Anecdotal Evidence: The MPAA Gets It and the RIAA Does Not
Everybody know I am an apologist for John Dvorak (hey, somebody's gotta do it: when you piss as many people off as John does, somebody, somewhere has to be on your side). Anyway, in his current column he discusses DivX and notes that the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) has been working with the DivXNetwork folks, in contrast to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) fiasco with MP3s. Everyone who follows the entertainment industry at all is fully aware of the criticisms leveled at the RIAA as to their poor treatment of recording artists and the grossly inflated prices they charge for audio CDs, as well as their ongoing hounding of their own customer base over "music piracy". As it turns out, I have a great piece of anecdotal evidence that really shows how these two branches of the industry have really gone two ways, and how seriously the RIAA just does not get it...I recently took my daughter to Borders to buy a birthday present for a friend. She wanted to get a copy of "Music Man" (yep, she actually has junior high friends who like old musicals) so we went looking for a CD and found the 1962 movie cast album: $14.99. Then we thought just for the heck of it we'd look for the movie itself--there it was on DVD: $12.99! This was pretty much a no-brainer: just music, or all the music and all the dialog and full color moving pictures to boot, for two dollars less! No wonder the RIAA is under fire from all sides. Hey...it couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of guys...