NETIMPERATIVE COMMENT: When will the record labels wake up to the web?

It seems that the record industry is feeling incredibly hard done by. After several years of declining sales, it is now firing at almost anyone who strays onto the scope. Last week, it called for ISPs to be accountable for their users, many of whom only have broadband so they can file-share, it says.

This week, it succeeded in gaining a guilty verdict for EasyInternet which, rather incredibly, had been charging its users £5 to burn tunes on to CDs. Ever the nimble publicist, Stelios Haji-Ioannou diverted attention and held a demonstration outside the High Court criticising the music industry for over-charging for CDs. And this is where the RIAA has a significant problem.

Thanks largely to the internet, even the common man has gained power. As hoped by many, the ease of communication and access to information on an unprecedented scale has enabled the average internet user to make his or her voice heard and, for the first time, large companies - even those as large as the record labels - have to answer to them on a level playing field.

And one of the topics on which people are prepared to speak up, is music. The launch of CDs - at £9.99 a pop - was announced alongside promised price cuts once the technology - which costs a pittance to produce - had taken off. An average, newly-released CD will now set one back £12.99.

This price is fine, of course, since the law of demand and supply dictates that £12.99 is what the market is prepared to pay. But, then there was no alternative. Now, there is.

While the record labels may bleat, the laws of demand and supply, with which it is to be assumed they were so pleased only a few years ago, have well and truly wrought their revenge.

Any music lover would tell the record labels that, when it comes to blame for their falling sales, they should look, firstly, at the music in which it currently invests; secondly, the prices it charges for its wares; and, thirdly, at its incredibly entrenched attitude towards the internet.

It is impossible to condone the process of file-sharing on the net since it is the artists that suffer through loss of royalties, as well as the companies that give them a voice. However, as long as the record labels continues to fight, rather than work with, the internet industry, it's clear where the buck stops and it is certainly not with the ISPs.







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