Oral Roberts University Awash In Scandal

If you are a student at this Tulsa, OK sorry excuse for a school, ask that your diploma be printed on soft, absorbant paper. The only thing you're going to be doing with your degree is wiping your ass with it. AP has a story today of numerous scandals rocking this moron factory. One student boldy declares he is going to transfer because these scandals are devaluing his degree. Hey pinhead! The fact that your degree is from a school founded by the charlatan and huckster Oral Roberts already tells the world you're a moron. It's nearly impossible to make your worthless degree worth any less.

RIAA Wins Suit Over Illegal File Swapping

The LA Times reports today that the Recording Industry Assholes of America have triumphed in their suit against a 30 year old single mom, accused of sharing 1700 songs online. She is being ordered to pay $222,000 damages.

Is downloading songs stealing? Maybe. Is going to the library and borrowing a CD stealing? No. Is that borrowing depriving the copyright holders of royalties? Yes, so why is it different? If you make a mix CD for your friend, are you stealing music? According to the RIAA you are.

And that's the crux of the problem.

Firstly, the music industry is a corrupt, soul-sucking leviathan. It exploits and destroys as well as creates dreams. The business model they follow is a mix between Mafia ruthlessness and feudalistic God-given rights. When someone buys an album, almost none of that money ever reaches the artist. Yes, ARTIST. The royalties work out to something like $1.25 - $1.50 per mechanical copy.

But before the artist can get that money, the label/company recoups their costs for advertising, artwork, photography, lawyer fees, printing, shipping, storing the CDs in their own warehouse, and a myriad other sneaky charges. And if the record company is having a bad quarter they will empty the stock of CDs as "cut-outs," which means they cut-out the bar code and sell them for like $6 or $7 to record stores - but those do not count as sales, nor do the band get any royalties.

If you are the band, and your single is not doing well, the label can decide that it is better for their bottom line to pulp all of your CDs, thereby preventing anyone from buying a full-priced one because they can buy one "cut-out" for $8, your account is awash in red ink, they recoup their money, they hold onto your contract and your album masters and then refuse to spend another cent either promoting (tour support) or marketing your album.

Your career dies.

Secondly, when the industry switched over to CDs it was supposed to result in a drastic price drop on albums because it was now going to be so much easier to manufacture and ship albums. Instead, the industry upped the price of albums by about 40-50%. Where vinyl was selling for $8, CDs were going for $11.99. They increased the sale price of an album - but did not increase the royalty amount paid to the artist.

Is it any wonder that Prince gave away his recent album free when fans bought a magazine in the UK? Or that Radiohead is selling their new album for whatever price a fan decides is fair? Oh yeah, if you think "free" is the right price - you can sign up to get the album and pay nothing!

Radiohead is one of the few bands that actually sees royalties because their sales are so robust. Even that does not make it attractive for Radiohead to stay in business with the corporate music industry. Radiohead can make more money if a fan decides that $2 is what their album is worth, than if they went with Elektra and got the best royalty rate in the business. Both Prince and Radiohead know that the way they are going to make any real money is by creating fans; fans who will buy t-shirts and pay for concert tickets. It's almost incidental if they buy the record.

The best model for this is The Grateful Dead and Phish, two bands I do not like at all, but they are two bands that encouraged fans to record and swap their music. It created a huge fan base, loyal and diehard.

Does the RIAA really think that they lost $222,000 worth of business over this lawsuit? Do they, fuck! The reality is that most people would not have paid for the song at any rate, ever. It's not like this woman in Minnesota had $222,000 to spend on music. There are exceptions to every rule. There are some people who illegally stole tens of thousands of songs, and at that rate, it's ridiculous.

So when the RIAA cries about lost royalties I feel it's like a pimp crying about the whore he started selling when she was 12 and now has died of a heroin overdose. Fuck the RIAA sideways.

At the end of the day, you should pay for what you want to use or consume. There really is no free lunch. The RIAA should have seen that Napster and other file-swapping services were the dawn of a new era and they should have altered their business plan accordingly. What? You don't need to warehouse CDs anymore? Okay! Downloading will save us all money and make albums cheaper! But they didn't do that. People want to download music and they want it to be cheaper than in the stores. Look at iTunes, way over a million songs sold. The RIAA cold have said, "fuck it! Let's hop on this train! From now on, let's put our music up online at a better bitrate, totally secure files, and sell complete albums for 5 bucks!" They would have made their biggest profits ever.

I hope that Prince and Radiohead are leading the way to a new business model for the music industry. The old model deserves to die.

LA GALAXY 2 COLUMBUS CREW 1
The Galaxy are still keeping their dim hopes of a playoff berth alive with last night's win in Ohio. The Galaxy overcame a 2nd minute goal to peg back the home side and go ahead inside the first half.

Troy Roberts bundled the first goal past a flailing keeper and Kyle Martino shot through former Galaxy player Ezra Henderson's legs to make it 2-1.


USA Women lose to Brazil 4-0

The US Women's World Cup team has been the powerhouse side in international football for years. We should have brushed Brazil aside with ease and booked our place in the final. Instead, Germany went on to beat Brazil and we faced Norway, who eventually collapsed 4-1 under a reinvigorated US team.

What happened? In short, coach Greg Ryan replaced an in-form goalkeeper, Heather Solo, with someone who hadn't played in 3 months for God knows what reason. You're a nitwit, Ryan.

Here's what happened (broken down by Nick Webster):

September 27, 2007: Brazil vs. USA — Women's World Cup Semifinal

Greg Ryan decided to melt down on the eve of the biggest game he has ever coached when he benched his regular goalkeeper Hope Solo after three consecutive clean-sheets. Her replacement is Briana Scurry. Scurry hadn't played in three months. As the Arsenal fans sang to Jol recently at White Hart Lane "... sacked in the morning, you're getting sacked in the morning, sacked in the morning you're getting sacked in the morning ..." Yep, a 4-0 tonking and complete, utter humiliation.

Mind you, if the USA men's team ever finished 3rd in the World Cup, it wouldn't be "utter humiliation" but "total jubilation."