The RIAA is on a Roll

I have never made my feelings for the Recording Industry Association of America a secret. I have always been pretty honest with my belief that the record execs do not have the public’s best interests at heart. We have seen their true colors through the recent payola scandals and their squabbles over the 99 cent price point for the iTunes music store.

This morning I received the following email from XM Radio.

Everything we’ve done at XM since our first minute on the air is about giving you more choices. We provide more channels and music programming than any other network. We play all the music you want to hear including the artists you want to hear but can’t find on traditional FM radio. And we offer the best radios with the features you want for your cars, homes, and all places in between.

We’ve developed new radios — the Inno, Helix and NeXus — that take innovation to the next level in a totally legal way. Like TiVo, these devices give you the ability to enjoy the sports, talk and music programming whenever you want. And because they are portable, you can enjoy XM wherever you want.

The music industry wants to stop your ability to choose when and where you can listen. Their lawyers have filed a meritless lawsuit to try and stop you from enjoying these radios.

They don’t get it. These devices are clearly legal. Consumers have enjoyed the right to tape off the air for their personal use for decades, from reel-to-reel and the cassette to the VCR and TiVo.

Our new radios complement download services, they don’t replace them. If you want a copy of a song to transfer to other players or burn onto CDs, we make it easy for you to buy them through XM + Napster.

Satellite radio subscribers like you are law-abiding music consumers; a portion of your subscriber fee pays royalties directly to artists. Instead of going after pirates who don’t pay a cent, the record labels are attacking the radios used for the enjoyment of music by consumers like you. It’s misguided and wrong.

We will vigorously defend these radios and your right to enjoy them in court and before Congress, and we expect to win.

Thank you for your support.

I heard rumblings about this lawsuit over the weekend but didn’t think much about it at the time. Now, the more I think about it the more frustrated I get.

It isn’t that I am against the RIAA. I am not rooting for piracy or for blatant disregard for the artists. No, what I am for is an industry that seeks innovation and creativity instead of complaints and lawsuits. The RIAA has circled the wagons and has been fighting technology instead of working with it for the better part of a decade now. True, the industry was hemorrhaging money due to online piracy. However, instead of looking for innovative ways to meet the demand for online music they went looking for lawyers and congressman to haul the offenders in front of the public in order to scare us into submitting to their old form. While the music industry was in court, tech companies were we busy in the labs creating. They created the iPod and the iTunes store. These products changed the listening habits of music fans all over the world. The RIAA was begging and pleading to be a part of iTunes. That is until they wanted a bigger slice. Today is no different.

It’s the same old song and dance: An innovated product and company that will allow consumers to get the music they want when the want it is being sued by the RIAA.

I am incensed by this industry embracing litigation over innovation. Get your heads out of the sand: Music on demand is here to stay. Like it or not. The RIAA has two choices. They can keep suing and complaining and crying and wasting tax dollars through litigation or they can begin to look ahead to the future through creative marketing and innovated products and begin to be on the forefront of technology. The industry could look like a stallion: Muscular, strong, beautiful, and running at full stride. Instead, they look more like a little kindergartner on the playground screaming at the top of his lungs to the 12th graders:

“Stop! I can’t keep up. Teacher! They won’t stop! I’m telling! Please, stop!”

Pathetic.

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