you were simply here to steal music,
to gain kudos with other folks on the internet. Whilst I know a lot of people
feel that music should be available to all, it is something that artists have to
write, and record and convert into files/cds and it is the selling of this
material that pays their bills. By uploading these tracks, you have taken
something they have made without paying for it (just like walking into a shop
and taking something) and even worse, by passing it on, you are encouraging
others to do the same, are passing on stolen goods and discouraging someone else
from buying it. You have done the opposite of what a Street Teamer is here to
do- you have shafted the band. And I am willing to put money on the fact this
is not the only band you have taken music from. In fact, I have taken the
liberty of forwarding the details of your Download bootleg site to the record
labels concerned, including those of Marilyn Manson and Metallica. And I have
notified ********** of the abuse of their site for the distribution of illegal
downloads.

As music is something that belongs to the artist and is theirs and only theirs
to sell or give away (via their record label), it is protected by law, and the
copying and distributing of music freely, without permission, on the internet or
by any other means is ILLEGAL and you can be prosecuted. As such I have
forwarded the screen grabs of your posts, and your personal details to our legal
department, and you will be hearing from them shortly. I have also passed these
details onto the B.P.I. (the UK record industry’s governing body) who last year
prosecuted illegal filesharers resulting in fines of up to £200,000.

Kind Regards..."

Sami
x

I must say, I laughed pretty hard about this, the guy who leaked the tracks must be pretty stupid.

cornbb

Numina wrote:

You may as well take food off their
tables by taking their music and making it available for free
....
As music is something that belongs to the artist and is theirs and only theirs
to sell or give away (via their record label)

While stealing is certainly wrong, their argument is totally misleading. Artists make the bulk of their earnings from gigging. Record labels pocket the vast majority of the cash from CD sales and they are, lets face it, middle men who are becoming less and less necessary in the age of the Internet. Music piracy is not the heinous crime they would have you believe it is.

DerekD Goldfish

A number of these "Criminals" who got sent copys of the tracks if they like them will buy an album or go see the band when it plays live these are people who might not have done so otherwise.

Fileshareing has an increasing effect on Sales without it music sales would be down by far more due to other factors affecting the industry non piracy accociated.


Also Trivium are ****

RE*AC*TOR

1. Copyright infringment isn't stealing.

2. He mentioned something about a bootleg site (i assume he means live shows). While still illegal, is generally viewed benignly by artists.

BTW, never heard of Stone Sours, mind you I'm not much of a metal head.