i think the irritating promo bots are defiatly the way to go.. people try downloading the album only to find its always just snippets. You flood the file sharring boards and away you go.
i seem to recall common's legendary turd electric circus was like this... it appeared to be the record but each song was really just the same endless 15 secon loop over and over again.
additionally do people really think the majority of leaks come from studios??
i seems to me the VAST majority of leaks are from the media / journalists.
hell i know alot of press / radio dudes and they all rip EVERYTHING and have it online moths before the regular release is out.
personally i think vinyl is still the way to go .. keep the release vinyl only ad then at least if someone rips the thing its still not a digital copy.
i seems to me the VAST majority of leaks are from the media / journalists.
hell i know alot of press / radio dudes and they all rip EVERYTHING and have it online moths before the regular release is out.
personally i think vinyl is still the way to go .. keep the release vinyl only ad then at least if someone rips the thing its still not a digital copy.
I'll echo Hua: I don't know any *credible* writers who'd leak shit online since that's a really great way to get blacklisted and never get another advance again. I can't speak for radio dudes - apples and oranges.
The truth is, there's just a lot of people in the chain of who has access to an advance. As I noted ALL IT TAKES IS ONE. So while watermarking your CDs might be a deterrent for a writer, that's not going to stop an engineer or an intern or someone at the manufacturing plant or whoever casually slipping out with a copy and posting it up. Or selling it to someone who would.
I just think we're at a stage where stopping leaks is impossible. If you got too many mice trying to steal your cheese, the trick now isn't building a better mousetrap (see Sony's DRM debacle); it's finding other ways of making cheese.
i don't see how there are so many middlemen in the chain between the artist and the retail outlets
Mix engineer(s)
Mix engineer's assistant(s)
Mastering engineer
Potential magazine reviewers
Distribution A&Rs
Friends of artist(s)
All it takes is one person to be careless. And all of these people are exposed to the material months before it hits retail outlets.
It's tough to keep ish on lock when so many people have their hand in the pie. IMHO, album leaks will always be an issue on one level or another. Even your best efforts won't stop them completely, it will only keep them to a minimum.
At best case scenerio, they can put tracking info on CDs which will be retained when copies are made. But even with that, there is a simple solution: get an audio CD-recorder like this
which has rca line inputs and thus records a CD exactly like a tape-deck would a cassette. And since it's in pure audio form, guess what -- that digital watermark used to track each copy back to its source is useless.
If you got too many mice trying to steal your cheese, the trick now isn't building a better mousetrap (see Sony's DRM debacle); it's finding other ways of making cheese.
good point. I definitely notice a lot more elaborative packaging and bonus DVD type shits now than ever before to try to create more incentive in buying the actual CD. I'd definitely like to see stats on how well that is working though.
When I worked at EMI, the promos for OK Computer were sent out in sealed boomboxes with the cassette inside. Expensive, but pretty foolproof...
SOunds more like a gimmick. In any case, all you'd need to do is run a y-adapter (stereo --> RCAs) out the headphone jack into a computer and
unless the execs were dumb enough to install outputs, it would probably require disassembling the unit to either get the cassette or find the audio singal wires. not too difficult either way, but it would be harder than importing your shit into itunes.
i have no idea how early and how readily available the leak was, but it would be interesting to see what the outcome was.
When I worked at EMI, the promos for OK Computer were sent out in sealed boomboxes with the cassette inside. Expensive, but pretty foolproof...
SOunds more like a gimmick. In any case, all you'd need to do is run a y-adapter (stereo --> RCAs) out the headphone jack into a computer and
Ahhh... Here is a thought.
Why don't labels set up a 1-800 # with a personal passcode for each person needed to review something.
Everyday a certain reviewer could phone in. Punch in his code and listen to anything new the label wanted to push. Labels could keep track of who's listenning to what.
I mean, it was good enough for me when I was buying from distribution. Seems like you could keep shit pretty safe.
But then... From my personal experience. It's people low on the chain at labels you really gotta watch out for. They are the ones wheelin' and dealin' in some cases.
Comments
i seem to recall common's legendary turd electric circus was like this... it appeared to be the record but each song was really just the same endless 15 secon loop over and over again.
additionally do people really think the majority of leaks come from studios??
i seems to me the VAST majority of leaks are from the media / journalists.
hell i know alot of press / radio dudes and they all rip EVERYTHING and have it online moths before the regular release is out.
personally i think vinyl is still the way to go .. keep the release vinyl only ad then at least if someone rips the thing its still not a digital copy.
I'll echo Hua: I don't know any *credible* writers who'd leak shit online since that's a really great way to get blacklisted and never get another advance again. I can't speak for radio dudes - apples and oranges.
The truth is, there's just a lot of people in the chain of who has access to an advance. As I noted ALL IT TAKES IS ONE. So while watermarking your CDs might be a deterrent for a writer, that's not going to stop an engineer or an intern or someone at the manufacturing plant or whoever casually slipping out with a copy and posting it up. Or selling it to someone who would.
I just think we're at a stage where stopping leaks is impossible. If you got too many mice trying to steal your cheese, the trick now isn't building a better mousetrap (see Sony's DRM debacle); it's finding other ways of making cheese.
Mix engineer(s)
Mix engineer's assistant(s)
Mastering engineer
Potential magazine reviewers
Distribution A&Rs
Friends of artist(s)
All it takes is one person to be careless. And all of these people are exposed to the material months before it hits retail outlets.
It's tough to keep ish on lock when so many people have their hand in the pie. IMHO, album leaks will always be an issue on one level or another. Even your best efforts won't stop them completely, it will only keep them to a minimum.
At best case scenerio, they can put tracking info on CDs which will be retained when copies are made. But even with that, there is a simple solution: get an audio CD-recorder like this
which has rca line inputs and thus records a CD exactly like a tape-deck would a cassette. And since it's in pure audio form, guess what -- that digital watermark used to track each copy back to its source is useless.
But
You didn't hear that from me.
SOunds more like a gimmick. In any case, all you'd need to do is run a y-adapter (stereo --> RCAs) out the headphone jack into a computer and
good point. I definitely notice a lot more elaborative packaging and bonus DVD type shits now than ever before to try to create more incentive in buying the actual CD. I'd definitely like to see stats on how well that is working though.
unless the execs were dumb enough to install outputs, it would probably require disassembling the unit to either get the cassette or find the audio singal wires. not too difficult either way, but it would be harder than importing your shit into itunes.
i have no idea how early and how readily available the leak was, but it would be interesting to see what the outcome was.
Ahhh... Here is a thought.
Why don't labels set up a 1-800 # with a personal passcode for each person needed to review something.
Everyday a certain reviewer could phone in. Punch in his code and listen to anything new the label wanted to push. Labels could keep track of who's listenning to what.
I mean, it was good enough for me when I was buying from distribution. Seems like you could keep shit pretty safe.
But then... From my personal experience. It's people low on the chain at labels you really gotta watch out for. They are the ones wheelin' and dealin' in some cases.