The RIAA execesses are bad, but my point is that government is worse: imagine what the government could do to the music industry if it converted it into a state-run monopoly. What is worse about governments is that they are not even optimized for profitability (of the economy as a whole, viz 50%+ marginal tax rates with most of the proceeds burnt off with no retained value for anyone). Also virtual monopolies on the business side are not monopolies in the same way that government is: you can buy independent music, you can not buy music distributed by the most abusive distributors etc. Adam On Mon, May 05, 2003 at 10:42:07PM -0700, Bill Frantz wrote:
At 3:17 PM -0700 5/4/03, Adam Back wrote:
As to virtual monopolies being worse than government: I disagree businesses aim to maximise profit margin and this places a limit on the depths of unethical and bad for the individual behavior they can do. They won't do it becaues it's not profitable: unhappy customers are not good business.
Remind me how this relates to the relations between the RIAA, the people who write/perform music, and the people who listen.