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George is back from the DMCA hearings at the UCLA Law School and he brings us news. Hit Read More.
RIAA Lies at DMCA Hearing
To: US Dept of Justice and US Copyright Office
I have just returned from today's (May 14) DMCA rulemaking hearings at the UCLA Law School.
I would like to bring to your attention the false statement made at these hearings by the RIAA attorney (whose name I missed) on the third panel of the day.
A review of the transcript, when it becomes available will reveal that said RIAA representative made the following statement:
"127,000 albums have been released in the past three years."
While this may seem insignificant at first glance, this is another example of the RIAA's willingness to provide false information as testimony to the government. I offer the following data as proof of this.
From the RIAA website (http://www.riaa.org/MD-US-7.cfm) in an article titled "The Cost of a CD," which was released at the beginning of 2002, the RIAA stated that in the previous two years (2000 and 2001) an average of 27,000 new releases were issued.
In order for today's statement and the referenced article to both be true, the industry would have had to release 73,000 new releases in 2002.
However, the 2002 statement has already been proven false by BusinessWeek.com, after I used the RIAA's figures to show that the cutback in releases would have accounted for the current sales decline as a natural cause and effect. Jane Black, a writer at BusinessWeek, contacted the RIAA for verification.
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/feb2003/tc20030213_9095_tc078.htm
"The RIAA disputes Ziemann's analysis, saying it hasn't released an official tally of annual new releases since 1999. Industry-research firm Nielsen SoundScan has run the numbers, however, and the RIAA doesn't dispute its findings. According to SoundScan, new releases in 2001 totaled around 31,734, still a 20.3% drop."
Additonal data from SoundScan provides the new releases for the past three years, as follows:
2000 -- 35,516 releases
2001 -- 31,374
2002 -- 33,443
Total -- 100,333
As you can easily see, the RIAA has overstated reality by approximately 27,000 releases.
Additionally, a complete review of the RIAA's data will reveal that there have never been 127,000 releases in any 3-year period since the inception of the recording industry.
I realize that the panel members did not swear to tell the truth under penalty of perjury. However, this is just one more example of the deception and fraud being employed by the RIAA to further their monopolistic activity.
I was not involved in this particular panel so I did not have an opportunity to rebuff this falsehood.
I also made my accusation of antitrust at this government hearing.
I spoke the truth. The RIAA lied.
Again.
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