American Apologies

Formed in 1952, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a group that represents the recording industry distributors in the United States and whose members consist of record labels and distributors. Their stated goals are to protect intellectual property rights worldwide and the First Amendment rights of artists, to perform research about the music industry, and to monitor and review relevant laws, regulations and policies. What they really do and care about is a lot different, and this powerful association deserves much of the criticism it garners for being out of touch with music listeners today. Most notable is their ludicrous (and impossible) war against file sharing, and their petty lawsuits against students who represent the backbone of their audience. Instead of trying to adapt to the shifts in music listening tastes, they actually thought it would be a good idea to attack their listeners for downloading albums. They should be glad that they were even downloading a whole album in the first place, considering most mainstream albums these days tend to have only 2 or 3 good songs anyways. Also worth mentioning is the self-censorship practice of those Parental Advisory labels, which like the MPAA rating system, has unclear and questionable standards. Needless to say, it’s no surprise that the music industry is currently on a downward spiral.