Spitzer Takes On Record Industry Payola 411
flackrum writes "NY Attorney General Spitzer has served subpoenas to four major record labels (UMG, BMG, EMI, WMG) in a continued house-cleaning of corporations employing dirty-tricks. In this particular group of cases, investigations are focusing on the circumvention of the Federal Payola Law, which forbids bribing radio broadcasters in return for airing specific songs. Mmm sweet karma."
At least it is a step up (Score:4, Funny)
http://money.cnn.com/2004/10/08/news/funny/spitze
Re:At least it is a step up (Score:3, Insightful)
if kerry wins the election... oh wait...
Re:At least it is a step up (Score:5, Insightful)
I've said it before, and I'll say it again... people put WAY too much weight on the power of the presidency. In candidate ads, news articles, /. posts, and conversations, I hear/read of all these magical powers that just don't exist. Bush should do something about X, Kerry will make the paralized walk. The president has power but there are other people in our government.
Worried about the draft, pork spending, over/under litigation? Want more/less spending on aids, stem cells, drugs then? Talk to congress. They write and pass bills. The prez can veto but congress can battle that. If the current music business model is not working, then your congress-person should be pestered. If they thought stem cells are the cure and private funding isn't getting it done then there would be 100% backing in congress to ram a bill into Bush's lap.
Republican or Democrat, the president is not a Mystykyl Majical being that can cure every problem in the country.
Re:At least it is a step up (Score:3, Interesting)
The presidency is a sporting event. People don't seriously expect the president to directly affect their lives for better or worse, they just want to see their favorite team win. If it were all about issues and results, nobody would take it nearly as personally as they do now.
Re:At least it is a step up (Score:5, Informative)
Ahh, but you missed the most obvious way to put the lie to that statement. I give you the DOJ v M$ as a case in point. IIRC the judge who was supposed to rule, and we all expected the ruling to be against M$ from the public statements made (a definite no-no according to some), was replaced by a GWB puppet, with the expected results, business as usual for M$.
So yes, the President can find a way, and the more circuituous that path back to him, the better its swept away, drowned out by the other public noises.
Cheers, Gene
Re:At least it is a step up (Score:3, Informative)
Re:At least it is a step up (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:At least it is a step up (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:At least it is a step up (Score:3)
I will admit that the tipping might create an incentive to make sure the bathroom really is clean. That said, I thought there had to be a minimum wage. IIRC, the minimum wage assuming there is sufficient
Re:At least it is a step up (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:At least it is a step up (Score:3, Interesting)
You should try France: I remember taking a pee in an airport (I think) and having a female cleaner wipe a mop around the floor including between my feet at the time!
Loophole (Score:5, Interesting)
Broadcasters are prohibited from taking cash or anything of value in exchange for playing a specific song, unless they disclose the transaction to listeners. But in a practice that is common in the industry, independent promoters pay radio stations annual fees - often exceeding $100,000 - not, they say, to play specific songs, but to obtain advance copies of the stations' playlists. The promoters then bill record labels for each new song that is played; the total tab costs the record industry tens of millions of dollars each year.
Why wasn't this loophole simply closed up when it began?
Because without the loophole (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Because without the loophole (Score:2)
That, or what you think, they ought to want to hear?
Re:Because without the loophole (Score:5, Insightful)
Exactly. Excellent point. Whenever the subject of music comes up, you always get the freaky clove-smoking oddballs who claim that radio doesn't play OBSCURE BAND X. The implication, of course, is that OBSCURE BAND X on OBSCURE LABEL Y is objectively (no questions asked) "better" music than NOT-OBSCURE BAND A.
And what usually happens, once the freaky clove-smoking oddball launches into the first attack, several additional attacks follow -- all of which list more OBSCURE BANDS from OBSCURE LABELS. Subtext here -- always -- is: gee, if only folks would listen to this music, we'd all be "better off".
Most of the music -- from where I sit, at least -- listed is wretched. This is my opinion, of course, but for whatever reason, the clove-smoking oddballs don't seem to understand the idea of "subjectivity" in art. I don't either, but I pretend I do -- and by pretending, I'm at least making an effort at being charitable and understanding that usually the reason that obscure bands are on obscure labels is that the music isn't appealing to a large audience. It may appeal to a small audience, but the commercial potential probably isn't there. So, okay: fair enough.
But I suspect -- and have no proof, of course -- that the only reason the clove-cig smoking oddballs list the obscure bands is to say, hey, look at me, I have distinct musical tastes and now this little band out of Idaho called the Blue Fonzies that plays *real* punk music, blah blah blah. I also suspect that the clove-crowd is pretty narcissistic and isn't able to think that, well, some folks *do* like Britney and Usher and Justin and that's okay. Personally, I don't -- I abhor the hip-hop stuff, yet (paradoxically) I have a hard time latching onto the Blue Fonzie-like bands from Idaho for (mostly) ideological reasons. They piss me off -- not tha band, but what band stands for -- and the sort of clove-cig smoking idiots that use art as ideology in order to drive home an uncharitable, narcissistic point that says nothing about the music industry, music in general, the band, or even the state of contemporary culture.
It says: hey, look at me, I like the Blue Fonzies. Ergo, I'm hippy-dippy cool.
sounds good; not true (Score:4, Insightful)
You might have a real point if airplay correlated with album sales. But there are glaring exceptions. Look at Radiohead. Look at Steely Dan. Look at the Grateful Dead or Phish. There are lots of bands who aren't on the radio, yet have huge album sales. The issue is not radio reflecting the taste of phillistines; it's radio reflecting its own corporate ambitions, and intentionally shaping the preferences of the casual listener.
As a person's devotion to music increases -- i.e., more time is paid to the hobby -- the overwhelming majority turns away from what's on the radio. They may turn to obscure country, or blues, or indie rock, or jazz -- whatever. But very few people who spend a lot of time listening to and reading about music find their love of Britney Spears' artistry deepening.
Is this just en-masse elitism? I'm sure to some extent it is. But I find it hard to believe that solo artists locked into multi-album deals -- the kind of artists that are most profitable to the record companies -- are the "naturally best" solution to serving casual listeners (at least from the listeners' perspective).
You're right that the subjectivity of art means we can argue forever about what ought to be on the radio, but one thing should be clear: whatever it is, it isn't what's on the radio now.
Re:I dunno (Score:2)
Exactly! The law is ripe for repeal.
-2 Bad Troll :-)
Re:I dunno (Score:5, Interesting)
To see what the power of payola was, one record company decided to NOT participate when Pink Floyd was on their The Wall tour in Los Angeles, one of the biggest music events of the time. The song (I forgot which) was a hit across the country, but was not played by a single radio station in Los Angeles in the week before the concert.
There's a book about this called "Hit Men" or something like that. It's pretty interesting stuff. A basic overview is at:
http://www.antimusic.com/rants/2003/march.shtml [antimusic.com]
As far as Spitzer goes, he seems to be doing a great job battling corruption throughout NY. I've been impressed with how much he is accomplishing.
Re:I dunno (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I dunno (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a myth that an unregulated market is good for the small guy trying to break in. The reason this is not the case is the concept of scale effects. When you sell 100 items of a product your fixed costs per product are a lot higher than when you sell 100.000 items, and your variable costs tend to be higher as well (due to the inefficiencies of low volume production). Because your cost per product as a small guy is higher, it is hard to compete against the bigger businesses, who can maintain lower prices and still be profitable. Over time, this effect causes the market to merge in a number of big behemoths (the larger you are the more profit you make per product), and once you reach that point usually they will form cartels, where they use various kinds of underhanded tactics, like predatory pricing, coupled sales, government bribing and so on to keep out new market entrants and maintain higher prices than market forces would dictate. Examples of this are the music industry (the big five), microsoft's windows and office empire, the telecom industry on the local level, and on and on.
Cartels or monopolies have been demonstrated to tend towards having low market efficiency, due to the profit maximalization imperative and their ability to maintain non-market-optimal pricing models at greater profit to the business.
The only way to avoid this is to limit the ability of market players to form cartels or monopolies, and then abuse their power. Retroactively, that means antitrust law. So antitrust is a necessary part of maintaining a healthy free market. Proactively it means making sure that new market players can enter without high entrance costs (like allowing small telecom companies to use existing networks for a fair price, so they don't have to build up their own network at extreme cost), so raising prices by the big players would cause new players to enter at lower price points.
So, in conclusion, to have a truly free market (meaning with near non-existant barrier to entry), you must regulate it so no market player can become too powerful. A correctly regulated market is a healthy market, an unregulated market is a diseased or soon-to-be-diseased market.
Ofcourse, big business has been very successful at spreading the meme that market regulation is bad for the market. The reality is that it's good for the market (if done correctly), but it's bad for the behemoth.
Re:I dunno (Score:3, Interesting)
I think you're mixing concepts here. Market regulation _is_ generally bad for the market. Antitrust regulation is good for the market.
Big companies really welcome true market regulation, because it prevents smaller players from entering the field. For example, the reasons drug prices are so high is because regulation makes it virtually impossible for small companies to compete. Therefor
Re:I dunno (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I dunno (Score:3, Insightful)
Economies of scale are the explanation of why a totally unregulated market over time turns into a few large behemoths, unless the product doesn't afford barriers to entry or economies of scale (very few products are like that). I think I made that point, you may want to refute it.
But tr
Re:Because without the loophole (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Because without the loophole (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Because without the loophole (Score:4, Insightful)
That's cute and all, and certainly plays well on slashdot, but it ends up sounding pretty stupid when you consider that the number of radio listeners has actually been growing for the past few years [arbitron.com]. Radio stations are obviously doing something right, and that something is "play[ing] what people want to hear."
I'm sure that you (like many here, including myself) don't listen to much mainstream radio, if any. You don't like what they play? Everyone has different tastes, nothing wrong with that. But don't make the mistake of thinking that because you think something sucks, everyone else feels the same way too.
Re:Because without the loophole (Score:2)
(And no I didn't read your link. It required a frickin' cookie, and somehow I didn't feel like feeding wargod.arbitron.com
Re:Because without the loophole (Score:5, Informative)
Ooo.. lookie.. the cumulative number of people born increases over the years.
Congratulations, you've just managed to find a (very poor) measure of population growth.
Every stat except the cumulative shows a downward trend. This includes the TSL (which I assume stands for Total Seconds Listened). More people, listening less. That certainly says something about the quality of radio, doesn't it?
Disclosure (Score:4, Interesting)
Legalizing payola would create a shock to the industry's business models. Any shock can only have positive results given the state of current business models.
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Disclosure (Score:2)
I swear today is the "Let's not RTFA" day on Slashdot... Quote from the article:
"Broadcasters are prohibited from taking cash or anything of value in exchange for playing a specific song, unless they disclose the transaction to listeners."
Re:Disclosure (Score:4, Funny)
You're confused. This is completely normal. You're thinking of "Let's RTFA" day, which happens every other leap year.
Re:Disclosure (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Loophole (Score:2)
I don't know much about music business... (Score:2, Insightful)
But government's meddling in what businesses can pay to each other seems wrong to me.
That said, Spitzer is right enforcing the law -- the practice of having stupid laws on the books without enforcing them for years is even more worrysome -- it simply leaves the door open for selective enforcement in the future.
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:5, Insightful)
But government's meddling in what businesses can pay to each other seems wrong to me.
In this case I don't think it's wrong, since the richer companies could use their money to effectively monopolise radio for their artists.
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:2)
Does not make sense to me -- there are almost no up-front costs in starting your own radio station, AFAIK -- may be a $100K. And the high startup costs for the field is one of the main requirements to even begin discussing the possibility of there being a monopoly in it.
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:2)
Anything below 5-10 million dollars is still very low.
Finally, yes, you can start with covering "five blocks" and if there are listeners, there will be advertisers. And with advertisers, there will be money for expansion.
We need to stop it already. (Score:2, Insightful)
These include:
1. radio and tv broadcasts - no possibility of free markets here as the government licences "public" spectrum to the entities in the first place. and afaik the government will police your spectrum for you. so to talk about a free market here we would first have to let anyone who wanted broadcast on any frequency he wanted. if we do this, perhaps it will be ok to talk a
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:5, Interesting)
He writes:
"At this late stage, media companies have grown so large and powerful, and their dominance has become so detrimental to the survival of small, emerging companies, that there remains only one alternative: bust up the big conglomerates."
The whole article is
here [washingtonmonthly.com]
Arguably he discusses television, not radio but many of the companies involved are the same, the "product" sold to advertisers (John Q. Public) is the same, and a part of what is aired (music, news) is the same too.
Maybe you could start your own radio station, but who will listen to it and why would anyone advertise with you, with your tiny marketshare? The other companies are just too big, so they will very easily undercut you while you are trying to build your business.
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:3, Interesting)
He also supported a flat tax, no exceptions. Of course, that meant he would lose a lot of money. His response: "Of course I'm going to take advantage of it, I'd be an idiot not too. But that doesn't mean I don't think there isn't a better system out there." The true idiot is one who can't see past his immediate gain to recognize a b
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:2, Insightful)
The point is supposed to be to prevent large record labels from locking out smaller competitors for air time. Hardly a simple case of the govt "meddling" with business.
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:5, Insightful)
"But government's meddling in what businesses can pay to each other seems wrong to me."
(I'm not American, nor in America, thank goodness) A previous poster stated that the law prevents the station from recieving inducement and _not disclosing it_ to the listeners. The law doesn't preclude the inducement, just the concealment of "sponsored" playlists.
i.e. it prevents corruption.
This is, in general, a good thing. In the UK, this is why extended "infomercials" have to bear a banner telling you that they are an "advertisement feature"; to prevent the credulous masses from thinking they are getting unbiased information, when in fact they are getting neither (not unbiased, probably not information either)
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:2)
Then all business transactions are "bribery".
Anyway, I don't see, how bribery should concern anyone other than the bribe-taker's employer and -- in an enlightened society -- the bribe-giver's employer too.
I'm not even sure, we are right punishing our businesses for bribing foreign governments (Europeans don't object to that). But bribing each other? Please -- that is just business.
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:3, Insightful)
Because most people have an innate feel that there is more to right and wrong than might and weakness. You would have felt bad if a big kid beat you up and took your new skateboard. You would have called on some authority to stop this unfair behaviour.
Modern society recognises that money is power today, and that someone has to stop the big co
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:2)
Beating up is made illegal to protect individuals. Protecting businesses from each other is a different story, and I don't see a use for it -- unless, may be, in case of a credible threat of there appearing a true monopoly.
We stopped throwing wretched newborns from cliffs long ago, but market still benefits from survival of the fittest businesses.
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:5, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I don't know much about music business... (Score:3, Informative)
Good Idea (Score:4, Insightful)
They should enforce the law or remove it from the books. But if big media can't get the radio play they want, it really makes it hard for them to produce mega hits "on demand."
Re:Good Idea (Score:5, Informative)
Radio stations I used to like to listen to were playing top 40 hits non-stop during the day, and often two stations would be playing exactly the same song at the same time. I said to myself, that isn't music it's advertising space.
In Canada there was a backlash against it by a number of top DJ's who got sick of playing this crap and the left to join a group of radio stations that were formed across the country (by a big corporation mind you) that lets them play whatever the hell they want. It ain't always in my taste but I guaruntee no one paid to get Whitesnake or Genisis played
Hopefully this means the Rock/Classic Rock stations I was listening to can stop playing top 40 music.
Come on. (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Come on. (Score:5, Insightful)
Aren't you in the least bit frustrated to tune through the FM dial and find the same artists on 3/4 of the stations?
Do you really believe that the reason independent artists are never played on the radio is that none of them are as good as commercial artists? The reason they get no airplay is because they can't afford to stuff the pockets of radio programmers. This system keeps the big labels happy, because they essentially own the FM radio band, and they use it as one big commercial for all their latest crappy music.
$tatus quo (Score:2)
But in the record business, that's the playing field. The law is the law - abide by it, or bribe^H^H^H^H^Hget Congress to change it.
The law is there for the same reason antitrust laws are there: to keep MCA and friends from crowding out the smaller labels the same as they crowd out indy musicians. The laws should be enforced or taken off the books so that everyone knows what the playing field is.
Ha-Ha! (Score:5, Funny)
Anyone...
Anyone at all...
Buhler? Buhler?
Re:Ha-Ha! (Score:3, Funny)
I'd also like to say *thank you for the $50,000 check*
I think They Might Be Giants said it best... (Score:2, Interesting)
'Cause my alarm clock always wakes me right up
And since my options had been whittled away
I struck a bargain with my radio DJ
I said I'd like this song to be number one
He said "I'd really really like to help you my son"
And then I knew that I would have him to thank
Because he asked me how much I had in the bank
He said to think long term investment and
That all the others had forgiven themselves
He said the net reward would justify
The colossal mess they'd made of their lives
This is bad news. (Score:3, Insightful)
I mean, how a mere official dare confront the biggest in the mind-shaping industry???
Expect Orin Hatch to soon introduce legislation to legalize payola...
This is where ambition serves the public good (Score:5, Interesting)
Mark my words, very soon this guy will either be the successor to Pataki as governor, or Bloomberg as mayor. From there he WILL go national.
Re:This is where ambition serves the public good (Score:3, Interesting)
Sure it's a political powerplay, but one that actually benefits people.
* - if you happen to be in the US Territory of the Marianas Islands.
Re:This is where ambition serves the public good (Score:4, Funny)
Re:This is where ambition serves the public good (Score:2, Insightful)
Didn't kerry vote for most of the laws that allow ashcroft to do what you do not like?
Re:This is where ambition serves the public good (Score:2)
This is a waste of taxpayer's money (Score:4, Funny)
Given their record of fair play, being law abiding citizens, and their respect for the laws of this country - so great that they even write the laws - it is quite clear that they have not done anything wrong, and should not be investigated at all.
Re:This is a waste of taxpayer's money (Score:2)
Perhaps an unpopular opinion, but... (Score:4, Interesting)
Don't get me wrong, it actually does please me to hear about the government finally cracking down on payola, and I hate the RIAA as much as any self-respecting geek. But in this case... I wouldn't necessarily call it black-and-white. Perhaps a matter of monopolistic control of a market, but beyond that?
As an aside... This addresses labels trying to do an end-run around the payola laws... But a much more obvious way to comply in letter if not in spirit exists. Payola laws forbid paying for songs without admitting it. Who sees the next big thing in radio as "and now, BoiBand9000's latest hit, brought to you by the kind, friendly, law-abiding, just-shy-of-saintly folks at Sony"?
Re:Perhaps an unpopular opinion, but... (Score:2)
One reason I think this is bad is because the record labels control the destiny of so much of the musical talent that they can make and break the artist based on their distribution. A lot of that being the radio stations.
Hence, music goes from being something of a meritocracy (where the be
Ads vers. Music (Score:4, Insightful)
The issue is, esp., when DJ's used to pick the songs they played, that the public would believe it was picked because they liked it... not because of payola.
Re:Ads vers. Music (Score:2)
I don't think so... there are still plenty of stations playing independent stuff, especially in college communities. If every station plays the same crap, then they dillute the market themselves and all lose money. People will turn to the stations that play good music... or, like I imagine, more and more peo
Re:Perhaps an unpopular opinion, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
Now, if you subscribe to this mentality, the law falls into place nicely. Since the radio stations are there for the public benefit, it is up to the public (by way of representatives and laws) to determine how they should conduct business. Also, since there's supposed to be a division between content and advertising, and I think we can all agree that that division is in the public's best interest, codifying that division can only support the public's best interest.
Again... this all makes sense if you agree with the original mindset in which the law was written. To sum it up, here's the basic logic (since that last paragraph was poorly written and hard to follow):
- Radio stations are allowed to broadcast by the government (acting as representatives of the people) for the public benefit.
- Radio stations have "content" (music, talk shows, etc
... ) and "advertising" (pre-recorded ads, endorsements, contests, etc ... ). Keeping these separate allows to strengthen the public discourse while providing the radio station enough money to operate profitably.
- By allowing companies and industry groups (like RIAA) to "pay for play" in the content section, the "public discourse" is taken away from the public and given wholly to the industry. As representatives of the public, the government should try to stop this.
- Furthermore, by having a "pay for play" policy, recording companies with less money are unable to get their songs heard and can never compete with the larger labels. This creates a oligopoly (like monopoly, but instead the market is cornered by a "group" of companies), which is against the competition model of our society's capitalist system.
Agree or not, hopefully that will make the intention of the law clearer. I thoroughly understand your viewpoint, though, and I agree that dictating what a company can or can not do is a little risky, but only if you're a laissez-faire Republican (one who believes government should be reduced in size, and take a less-active role in day-to-day life... i.e. a classical conservative). The fact of the matter is that industry is subject to regulation all the time, usually in a way that supports the public good (i.e. environmental laws, zoning laws, bribery laws, accounting laws, etcRe:Perhaps an unpopular opinion, but... (Score:3, Informative)
Who are the bad guys here? (Score:3, Insightful)
Think about it, who benefits from payola, the bribers or the bribees (don't know if that is a real word, but lets pretend it is)? The record labels are forced to pay just to get their music on the air, while radio stations get to cash in on the label's desperation. Pretty much any competent record company exec would prefer to get that promotion for free, and in fact that have written complaints over the practice in the past (just the people who would normally be on their side in such a case are convinced in their close minded world that everything a record company does must be evil).
Re:Who are the bad guys here? (Score:3, Interesting)
And as far as the radio stations are concerned, without the cash kickbacks from the labesl, even ClearChannel stations may be more willing to play independent / non-major-label music. Fat chance, I know, but as far as I can
Re:Who are the bad guys here? (Score:5, Insightful)
Here's the deal: This is a system perpetuated by both the music industry AND the radio stations, but the music industry is in charge, make no mistakes. If they really didn't like the system, they could have and would have phased it out years ago.
But I think they know they have too much to loose.
They essentially have a monopoly over FM playlists, which means they can push out whatever teeny bopper crap they come up with and know, just KNOW, that it will sell well. Why? Good question. The answer is, because we are sheep. Peer pressure is a powerful force, for every age group, but especially the ones they are targetting.
Now, the radio stations are just as addicted to this problem as the labels, but they are NOT in control. If the labels decided tomorrow that they weren't going to pay out anymore, the stations would fail fast.
The music industry is right where it wants to be: It can dictate play lists to the music stations.
Re:Who are the bad guys here? (Score:3, Interesting)
Look at the original example. The indies are paying $100,000 a year to the stations, and the record companies are paying a total of $30m a year to the indies!
So it's pretty obvious that, if the music firms weren't benefitting, they could just pay each of the radio stations $200,000 a year *NOT* to follow any indie's playlist. They wouldn't be able to buy play of their own songs, that would break the law; they would just, effectively, be paying the station for NOT using promoters. Bad deal
Elected Officials (Score:5, Insightful)
Did you hear that?
Re:Elected Officials (Score:3, Interesting)
Could you possible explain which ones those are? And what exactly is 'taking out'. Are you saying the government should be able to arbitrarily rule that a certain entity is 'evil' and therefore disband it?
More over, I'd like you to point out some evil corporations, because most likely 'taking them out' will not gain politicians votes, even though you wish it would. This conversation often goes something like this...
Walmart is evil! The
Spitzer's an Enigma alright (Score:2, Funny)
He charges recording industry with collusion and payola.
He's the first to sign on to the microsoft settlement of 2001.
I'm confused. Somebody, quick, help me form an opinion.
Re:Spitzer's an Enigma alright (Score:3, Insightful)
This doesn't work for every position -- most governors and the President, of course, have to mix so many different sides with no clear winner that they inevitably have to spend at least some time politicking.
OTOH, being honest, doing your job, and erring on the side of the little guy is a good enough forumla to win popular acclaim.
Sweet karma? (Score:4, Funny)
What's this? I clicked on the word "karma" and got some damn wiccan page talking about some religious concept they stole from the Hindus. I always thought "karma" was what I'll lose by posting this message.
What about News Media Payola? (Score:4, Insightful)
This history of payola (Score:3, Interesting)
The music industry has always paid to get air play. The states and the feds thought that if rock and roll radio stations were forbidden to take payola, through laws selectively enforced against those stations, they'd be forced to stop playing rock and roll. It didn't work.
Why those laws are still on the books are beyond me.
The dying throws... (Score:3, Insightful)
How about we re-regulate radio? I'm tired of 10 song play lists being recycled 24 hours a day. God damn clear channel.
Not about the RIAA (Score:3, Informative)
Listen, I don't like the RIAA more than anyone else here, but there's criticism, and then there's demonization. They have done plenty of other stuff to deserve derision, but this particular issue isn't about the RIAA.
a small nit to pick (Score:2, Interesting)
Here's a few hints:
Karma, dharma and samsara are three fundamental aspects of the Hindu world view.
Dharma, one's appropriate role or attributes, gives life its order and predictability.
Karma, the measure of how well one performs one's dharma, explains why one is born where he or she is, why there is suffering and seeming injustices.
Samsara, the continuous round of birth, death and rebirth, is the context for all experience.
For society to function, e
Right or Wrong, the law is... (Score:3, Informative)
Section 507 of the Communications Act, as amended, 47 U.S.C. 508 requires that when anyone pays someone to include program matter in a broadcast, the fact of payment must be disclosed in advance of the broadcast to the station over which the mater is to be carried. Both the person making the payment and the recipient are obligated to disclose the payment so that the station may make the sponsorship identification announcement required by Section 317 of the Act. Failure to disclose such payments is commonly referred to as ``payola'' and is punishable by a fine of not more than $10,000 or imprisonment for not more than one year or both. These criminal penalties bring violations within the purview of the Department of Justice.
Bad tunes require more cash (Score:3, Funny)
Payola is Rampant (Score:5, Interesting)
When I was far younger, I used to work in the radio broadcasting industry and the stories of what the indie-promoters do is shameful.
The program director, a few of his lackies, some of the higher-profile talent and an independent promoter all went out to dinner in Windsor. Not only did the promoter spring for dinner, but then he hands everyone in the group three crisp $100 bills and tells them to have fun in the Windsor Casino.
Or perhaps the station is out of money for promotions and can't buy bumper stickers or on-air give-aways. The indie will line up all sorts of cool goods to give away like video games, cell phones and lots and lots of record product and concert tickets. Funny thing is, the listeners get the record product and the concert tickets, but the video games and cell phones are traded to vendors to print bumper stickers. Or, they simply go into the pocket of the general manager and program director.
Another disturbing thing that happens now is ClearChannel has a concert promotion business too. So when their show comes into town, the playlist is modified so heavily on all their radio stations that you can't get away from the featured act. Imagine a weekend of nearly nothing but Journey!
Radio is pretty much a license to print money. It is not a surprise that it's rampant with abuse and corruption.
Re:Payola is Rampant...not just in radio (Score:3, Insightful)
Drug advertising contributes to the cost of the medication, on the order of 10%. Ironically, the 'bribery' has gone down as the TV advertising has gone up. This is O
NY AG is most powerful in country! (Score:4, Interesting)
Oh no! (Score:2)
starting to have reservations about spitzer (Score:3, Interesting)
However, at some point you have to ask yourself if having some state AG go after them is the right way. Isn't that the whole point of electing a legislature? Should the regulatory policies of an industry be decided by one all-powerful unelected state official?
I'm sure this will go over the heads of the slashdot faithful until some state AG decides to take on something we like. At that point slashdot will roundly criticize them for being undemocratic, while failing to appreciate the irony.
Just remember -- for everything you like done without legislative approval (like going after the record industry) there's going to be something you don't like (like some judge deciding we should have software patents). The best way is to do things the right way or don't do them at all.
HE IS GREAT FOR MANY REASONS... (Score:4, Interesting)
Why Did it Take So Long (Score:3, Interesting)