AARC
Just another acronym on the long list of music industry thugs.
The recording industry has spotted another potential target of tax-by-lawsuit: the auto industry, for in-car media players. In a complaint available at Scribd, the Alliance of Artists and Recording Companies (AARC) names General Motors, Ford, and component suppliers Denso and Clarion as supplying recorders that don't comply …
No, no, no Trevor - they represent artists: music creators; humans with souls and families to feed; people who have poured their life into creating their art and they deserve to be compensated. Otherwise your'e just stealing.
Oh wait, no, you're right.
"Trade Unions represent workers, which are human beings."
Sorry Trevor. I agree with your general sentiment but you didn't live through the mess that was the UK in the 1970s.
The Trade Unions, or rather their leaders, got way too powerful and really did hold the country hostage.
Three day weeks, power cuts, no ambulance service, no rubbish collections or funerals. No buses to get to work with.
It was pretty dire.
"Sorry Trevor. I agree with your general sentiment but you didn't live through the mess that was the UK in the 1970s."
You're right, I didn't. But trade unions still represent people directly. They are the equivalent of a music label, not of an association that represents music labels. The AARC is the equivalent of an organisation that represents a group of trade unions. Not the equivalent of trade unions themselves.
There is a difference. Good or bad, the trade union directly represents it's members. They are directly responsible for what happens. But the AARC doesn't answer to the artists at all. That's what makes it dangerous. They are far enough removed that they have lots of power and no restraints.
As for "how horrible your trade union strife was", I probably will understand. I live in a province that puts huge amounts of time and effort into union busting, so all I see is that there are damned good reasons for unions to exist, and that people in power always try to grind down individuals who seek to use collective bargaining to not end up becoming a slave class.
I'm a socialist. I believe in the right to collective bargaining. I believe in quality of opportunity and that we should strive towards equality of outcome...but that there need to be wiggle room in the outcome, because some humans are naturally far more greedy than others. If they don't have the ability to lord it over others, bad things happen.
In my view of the world we all contribute as we are able to society and we all benefit together. I have no time for those who don't want to contribute and I have even less time for those who want all the benefit and damned be those who will themselves giving their contribution.
So maybe the UK went through a bad time. That isn't going to either convince me unions are evil or that an organization that represents companies which then represent people is somehow the same as an organization that represents people directly (and whose leadership is elected by those it represents, which is still very unlike record labels!)
And I believe that difference is important.
You seem confused about how unions work. The leaders do not dictate policy, that comes through the membership and the reps, sadly the fallacy that unions are run by and policy directed by the leadership is likely to lead to new laws in the UK that will effectively remove the ultimate action from the working man allowing companies to once again ride roughshod over the ordinary working man.
Its the same sort of ignorance we see with the "nothing to hide nothing to fear" mob, Governement and big business do not always know best and frequently will screw the little man to further their own ends regardless of how that im;pacts those further down. The same is true of the music dinosaurs. I work today - I must work again tomorrow to live, not keep claiming payment for stuff I did 20 years ago - or things my late relatives did.The only thing the music mafiaa are protecting is themselves, thier bloated organisations and their over indulged lifestyles.
Now be fair, how else is the industry going to afford its drugs bill otherwise. The basis of the claim is otherwise so stupid as to be laughed at in normal life.
Mind you I have a CD slot in my car but have never used it as much as once in 8 years and have no idea if it even works, the radio gives me traffic and roads status reports, a CD does not. Neither would a hard drive even if it would store 'The Wounded Bulls Greatest Squawks.
No doubt the 'recording industry' would like to sue me for not buying something to use in the player.
"the radio gives me traffic and roads status reports, a CD does no"
Ah, you gots the wrong CD player there. Over 10 years ago my (then) state of the art VW Golf would be continually pausing my CD to switch me to a station warning me of a traffic jam 100 miles away, or broken traffic lights in a town I'd never heard of, before seamlessly returning me to the wrong track of the CD I was trying to listen to.
Oh, and if you had the temerity to override the RDS pings, it would bloody record all the bulletins and play them back to you as soon as you parked the car and took the key out.
Happy days
Completely Agree, and I thought that in the good ol US of A it was legal to make a backup of a CD?
In the UK I can't see this ever winning in court, even if you consider the player is designed to rip CD's. there are NO losses to the studios (people did not buy two copies of a CD before they could rip so they won't now), no losses = no crime & no losses for a civil offence.
I like our copyright laws mostly, they protect copyright without being overly zealous. (even if we do need a few exceptions added, such as copies for personal use by the purchaser & their family)
"And Apple with their Itunes and Ipod with integral hard drive that has a facility to store a complete CD in a lossless format from my home collections of CD's are not included in the law suit because?"
because when last I looked (which was, admittedly, some time ago) Apple accounted for 40% of the music industry's profits and it would be very, very, VERY simple for Timmy-boy to turn the money spigot off.
And the fact that Apple has mad-dog killer lawyers doesn't hurt.
>And Apple with their Itunes and Ipod with integral hard drive that has a facility to store a complete CD in a lossless format from my home collections of CD's are not included in the law suit because?
Simples! Those record companies are just waiting to be sued. Have you not seen the round corners on the typical CD? Has a CD never stopped working because you were holding it wrong? Apple have them over a barrel!
I'm wondering how the Audio Home Recording Act applies to cars with internal data storage.
I mean, a PC (not marketed primarily as a ripping device) doesn't fall under the Act, so a car (similarly not marketed primarily as a ripping device) shouldn't either.
Also, if your car is regularly in your home, you're an astonishingly bad driver.
Where is the evidence that such devices lead to pirating ?
Obviously they are designed to copy CDs already owned by the driver.
So that the music contained can be listened to in the car with more convenience (and at less risk of distraction) than 1) locating the correct CD. 2) extracting CD from case single-handedly.3) posting CD in slot.
Obviously not, they are designed to rip any CD that is placed in the unit.
That means that you pick up your friend who brought one of his CDs with him, he places it in the unit and bang! copyright piracy takes place.
Or worse, the nefarious criminal organization buys a car with this functionality, rips out the unit and uses that in a vast underground piracy ring thing like the criminals they are. The American Way (tm) is insulted that that can be even possible, therefor many lawyers must buy new cars with these units in order to verify the claims and devise the lawsuits that can bring back American Freedom, and more cocaine.
and the only output is via the in-car audio system.
Seem to be pretty much covered in the copy protection stakes.
And lets face it, 'everyone' borrows (or at least used to) CD's from their friends.
Further death-throes of the conventional music industry model
And another cashfest for the lawyers.