Muxtape Takes Fire from the RIAA
It looks like the big guys aren’t the only ones feeling the wrath of the RIAA these days, and it’s only bound to get worse. Muxtape, a service that allows users to upload music from their personal libraries to create an online mixtape, currently services less than 90,000 unique visitors per month according to Compete. That won’t keep it under the RIAA’s radar it would appear, as the service went down yesterday with the note “Muxtape will be unavailable for a brief period while we sort out a problem with the RIAA” on its homepage. A post on the Muxtape blog provides the following message:
No artists or labels have complained. The site is not closed indefinitely. Stay tuned.
It’s funny; rather than embrace this newer wave of online music providers, it appears that labels and the RIAA are intent on destroying these emerging technologies and completely eliminating new revenue streams that have the potential to become massive. By putting a fair royalty scheme in place, the RIAA stands to pull in hundreds of millions of dollars in the short-term and this figure would only increase as internet radio stations and other online music sites continue to gain momentum. Instead, the RIAA is trying to run these sites into the ground in order to maintain the current power structure – even if that means losing out on all of this new money. Users of sites like Muxtape aren’t going to replace their “free” listening habits with purchases, they’re going to find other off-shore sites with similar functionality. Apparently for the RIAA, “nothing” is better than “something” when that “something” helps illustrate just how useless the current record label model is these days.




The RIAA is the antithesis to music and everything dealing with music.
all the **AA dos is perpetuate failing business models I also think the patent system needs to go as well. the whole point of it was to establis a TEMPorary monoply. NOT a perment one toecourage competition and inovation instead we have this hug cartel of monoplistic companies in various indudtries software hardware ect.services. a diversified economy is a healthy one.
they can wipeout every god damn music site on the internet, i still won’t buy anything with RIAA marked on it. CD sales don’t support the artists.
i support artists by going to their shows, i’ll be damned if i ever give the fucking RIAA a penny.
long live radiohead. put these fuckers out of business!!!!!!
AMEN to that thats how it should be.
let good ol suply and demand determine your price noth lazy an greedy recod ececs who nolonger have a purpose.
The RIAA and the MPAA are both four dirty four letter words. Both organizations should be outlawed, their lobbyists should be banned from Washington, DCMA struck down, and copyright law reset to provide fair, not draconian protections.
The media industries complain that their revenues are down and can only point to piracy as a cause. Instead, they should be looking at fact they are releasing c**p that no one wants to pay $22/cd for.
Also…
Sadly, as with the energy issues this country faces, there is no one with the balls, drive, or vision to do anything about it in Washington DC.
Mitch Bainwol is f*cking Karl Rove. Really.
hell if I ran I’d do it but im dirt poor. Scarry thing is my buddies say i should be in politics.
Gal your friends must be comedians, although even you could probably do better then W.
I dislike the RIAA. Should they ever come after me, it would probably end very badly. I am not the nicest of people and can lose my temper easily.
Galvatron: You only have the view on Intellectual Property that you do because you’ve never created anything which is unique and is useful. You’re a digital clown on internet forums, in your totality. Pity that.
@ backbeat
I only disagree with your point of Galvatrons usefulness. said Galvatron provides always intriguing, insightful, befuddling commentary. It is unique in the sense that nothing remotely coherent comes of it, and is therefore entertaining to me. Galvatron, the sideshow on the BGR show. Useful indeed.
@dand: I’ll take those boring inside scoops and helpful details provided by BGR&Co, rather than having to be constantly ‘entertained’ like a 2-yr old.
But to correct your fundamentally flawed response, Galvatron has never created anything which is unique and useful with respect to IP, which defines the kneejerk responses by those ripping off others. Grow up, kiddies.
@ backbeat
Wow so sensitive. You may feel this response is flawed as well, but Mitch Bainwol & Karl Rove are looking for some hot 3 way action…
@dand: Sensitive? No. Accurate eye for valueless bullshit? Absolutely. Thanks for the confirmation.
These old moguls who have and are doing in every contact they come in touch with have to go!
The RIAA, CRB and Sound Exchange are nothing more than leeches on the backs of artists, both major and Indie as well as on all the music patrons of the world!
In a society like America where we like to believe we have the right to our freedoms we shouldn’t have to put up with an unruly service that has been outgrown by it’s society!
These folks are practicing corporate facism, I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that some of the label heads and officers are members of the secret society known as the “Fourth Reich,”
They want the monopoly of everything as their passed unruly illegal business practices have made them lazy fat cats who live in sub-lime luxury as they are well schooled in the art of professional leeching off other people’s talents and pocket books!
This is America we shouldn’t have to live with and put up with organizations that have become obsolete stumbling blocks that destroy rather than construct freedoms and choices like: the music we listen to, what instruments we use to listen to it with and the media we choose whether it be Internet Radio, Internet Video, Terrestrial Radio and TV or whether we listen to Indie artists, or label artists that should be our choice rights and freedoms as American citizens!
Not the decision of RIAA, CRB or Sound Exchange of their affiliates around the world!
We’ve got to shut them down for us to have any peace in these choices, write your congressmen and senators tell them what they have to do to get your vote!
Mark B.
We’re evolving into a digital and global economy. Shouldn’t business of old be redefined to capitalize on this emerging (and prevalent) trend? Standards hardly remain standard. Fuck the RIAA.
Well said Marc.
^ By “fuck[ing] the RIAA”, you also fuck the recording artists, most of which are session musicians. Most session players are _NOT_ megamillionaires.
Luckily there are alternatives to the RIAA-based music companies. Ones that don’t rip off the artist and the consumer. We can so, “Fuck the RIAA” without harming the non-megalomillonaires (pun intended) because they have the option of leaving the RIAA backed corporations for a better record label. Heck, they can distribute their music on iTunes and through websites and never need a record label. The world is smaller and the small guys have the technology to do things that only the record companies could do back in the day. Heck, all they need is a sound dampened room and a Mac and they can distribute professional quality music tracks on iTunes for almost nothing. The RIAA is dead – they just don’t realize it yet.
Mark B.:
Politicians are just as worthless as lawyers. They will not help you.
And for the record, I like Galvatron’s comments. He should be a politician. Hell, he can’t be any worse than what we already have.
@ backbeat: actually I used to code appz do graphic design photoshop an craft animated gifs and designed an silversmith jewlery. So Yes I have created stuff. An if you buy into the **AA’s and labels BS saying ” we are looking ut for the artists” your a bigger idiot than thoght.
the **AA and the lables and studios are looking out for nobody but themselves. I also know a few independents who go touring as well they don’t do the labels and don’t do itunes cause apple ripps off the artists from what they said they make more money touring an doing concerts , gigs at clubs, and parties.
@ Detest No i don’t think they weren’t joking
my recent ly deseces grandfather who died earlier this year is a Former govoner of AZ.
And ran agianst Mcain for the AZ US sentor seat atthe time.
My great uncle on my dads side Used to ba an assistant police cheif in Pheonix an even had a line in the movie Gauntlet. “open fire”
^ “I used to code appz do graphic design photoshop an craft animated gifs and designed an silversmith jewlery. So Yes I have created stuff.”
Just nothing useful and unique that would remotely qualify as IP. Just ask the patent attorney you can’t afford.
If you think the vulture capitalists backing the indie labels are looking out for the session musicians any better than the experienced labels, you’re obviously growing your own. Get out of a conversation you obviously know nothing about.
“My great uncle on my dads side Used to ba an assistant police cheif in Pheonix an even had a line in the movie Gauntlet. “open fire””
Just can’t stand on your own in any unique and useful way, eh idiot? Poor thang.
I still think backbeat is doin Rove & Bainwol..
Retard they have no no venture capitiolists backing them. that’s what an independent band is.
your right maby not of that stuff can be patented But in can be sold an reqires som creativity and skill to make. So it IS an art form and you can copyright digital logos as trademarks.
The only creativity you have demonstrated is how to be a web troll.
any your defending the RIAA?! Seriously WTF are you smoking or drinking? cause I want some.
^ An “independent band” has never been heard from, idiot. Which is why my statement was about “the vulture capitalists backing the indie _labels_”. If it was the artist you gave a rat’s ass about, you’d acknowledge that the RIAA is no better nor no worse than the so-called indie labels.
All you care about, from your assorted posts, is getting shit for free to which you have no right, simply because you can. If it was your protected name and investment interests involved, your ‘opinion’ may change from “who cares?” to preserving your creative rights.