OiNK, ‘Biggest Pre-Release Pirate Music Site,’ Shut Down

OiNK, reportedly one of the world’s largest sources of pre-release pirated music according to Breitbart, was shut down yesterday by British and Dutch police. The site had a reputation for distributing music weeks ahead of the official launch, with 60 such albums being released online this year. OiNK, run by an unnamed 24-year-old in northeast England town Middlesbrough, had approximately 180,000 members. To join one had to prove they had music to offer, and were required to continuously post music to maintain membership, said the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI). The site’s Amsterdam-based servers were seized last week.

http://www.dmwmedia.com/news/2007/10/23/oink-biggest-pre-release-pirate-music-site-shut-down

RIAA Sues Usenet.com, Decries it as Napster, Kazaa

The Recording Industry Association of America is suing usenet.com, decrying it as the next Napster, Kazaa and other peer-to-peer, illicit file-sharing sites. "Defendant provides essentially the same functionality that P2P services such as Napster, Aimster, Grokster and Kazaa did (prior to being enjoined by the federal courts) -- knowingly providing the site and facilities for users to upload and download copyrighted works -- except that defendant goes further than even the P2P services to facilitate and encourage copyright infringement by its users," said the lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. "Defendant customizes its service to make it as convenient and seamless as possible for subscribers to distribute and obtain copyrighted music without authorization and without paying for that music." The suit (huge .pdf), comes two weeks after the RIAA won its first pirating jury trial targeting an individual. A Duluth, Minnesota jury ordered Jammie Thomas to pay the RIAA $222,000 for pirating 24 songs on the Kazaa system in 2005. Article

Booker to Provide Free Downloads?

The Times reported yesterday that talks have been underway to offer all six of the Booker shortlisted books for free online, in their entirety. They note: "Negotiations are under way with the British Council and publishers over digitising the novels and reaching parts - particularly in Africa and Asia - that the actual books would not otherwise reach. Jonathan Taylor, chairman of The Booker Prize Foundation, said that the initiative was well advanced, although details were still being thrashed out."But the only publisher cited, Jonathan Cape deputy publisher Robin Robertson (where winner Anne Enright is published), expresses a preference for posting just a sample. And the newspaper gullibly passes along that, while Bookscan showed sales for THE GATHERING of 3,306 hardcovers and 381 paperbacks before the prize was given, "Enright's publisher said that the actual figure was 35,000, including sales in Europe." Times

Survey: File-Sharing Down, Legal Music Services Gain Among U.S. Teens

A recent survey of 980 U.S. teens conducted by Piper Jaffray found that 64% said they download music illegally, down from 72% a year ago, while 36% said they purchase music from online services, up from 28% last year.Among online retailers, 79% said they used iTunes, down from 91% a year ago; RealNetworks' Rhapsody and Napster each claimed 2% of market share, while 16% said they purchased digital music from a catch-all category of "other" services.The survey also found that 82% of teens who own an MP3 player also own some form on an iPod, up from 79% in 2006. Three percent said they already owned an iPhone, with 9% saying they expected to by one in the next six months. Article

Poll Results: Do you think publishers who offer DRM free content are making a mistake?

17 votes were counted, the results are:

• 15 thought that it was not a mistake
• 2 were undecided

EMusic, a Song-Download Site, to Offer Audiobooks

eMusic, which is second to iTunes in music download sales, will offer more than a thousand books for download, with many of them costing far less than on iTunes. For example, “The Audacity of Hope,” read by author Barack Obama, will cost $9.99 on eMusic compared with $18.95 on iTunes. The retail price for a five-CD version of the same book is $29.95. The biggest selling point for eMusic is also its biggest point of controversy: the site uses the MP3 format, which works on any digital player but lacks the technology, known as digital rights management, that protects copyrighted material from unlimited duplication.

eMusic, which has 10 percent, still sells more than twice as many songs as competitors like Napster, Rhapsody and WalMart.com. It is owned by Dimensional Associates, an arm of JDS Capital Management. Some publishers are just dipping in a toe. Random House Audio, for example, will be selling about 500 titles, roughly 20 percent of its catalog, through eMusic. “Our customers don’t steal music,” said David Pakman, chief of eMusic, of the company’s 300,000 subscribers, who pay from $9.99 (for 30 songs) to $19.99 (for 75 songs). “A lot of them are technically sophisticated, but they’re not prone to piracy.” Article

Warner Music Head Bronfman Hints at DRM-Free Distribution

Warner Music Group chief Edgar Bronfman hinted that his company, which had been adamant that it would not sell music without digital rights management (DRM) technology, might be open to doing so in some instances, Reuters reported. Fellow major labels EMI and Universal have begun limited sales of their catalogs in the unprotected MP3 format, which does not hinder copying of songs or their transfer to portable devices."DRM is here to stay, whether it's here to stay on every business model in the music business is open to question," Bronfman said at a Goldman Sachs investor conference yesterday. Warner Music has already begun experimenting with online retailer Lala.com, with DRM-free songs that are downloaded directly to Apple's iPod. Article

Random House declares DRM will fall

PublishersLunch just highlighted an annoucment from RH Audio Group publisher Madeline McIntosh in which she declare that DRM (digital rights management) is an obstacle to consumer adoption and market growth, and it will fall. "We at Random House believe that DRM will ultimately disappear," McIntosh writes, "and we believe that will be a positive development for our market."McIntosh explains further: "The potential benefits of moving away from DRM are clear: it would allow the market to open up, so that any online retailer would be able to compete to sell content destined for any device, including the iPod. The hope is that the greatly-simplified consumer experience, coupled with greater retail competition, would lead to growth." "Essentially, the very best, most 'secure' DRM is only so good as the ethics of the individual consumer." McIntosh notes that digital audio is the fastest-growing part of the audio business--now comprising about 15 percent of retail sales--but "these sales come almost entirely from iTunes and Audible." That hegemony is now an obstacle to growth, and the only way onto the dominant-iPod without going through Apple is with unlocked files. Amazon's long-stalled plans to break from their sales agreement with Audible and offer their own downloads probably hinges on getting producers to offer DRM-free material.

Universal Music to test DRM free everywhere, but iTunes

Universal Music Group announced on Friday that it plans to experiment with selling a portion of its catalog free of digital rights management (DRM) restrictions from a number of online retailers, including Amazon.com, RealNetworks' Rhapsody, Best Buy and Walmart -- with the notable exception of Apple's iTunes Store. Article