Fascinating story about an RIAA crackdown on a popular alternative music store selling DJ mixtape CDs (Busting Berry's Music). The music shop was raided, stock taken, and the store's named dragged through the mud. No warning, no cease and desist, the RIAA simply went full bore after the store for selling something (DJ Mixtape CDs) the recording industry praises in other forums. This was not about selling bootlegs or counterfeits. It was a store promoting music. You'd think the RIAA would be a little more supportive.
Nah.
The owners suspect they were targeted because they broke "streetdate," the day a release is officially to be sold. Stores frequently receive copies on a Saturday when the albums aren't supposed to go on sale until Tuesday. Seems like something the distributors could handle if the labels didn't like it.
Interestingly, the federal copyright charges against the store were dropped. However, the store was still prosecuted for violating a "true name and address" bill that requires the name and address of the CD manufacturer on CDs. Ridiculous. And the RIAA wonders why music sales are doing so lousy. Perhaps taking legal action against music stores and forcing them to close has something to do with it.
Category: IP Abuse
Does the RIAA have the right to raid stores? I thought outsourcing police work was only done in dictatorships?
Breaking "streetdate" is meaningless. Record companies typically send promotional materials to media and retail outlets 2 weeks ahead of time, sometimes even earlier.
Mixtapes themselves serve as promotional items for both the featured music and the DJ that provided the "hottest" new tracks first.
Tracked on July 24, 2004 05:52 PM