Kid Rock's surprising take on illegal downloading

Kid Rock's sarcastic "just do it" YouTube rant on illegal downloading is funny and makes the point--illegal downloading is stealing. With a smile on his face Rock says, "I'm rich," so sure it's OK to steal my music. Oh, and while you're at it, "Steal everything." Steal an iPod, Steve Jobs is a billionaire, he'll never miss it. Get yourself a Toyota, "They're foreign" and the gas too, "You know how much money the oil companies make?" Rock shrugs it all off, "They're not going to miss $30 or $40 worth of gas." (Full video after the jump.)

Rock exaggerates to make the message is super clear, illegal downloading is stealing. At the end of the video he takes a long drag on his cigar and says "Stay in school and stay off the drugs." I will add that buying an iTune certainly isn't stealing, but it doesn't make a lot of sense.

Don Reisinger's recent blog, "The music industry abuses us and we're to blame" brilliantly illustrates the point. When you legally download music, you don't really own anything. Or as Reisinger put it, "When you 'buy' a song on iTunes, you're not really buying it. Instead, you're acquiring the license to listen to a song that can be taken away from you at any moment, can't be sent anywhere you'd like for it to be, and is subject to draconian copyright laws that see you paying too much for too little."

Come on people, wake up and buy CDs, LPs, or DRM-free downloads.

[hybridmachine]

When buying CDs/LPs/Tapes/etc you never bought the music, just the medium and a license to play the music privately. iTunes is no different except there is no physical media and it is theoretically easier to revoke your license to play the music. To get around that just burn your iTunes tracks to an audio CD and you're set. Once you do that you'll have media that you own with music you have licensed, just like in the past.

[make_or_break]

The argument is OLD. One significant difference is that with an actual hardcopy CD (or better yet, the vinyl version) it actually has RESALE value. Used music shop abound everywhere; the RIAA hasn't bothered shutting any of them down in the name of prior purchase licencing. Try doing that with your digital download, or with that CD-R media that "you own". The record label CD is virtually untraceable back to the original purchaser. And the sound quality is incomparable to that relative piece of garbage CD-R you just created from that compressed iTMS download (or similar service). Your CD-R, should you try to sell, is simply counterfeiting.

[ryanmicj]

Or just do what the article says, buy DRM-free music. People shouldn't need to take needless steps, such as burning tracks to a CD, then re-ripping them in order to be able to listen to their music when and how they see fit.

Amazon sells all of their music DRM-free. As do other sites. Buy from them, not Apple.

[texasags]

Remeber, it's not Apple putting the restrictions on music in iTunes - it's the record companies. Steve Jobs called for DRM-free music in 2007.

http://www.apple.com/hotnews/thoughtsonmusic/

I hope that the record companies will eliminate the DRM on iTunes music soon...

[LunaticSX]

"paying too much for too little"

Uh, what service pioneered reasonable priced, flat rate, non-subscription downloads that you didn't need to pay extra to burn to a CD, and allowed you to burn it as many times as you liked, and copy it to as many devices as you liked? (Sure, they're all devices from the same company, but with non-DRM-free music EVERYONE has ties to specific hardware.)

Which was the FIRST service to pioneer DRM-free downloads?

C'mon, before trying to beat up on that fruit company, realize that without them, we'd be stuck with the joys of *NO* DRM-free downloads, and a myriad of only semi-compatible, highly onerous DRM-laden music files.

[cyberDJ-2038765336053745013836]

Stay away from the Apple Kool-Aid, Lunatic.

Apple made a fortune with their DRM-laden "reasonable priced, flat rate, non-subscription" service. Then convinced Mac-tards like you that going DRM-free was a revelation.

The only thing Apple succeeded in doing was convincing the world that they didn't have a draconian monopoly like Microsoft. And people like you fell for it.

[LunaticSX]

Apple succeeded because they were the first to actually get it right with music downloads. They haven't "made a fortune" off them, either: They make their real money from hardware. They make a tiny amount profit off downloads in comparison.

And does anyone think the music labels would have willingly gone DRM-free at all if it were up to Microsoft and their partner hardware companies?

[squished]

When your employer direct deposits your paycheck to your bank, there's nothing tangible exchanged. No cash, paper check, or gold. Yet we *trust* the money deposited in the form of binary code will be there to spend when we need it. And that's exactly the issue with DRM. It's worth only as much as our *trust* that it will be playable years down the road as we expected at time of purchase. We don't trust iTunes because it's controlled by one company and who knows if they'll still be in business to support us in 2020. Most likely they will but I'm not willing to gamble $1000 of downloads on it. For now I prefer leased access to millions of songs for just $12/mo. For a relatively small price, I don't expect it to be playable next month unless I pay just another $12. No lock in, they don't own me. I get to play just about everything out there.

[rfelgueiras]

"When you 'buy' a song on iTunes, you're not really buying it. Instead, you're acquiring the license to listen to a song that can be taken away from you at any moment, can't be sent anywhere you'd like for it to be, and is subject to draconian copyright laws that see you paying too much for too little."

not true. you can burn the track(s) to a disk, which is not only allowed under apple's drm but recommend that you use this method to back up your purchase. Under fair play rules you can burn the same playlist (re: album) seven times. How many legal copies on one album do you need?

kid rock is an idiot. I know he's trying to go "over the top" with this "ironic" rant but the fact of the matter is he's just being the record company's b!tch. Both artists AND customers are getting screwed by the companies. He should be standing up against the execs and fighting for more of the money they are owed instead of treating his fans like stupid children. Luckily he hasn't been cool in a long time so this will die soon.

[thedreaming]

45s, LPs, 8-Tracks, Casettes and CDs sold music in the billions and all without DRM. I guess that's a fact that the record industry has forgotten. No one likes DRM and the fact that itunes, napster, zune marketplace and others are offering drm-free downloads shows this. They should just take the plunge, remove drm completely and see what happens.

[make_or_break]

DRM-free does not mean identification free.

[FellowConspirator]

It's not stealing. Kid Rock's a fool, not a lawyer, so he can be excused. It's what the legal profession calls copyright infringement. It's a tort, not a crime, and it would be a contractual violation, not a criminal theft of property.

Aside form that, it's not even copyright infringement unless whatever the recipient of the work is doing something that extends beyond fair use of the work. The copyright holder's rights don't extend to saying how, when, or where you access/use/interact with a work -- only to making tangible copies or public performances, and even then there are limits. You can make copies for personal purposes, editorial/critical purposes, educational purposes, etc.

Nobody has noted that DRM can sometimes violate copyright by abridging an individual's fair right to a work, and by imposing rules/requirements to which the copyright holder has no claim. If it can be shown that DRM would prevent access to a work after the expiry of the copyright, the DRM explicitly violates the requirement that the work enters the public domain at that time. It interferes with the public's future right to copy and distribute the work, a right which is a precondition of being granted copyright on your work.

[dagwud]

The only way DRM would prevent access to a work after the expiration of copyright is if DRMed versions of the work are the only versions that exist. While I abhor the restrictions of DRM and refuse to buy music with such an inconvenience, the copyright holder does, in fact, have the right to choose DRMed files for distribution of the work, just like they once could choose to allow distribution only on LPs and not on 45s (for which, before the proliferation of the compact cassette, the exorbitant cost of reproduction was a form of rights management).

[kai6novice]

Today's storage (8G, 16G, 32G) mp3 players can store so many songs that we will never listen. Why can't music company start selling wav (CD quality) music online. So we can finally enjoy quality music. I always wanted to purchase music, but not in mp3 format. Of course, I can buy a CD and convert it to WAV and send to my mp3 player. But that take up too much time. I would rather buy WAV directly. Or be able to purchase individual song and some company would package it into a single CD, like a MIX CD. However, it's very difficult to find À la carte music store.

[minimalist]

I thought the Reisinger article was anything but brilliant. He said ?we are to blame? but the subtext was really ?YOU are to blame because you do not do as I THINK you should do?. Nobody likes a scold who thinks they know what?s best for you

It?s fashionable (if not downright mandatory) in geek circles to decry the evils of DRM but what happens when Amazon, Zune, Napster, eMusic and others sell DRM free music and ?the people? STILL choose iTunes as they are doing? As technology enthusiests, we have always told ourselves that cheaper DRM free music is the holy grail of "the people". But what if "the people" just don?t care? Personally, I like higher quality DRM free music in a flexible format but I have to accept that my concerns may not be the concerns of the average consumer that is driving iTunes to the number one position.

I?m still paying for my music but I don?t buy CD?s anymore and I don?t pay over 9 bucks for an album (often I can find it 2 or 3 dollars at eMusic). But whether Kid Rock likes it or not, music has indeed been devalued through both market forces and piracy (which some might argue is another form of market force as well).

[minimalist]

I thought the Reisinger article was anything but brilliant. He said ?we are to blame? but the subtext was really ?YOU are to blame because you do not do as I THINK you should do?. Nobody likes a scold who thinks they know what?s best for you

It?s fashionable (if not downright mandatory) in geek circles to decry the evils of DRM but what happens when Amazon, Zune, Napster, eMusic and others sell DRM free music and ?the people? STILL choose iTunes as they are doing? As technology enthusiests, we have always told ourselves that cheaper DRM free music is the holy grail of "the people". But what if "the people" just don?t care? Personally, I like higher quality DRM free music in a flexible format but I have to accept that my concerns may not be the concerns of the average consumer that is driving iTunes to the number one position.

I?m still paying for my music but I don?t buy CD?s anymore and I don?t pay over 9 bucks for an album (often I can find it 2 or 3 dollars at eMusic). But whether Kid Rock likes it or not, music has indeed been devalued through both market forces and piracy (which some might argue is another form of market force as well).

[Don Key]

If I bought an LP or Cassette tape of music... didn't I already pay the artist/label for their work years ago? Shouldn't I be able to download that exact same song that I already paid for before?

[Anonymous Hero]

It's not stealing because "intellectual property" is not property. It's a legal incentive given to the public by Congress more than 200 years ago to encourage progress in science and the arts. The "property" moniker was attached by content holders a century and a half later. The same people who lobbied Congress to continue to extend the copyright term just to save the damn Mouse from going into the public domain (where he long belongs).

You should "steal" all the **** you want, because Congress never intended encyclopedias and radio songs from the 1930s to remain copyrighted way into the 21st century. Until they change the law, downloading "illegally" it is.

[Zero187]

Notice his sarcasm throughout the whole video and then at the end he goes "Stay in school and stay off the drugs." Being the person that he is, I wonder if that was a little sarcastic as well? I mean, he did take a big rip of that cigar at the end of the video (yes, tobacco is a drug, as well as alcohol). I guess my point is, he's not very smart to begin with, so don't listen to his theories on music downloading.

[tourband]

Good for Bob - he's right. Who cares what most of the pretend IP attorneys. label poseurs and sexual intellectuals write (f**king know it all's).

[Composer_1777]

Burning CDs and re-ripping them is so 90's... Who uses Cds anymore? Buy from amazon and DRM free I tunes and napster. There is no need for DRM i tunes anymore that sht is outdated . Apple fans and I pod users who buy DRM track, well ur just plain ole stupid.

[Composer_1777]

Burning CDs and re-ripping them is so 90's... Who uses Cds anymore? Buy from amazon and DRM free I tunes and napster. There is no need for DRM i tunes anymore that sht is outdated . Apple fans and I pod users who buy DRM track, well ur just plain ole stupid.

[tekwiz4u]

The music industry just need to understand technology, but they refuse to do it. In the 1990's they didn't make a big stink about while raking in money. Now that the internet has evolved, they still are thinking like the 1990's. They refuse to sell DRM-free music, and punish those who wants to enjoy *their* product by sharing it with others. I pay for a CD.. you got your money.. its mine! Same with music. Deal with it.

[Eric_The_MadMan]

+1 on many of your comments posted above! The bottom line is that the music industry has been screwing us and the artists for way too long. They are way behind the technology curve and we don't really need them anymore. With the internet and the way things are headed they are scared! Artists can now release their own music through the internet and charge us 1/2 of what the record companies would charge and the artist would make twice what the record companies would pay them. So, bah-by....screw em all.....Power To The People!! Kid Rock Rock's!!!!

[danielszabo1981]

i prefer to download the music videos off youtube with keepvid.com, and then strip the music out of them.

free, drm-less music.