boycott-riaa.com - Article: Napster Proposes $1 Billion!

Napster Proposes $1 Billion!

Posted by jark on February 20, 2001 at 6:11 PM (printer friendly)

In an attempt to prevent the court ordered shutdown of the file sharing service that Napster provides, the company has offered to pay record companies $1 billion over the course of five years in exchange for allowing the trading of copywritten music on the service.

"What we're saying is this community ought to be allowed to stay together," said Napster interim CEO Hank Barry. "We all ought to sit down and settle this thing." Those remarks were made during a press conference in San Francisco in which both Napster and Bertelsmann executives were attempting to appeal to the other record by asking them to call of the attack dogs...for the time being at least.

The new proposal comes on the heels of other offers to the other record labels being rejected. Napster had previously attempted to hand the record labels a percentage of their revenue, of which none of the labels agreed to.

What the existing offer amounts to is $150 million dollars a year to the major record label as well as another $50 million shared between the independent labels.

Napster's CEO, Hank Barry, said that they would set up a fund setup to ensure that they are capable of paying the record labels the $200 million annually. They project the amount to come from their soon to be announced tiered subscription service, which supposedly will offer services such as limited downloads for the price of $2.95-$4.95 per month and unlimited for around $5.95-$9.95.

Of course, the RIAA's chief attack dog, Hillary Rosen, had comments regarding the latest offer. She all but dismissed the offer and said that if Napster is really concerned about legitimate talks then they need to stop the trading of copywritten material on the service. "To the management of Napster I say again: You claim you want to be legitimate and negotiate licenses based on real business models," Rosen said. "I urge you to act accordingly. Stop the infringements, stop the delay tactics in court, and redouble your efforts to build a legitimate system."

So here we are, yet again, at another crossroads for Napster, the company, as well as Napster, the service. Two record labels seem to like what Napster offers...will the others give in as well?

User Comments (These do not necessarily reflect the beliefs of this site)


mofomegax	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 6:24 PM christ........is it always that time of the month for that woman?

Anonymous	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 6:32 PM While this is all well and good, I doubt the recording industry will be very receptive to this for one primary reason. Napster has no way of assuring the industry they will actually have that money every year. When you think about it, wouldn't you just move from Napster to another service once it started charging? If too many people do that there won't be enough revenue to pay off the industry, let alone pay for the equipment and services to keep Napster afloat.

Anonymous	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 6:38 PM Give me a break! Their offer is ridiculous. Over fives years? Kiss the offer goodbye.

Anonymous	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 6:40 PM napster and gang are sell outs. Music is free. Napster is legal and the corruptness of america has obeyed the big money pockets of america. America does what the RIAA wants. Giving a piece of music to a person in cali is totally legal. Do you think I would have ever had an Nsync song? Hell no I wouldn't be caought dead with an Nysnc cd but who says I can't listen to them. I hear it for free on the radio so why can't i hear it for free on my computer

idlejam	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 6:43 PM true, but napster is certainly the most user freindly service. Also I don't think 5 -9 $ is too much to pay for unlimited d/ls... oh well we will just have to wait and see how this all works out... If everyone just worked together on this, dontcha think this'd be solved by now? they'd probably be making loads of money by now instead of trying to shut napster down... IMO... ...::: idlejam :::... i try not to think too hard...heh it hurts my creativity & spontaneity, not to mention my head.

Anonymous	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 6:44 PM Well I for one paid for my SONGS in a shop/store, so I own my Songs. The Person/s Swaping with me Paid for their Song/s so also own them. Why should we keep giveing these record companies billions of dollars every year for CDs that are far over priced. I will not pay for anything on the Internet. NOT SECURE ENOUGH FOR MY LIKEING. I hope SONY gos BUST.Long Live NAPSTER>

idlejam	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 6:55 PM i go to the record store regularly, so it don't really matter to me what happens ... i was just trying to put things in perseptive. CD's are way too over priced i agree... i'd rather pay $10 than $16 to $20 for a 8-10 song cd... that's just rediculous. If record companies want to solve a problem, they should focus more on lowering prices. they'd make a better profit that way... ...::: idlejam :::... i try not to think too hard...heh it hurts my creativity & spontaneity, not to mention my head.

Anonymous	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 7:00 PM the dude above me is a fucking idiot... just because you bought a CD doesn't mean you now own the music... that is just what the RIAA wants you to think... YOU CANT OWN MUSIC! all y'all who say $5-9 isn't much... let me just say that your fucking stupid to waste your money on naspter when there are other systems out there that are just as good as napster if your smart enough to find them and learn them... My prediction is that everyone will be using Espra... (www.espra.net) but it ain't ready yet for widespread use... (espra is a windows freenet client that just had its first release! go check it out)

sirmorphix	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 7:10 PM Audio galaxy owns. I love free music. I'm a music collector. I buy lots and lots of CDs. Most artists in my collection wouldn't be there if it wasn't for napster. Napster helped me get a hold of music that wasn't on the radio that I wanted to hear. Bands that impress me, they get my 15 bucks when I go buy there CD. A burned CD will never be good enough for me. From my point of view. A lot of smaller artists stand to lose out on a close to napster. As for the 1 billion. Doesn't matter, napster is going down. Free music will love on though. Cheers, Sir\|Morphix

5tarkad	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 7:41 PM i dont know if anyone has said this yet, but im going to. it seems to me that the RIAA just cant live without haveing complete comtrol of music distrubution. if a $1,000,000,000 isnt enough money i cant think of any reasonable agreement they can come up with without THEM being in control of eerything.

doobybrain	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 8:29 PM LOL! [doobybrain]

doobybrain	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 8:30 PM knowing the recording industry, i'd say most of them wouldnt take the offer because they always seem to want everything (including results) FAST FAST FAST!! and this 5 year period of payments isnt fast enough for them i dont think. anyway, it sounds like napster is pretty desperate to stay alive. [doobybrain]

bloodytears	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 9:11 PM the RIAA has no chance of stopping free music altogether.. i don't see why it's trying to... i hope they overextend themselves and go bankrupt... when you say no to $1 billion, it becomes safe to say you had a very abnormal childhood...

Anonymous	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 9:14 PM Think about it. $200 Million a year probably isn't enough, considering this would allow Napster, Inc. to "legally" use any music for their for-profit Napster II service. This is, of course, assumes people will pay Napster for whatever services they come up with.

Anonymous	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 9:15 PM What are you talking about? The RIAA can't go bankrupt since it's isn't a company.

Anonymous	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 9:15 PM Err, it isn't a company.

Anonymous	Date: February 20, 2001 @ 9:17 PM Err, "This, of course, assumes people" Gotta start reading what I type... ;)

docholoday	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 12:42 AM doc throws 2 cents into the pile I'll be the first to admit I'm an MP3 slut, I have over 30 CDs (approx 250 songs apiece) and about another 10G on my harddrive. But...and this is a big but. I also have a large collection of audio CDs. Over 450 actually. I just bought 2 yesterday. The fact that I have lots of MP3s doesn't even begin to affect the number of CDs I buy. The greedy music companies already get our money from the music, the t-shirts, the posters, the concerts and other endless supplies of worthless merchandise crap. They may have my stereo, but they can stay the hell away from my computer. They can be all high and mighty about copyright infringments if they want, but it'll do about as much good as the stink they put up when the electronic companies invented the audio tape. They didn't stop music trading then and they're not going to even put a dent in it this time. Viva la Napster, screw the RIAA and long live the internet. .....plus, if that doesn't work...picks up baseball bat, I'll go have a nice chat with them... :) ~take it easy, but take it.

Anonymous	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 1:30 AM Piss on you Shawn Fanning. I even bought a damn shirt.

Anonymous	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 2:47 AM Hey straight up they shutdown Scour and you can't tell me that software did not kickass I downloaded so much music and free movies from that place that I had to go out and unload all of my guns when I found out that they lost to the courts. Of course an hour later I was downloading Titan A.E. off the web at a nice little site I found :) Hell If these dumbbass idiots think that shutting down Napster is going to stop free music they are in for a hell of a rude awaking. It would be better for them to take the money cause then they would have something this way ain't nobody gonna be happy except us net junkies that know the best places to find the music games and videos that we want for learning purposes only though we wouldn't wanna keep anything over 24 hours

Anonymous	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 2:49 AM From who? Napster doesn't sell shirts.

Anonymous	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 2:53 AM A burned CD isn't good enough for you? Shit, I have over 500 burned CDs and only 30 normal CDs. Stop supporting all these fuckers in the record industry! Buy CD-R not CD!

Anonymous	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 3:10 AM Yep, I have over 100 gigabytes of stuff I'm using for learning purposes!! Music is is like warez!

littlebuddy	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 5:20 AM Why give the money to the record companies when they can give it to me!! =) Little Buddy, always in need of money

doobybrain	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 6:50 AM scour ran out of money. [doobybrain]

Anonymous	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 6:59 AM i use napster a lot for music that is 40 years old. the music companies have had their money from vinyl, tape and CDs and still they want more. copyright should cease after 25 years!

skrath	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 7:40 AM money money... da da dada da! wooo! money money!! wooo yeah da da da dadada!! err.... righto, bastard companies want money, this'll probably work fairly well

p0ppe	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 8:51 AM I'm happy to see that Napster is offering something for the indenpendent labels. BUT, riaa wont accept loosing control.

babyraven	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 8:55 AM There's no way the record companies will accept this. They're just too greedy. Nice gesture on Napster's part, however. -babs ----------- She said I know what it's like to be dead...

audiolocator	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 9:29 AM I don't mind the record companies, it's the RiAA I can't stand...

nontoxic	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 10:35 AM the RIAA are seriously stupid.. they have things all mixed up.. It's kind of like the baseball strike.. or the basketball lockout... it's better to keep the players playing and finish a deal rather than shut the play down and make a deal.. in the latter case the fans get PISSED OFF.. and honestly.. the consumers are the boss of the major labels.. (as well as any form of commerce).. atleast so the labels seem to forget

Anonymous	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 10:42 AM fuck 'em all

whatsinaname	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 10:54 AM Napster, it seems, my friends, will soon be dead. And those millions of people who don't really know how to use a computer, let alone find this site, will be SOL in finding one of the sites we use other than Napster. It will severely limit the so-called 'illegal' trade of mp3's for a while. But it certainly will not stop them, this we know. And as I've said before, what's to stop a ___________ (country of your choice, other than US) Napster from starting?

Anonymous	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 11:43 AM What is going to stop another Napster? How about money? Remember, Napster is a for-profit company with IPO goals. This is not going to happen when hiding from the authorities. ;) I'd expect so-called 'illegal' trade of MP3 files to fall back into the underground again without a venture capital funded corporation trying to milk it. :) Think Gnutella, though it will never scale.

Frawgster	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 11:45 AM So if this does go through, Napster will just become another whore for the recording industry to pimp right? These are sad times folks... -Frawg-

simcom	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 1:22 PM LMAO!! -simcom

milladrive	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 1:25 PM Finally, someone down here is beginning ta see things clearly. Frawggy, such is the reason for my own mixed emotions. We're caught between wantin' Napster ta stay open and wantin' them ta fight this "cause" ta the Supreme Court, so some o'the game rules can be modified. Which do we want more? Immediately, I think this may buy time. I think if they can get the labels ta be unanimous, Hilary may just deal w/it. In the meantime, while the world enjoys the continued use of their favorite muisic-sharing community, they can work on that fight, and perhaps take on the real challenge of an acceptable business model for artists. :)

valse	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 1:34 PM is there another software out there that has the exact same function as napster? well, I dun really bother to think that deep, hope napster will not close, cos to me as a end user, I just noe its providing a service and getting nothing from me. yet its paying 1 billion to keep this free service for us. shruggs how many napsters can they shut down? M. (Valse)

Anonymous	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 2:00 PM My primary use of Napster isn't even illegal (I like to find live versions, b-sides and other non-commercially availablle tracks). But even so, I was going to be willing to pay for the use of Napster, because it's easy to use and relatively reliable. But when they (Napster themselves) start talking about digitally encoding files so that I can't burn them to CD or listen to them on an MP3 player without paying extra, I'm gone. I'll never pay for Napster until I am allowed reasonable use of the "copyrighted" material for which I'm paying.

jcalamos	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 2:28 PM Like "Anonymous", I'm into the oldies as well. The music of my youth if you will. However, unlike Anonymous I don't believe copyrights should cease after 25 years, or ever for that matter. Artists should receive their royalties. It's their living. If there was anyway I could get, let's say, $1 to the Eagles or to Chicago or the Doobie Brothers for each song of theirs that I download, I would be more than happy to do so. It's great hearing the oldies again and customizing your own CD's. But the record companies prefer that you buy the Eagles or Chicago or the Doobie Brothers "greatest hits CD for $15 to $20 a pop. If the Artist "slaves" and their record Company "masters" could be guaranteed that they would receve $1 (or preferably fifty cents) for each individual song that I download they just might hop on board with this new technology. But until then, millions of honest people who are willing to pay for this wonderful capability of downloading any song ever recorded for the purpose of personal enjoyment, and not for commercial profit, will have to live with the fact that in the eyes of the law they are criminals.

jcalamos	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 2:35 PM Like one of the "Anonymous" writers, I'm into the oldies as well. The music of my youth if you will. However, unlike this particular Anonymous I don't believe copyrights should cease after 25 years, or ever for that matter. Artists should receive their royalties. It's their living. If there was anyway I could get, let's say, $1 to the Eagles or to Chicago or the Doobie Brothers for each song of theirs that I download, I would be more than happy to do so. It's great hearing the oldies again and customizing your own CD's. But the record companies prefer that you buy the Eagles or Chicago or the Doobie Brothers "greatest hits" CD for $15 to $20 a pop If the Artist "slaves" and their record Company "masters" could somehow be guaranteed that they would receve $1 (or preferably fifty cents) for each individual song that I download they just might hop on board with this new technology. But until then, millions of honest people who are willing to pay for this wonderful capability of downloading any song ever recorded for the purpose of personal enjoyment, and not for commercial profit, will have to live with the fact that in the eyes of the law they are criminals.

Anonymous	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 5:00 PM true dat...dmusic is impossible to navigate...the design sucks -scott

Exxtreme	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 5:17 PM maybe he bought some non-official shirt... ROFL You sounded like a 9 yeared old boy who was mad at your parents!!

Anonymous	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 6:52 PM yeah, whatever...anyways, screw napster..migrate underground to IRC or post to USENET binary groups!

Clair	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 8:01 PM hey now ;-) hehe jk

Clair	Date: February 21, 2001 @ 8:11 PM whoa there stallion

Anonymous	Date: February 23, 2001 @ 10:15 PM especially your spellin!

blinkfan17	Date: February 25, 2001 @ 7:13 PM I have something to say on Napsters behalf. I have been hearing a lot of rumors going around saying they were being shut down sometime this week. I don't know if this is true, I'll wait and see. Anyways, all the record labels are worried about is MONEY! most bands out there aren't worried about napster, most think it's great it came along. I think we should focus on what Napster does good, instead of bad.

Anonymous	Date: February 28, 2001 @ 11:39 AM I think that the judges are being payed off to rule in favor to shutdown napster. I think Shawn Fanning should go and work with some of the other downloading progams and help to make them better and easier for people to use.

yellowbeard	Date: March 1, 2001 @ 7:55 PM looks like they will only be happy with a napster that doesnt distribute copyrighted materials no matter how much money they give them. i think they want it to be up to themselves to distribute music. too bad no one will ever want to use the record labels' own services now. they are killing the most promising money maker the music industry has ever seen. napster is free advertising, the best form of "word of mouth," and has a huge userbase. they are shooting themselves in the foot. lobbying groups like the riaa have become way too popular these days.

yellowbeard	Date: March 1, 2001 @ 7:55 PM not popular---i mean powerful

yellowbeard	Date: March 1, 2001 @ 7:58 PM i never took the time to become a member at a site i despise. you must like red bull. don't be such a loser.