You’ve got to read this story from the "Wall Street Journal".  About Brightcove.

The problem the major labels are facing isn’t one of piracy, but one of LICENSING!  That’s what you do in the modern era.  Instead of shining the light at yourself, instead of trying to get your own house in order, you go on the ATTACK!  Which is a true head-scratcher in the music business.  Because this attack is on the CUSTOMERS!  I mean go on attack in Washington, D.C.  Hit your suppliers.  Hit people on the inside.  But to go after those who ultimately keep you in business makes NO SENSE!  Talk to anybody running a record company.  They’ll tell you it’s all about retail, where the transaction takes place.  They’ll tell their junior employees to work in a record store.  So why can’t these people get their heads around the concept that they’ve got to pay attention to the transaction in CYBERSPACE, on the INTERNET!

There’s demand.  Make no mistake there.  Thousands of products are introduced into the marketplace every year and get no traction.  But people want music.  Not EVERY production, but a healthy number.  Why can’t P2P be seen as DEMAND?  Why can’t 60 gig iPods be seen as devices to FILL?  Why do those in control want a walled garden, keeping the product from those who want it?  Wouldn’t it behoove them to open the doors and let people GET IT?

Brightcove is a middle man.  You go to their site and sign up to distribute copyrighted video content on YOUR site.  It’s a one page contract.  Suppliers include such low-level, irrelevant names as REUTERS!

How come Reuters can see that it benefits them to get their wares in front of as many eyeballs as possible and the music companies wear blinders?  Shit, music should be available EVERYWHERE!  At a CHEAP PRICE!  So people CONSUME IT!

How come the TV companies are licensing all their product ALL OVER the Web and the labels still aren’t?  Shouldn’t Disney be worried about pissing off its AFFILIATES?  That’s what we heard for years, that the labels couldn’t take steps in cyberspace for fear of pissing off their retail partners.  Well, seemingly all of those large partners have gone bankrupt.  And there hasn’t been any attention paid to the indie store in EONS!  And the main wholesale customer, big box retailers like Best Buy and Wal-Mart, DON’T GIVE A SHIT ABOUT MUSIC!  Who are the labels protecting?  Do you think Best Buy’s gonna shut its doors when the CD expires?

We’ve got to go back six years to Napster.  Thomas Middelhoff wanted to license the music industry’s wares to Napster.  End result?  His company Bertelsmann and the investors in Napster were sued by the likes of Universal and are STILL IN LITIGATION!  To what purpose?  So that Universal can put a few bucks in its coffers?  Aren’t these dollars DWARFED by what they would have received if they’d made a deal for their music on Napster HALF A DECADE AGO??

And don’t tell me it’s about teaching people a lesson.  Then why is Shawn Fanning the labels’ best friend?

No, the problem is music publishers who won’t go to a percentage rate.  And major labels which won’t give a high enough percentage to them anyway.  Allowing the cost of music to COME DOWN so more people can acquire MORE MUSIC!  This fight within gets no coverage, but IT’S WHAT’S IMPORTANT!

And then there’s the iTunes fiasco.  Wherein the labels want variable pricing.  Which if you don’t think means HIGHER PRICES you just fell off the turnip truck.  The key to success, to greater revenue, is LOWER PRICES!

How much music should a person own?

In the future, they’ll possess MUCH MORE THAN THEY DID IN THE CD ERA!  Actually, this is ALREADY TRUE!  Why not CHARGE FOR IT!

How about a one page contract in the music business.  You want to sell our wares, here’s the deal.

Hell, let the online retailers sell the product for whatever they want.  As long as they GUARANTEE a gross payment.  Fuck the iTunes model.  You want to sell music, do it YOUR WAY, just make sure I get a billion dollars from you every year (plus royalties/additional payments if you’re TRULY successful).

Then Apple could sell the iPod with the music ON IT!  Or with a coupon to download a THOUSAND TRACKS!  Think of the stampede to the Apple Store (or apple.com!)  People would LOVE this deal.  And make the prices so low, that DRM is unnecessary.  Just like HBO is cheap enough per month that you won’t tape or burn a disc of it for a friend.  It’s not worth the HASSLE!

Stop the suing of customers.  Focus on legislation.  Or the threat thereof.  To get the music companies to create easy, coherent, possibly even COMPULSORY licensing!

Every step of the way the music companies have thwarted innovation.  They’ve made it so entrepreneurs could not come up with new ways to distribute music, for fear of being SUED!

The answer isn’t lawsuits, it’s LICENSING!

To read the WSJ article on Brightcove, go to http://www.brightcove.com/.  When the page finally comes up, and why is it so slow, click on the top story under "In The News" on the left-hand side.  Ultimately click through to read the whole story, which, isn’t it interesting, the WSJ LICENSED!  They didn’t say to read our article people have to sign up for a year of the "Journal".  They understand that the more the story gets out there, the better it is for THEM!  That to CHARGE for usage rather than keeping content behind a walled garden is the future.  And how music started off as the future of online content and is now riding in the back of the bus I have no idea.  Once again, the ignoramuses running the labels have taken the HOTTEST entertainment medium, requiring the LEAST TIME, EFFORT AND CASH to create, and have decided to purvey crap in a backward fashion.