I don’t want to be threatened by fat cats worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Certainly not ones who’ve moved their assets from their homeland in order to avoid paying taxes.

And I don’t want to hear about the future from any fucking asshole who has not spent more time surfing the Internet than flying on a private jet.

Paul McGuinness’ heart is certainly in the right place, rights holders should be paid, but his message is delivered in such a ham-fisted, back alley, contemptuous way as to undermine his complete argument. The music business has historically been one of intimidation, where a gun is a more important asset than a lawyer, what the technological revolution promises is a transparency the old guard hates.

If the old guard really wanted to illustrate it had come up to speed, was truly living in 2008, it would make the ISPs AN OFFER!

But Universal can’t make a public offer, it’s too busy ripping people off. That’s the major label business model. Onerous contracts containing terms they don’t live up to. Mr. McGuinness himself stated he had never done an audit where the artist came out ahead. So why in the hell is he defending these assholes? Telling us they’ve come up to speed, that they’re now ready for the future, that it’s the pundits who are the dinosaurs.

Reminds me of being lectured on Napster by Metallica. Look how well that worked out for the band. Hurt their image so bad, and their karma, they’ll be lucky to shed the stink in heaven, if they ever get there, if they emerge from their living hell. You can’t prognosticate about the future, can’t criticize what’s going on, UNLESS YOU LIVE THERE!

What I want first and foremost from the old guard is an admission that the Internet is the best thing that has ever happened not only for music, but THE AUDIENCE! What could be better than having everybody able to experience your wares, having their lives enriched? This can be done for a low price. The days of eighteen bucks an album, even ten, are gone forever. The goal is to get ten bucks from every person every month, or an even smaller amount, that in the aggregate is larger than what we made in the CD era. How come the mobile companies have figured this out and the content industries have not? Only when the price goes down and everybody partakes will we truly live in the future. Actually, we’re living there now, it’s just that the rights holders are not getting paid, because they only want to be paid in the old way.

When a candidate runs for President, he’s got a platform. What is the record company platform? Where is the ten dollars a month for all you can eat with fifty percent going to the record company and fifty percent of that going to the artist? Everybody knows the label rips off the talent, this is further incentive to steal. If you want the public on your side, you’ve got to show that you don’t have criminal intent, that you’re fair.

McGuinness referenced this fairness, after defending the major label model. Why? Did Smith Corona survive? Is IBM the biggest purveyor of personal computers? They missed the moment. And newbies usurped the market from them. Newbies are going to steal the majors’ thunder and business. And I wish to hell some of them were making these pronouncements instead of Paul McGuinness, he just looks silly. Like your grandma lecturing you on hip-hop.

He says he doesn’t want an Internet tax, but then asks for the government to establish ISP liability. Which way do you want it Paul? Free market, business to business, or Lord/Senator to corporation?

He quotes the French people as saying they’d be afraid to trade if the three strikes your out law is enacted. I doubt if that law comes to be revenue will be completely restored. How about sending files via IM? Or e-mailing them? Or hard-drive swapping? The future is not restriction, but ease of use! Come up with an offering that is enticing, that is more efficient, more thrilling than stealing. But it’s got to be cheap.

The average person can’t even avoid viruses and phishing scams, do you think he’s trading P2P? He’s just been scared away, fearful of getting sued. The key is to bring this person back and to make the trader realize legal is better than illegal. Not by making illegal harder, but the business proposition so good!

ISPs should offer music. But if we wait for the government to bring them to their knees, it will never happen.

In the U.S., the Universal Music controlled RIAA is suing people. Until this stops, you’re never going to get the public to pay.

Where’s the licensing at the college level? Instead of trying to make the administration the police?

It’s a brand new era. The meek have inherited the earth. Music will not die, will not cease to be created if it is not paid for in its recorded form. All that will happen is the old guard will give up. If the label can adjust to a 360 degree model, theoretically it could adjust to new business models, but it doesn’t want to! It just wants the old way perpetuated, ad infinitum.

All that free music. Do you think it had anything to do with Zeppelin mania? The collection of millions of e-mail addresses? Do you think that every kid would know "Stairway To Heaven" if it weren’t for P2P, the free transferability of music?

How about Pink Floyd? And AC/DC?

And all those people paying a fortune for concert tickets. Are you sure the Internet has nothing to do with that demand?

The music industry, still reeling from not getting the lion’s share of profits from MTV, wants to make sure it doesn’t get suckered in the future. Therefore, it moves so slowly, on such onerous terms, that it essentially turns the industry over to those young and industrious, who don’t rely on recorded music revenues to make their nut. As for getting in bed with pirates… Isn’t that what YouTube and MySpace were? Pirates? Seems like you can’t make any progress with getting rights licensed unless you steal the music to begin with.

I don’t know whose idea it was to make Paul McGuinness the new statesman for the music industry. He doesn’t fit the part. He comes across as a boring schoolteacher, the one all the students hate, snicker about behind his back. If we’ve got to have a spokesman, can’t it be someone under thirty? Who’s acknowledged how much the Internet has helped him? John Mayer attributes his success to file-trading… Get him to make these speeches. But he won’t. Because he knows first and foremost, you’ve got to have the audience on your side, without hearts and minds, you’ll have no progress, you can’t fight the North Vietnamese… Maybe not the Iraqis either. Some battles shouldn’t be entered into without a foolproof plan. I don’t see a plan here other than GIVE ME MY MONEY!

You can’t beg and you can’t cajole. You can’t urge people to come back to the past. You’ve got to cut them off at the pass, in the future.

Paul McGuinness has modified his stance a bit since MIDEM. He’s now speaking of ISP deals more than shutting trading down. That’s progress. But why did it take six months? How much more will his posture have to change before any true progress can be made?

This morning, John Kennedy told me there’s been no real progress, the ISP don’t want to make deals. I think they will. If they stop being told they’re guilty and legal services are proffered to them, that they can charge for and profit from.

Which is it? Is file-trading an individual problem or an ISP one? How come the music industry fought individuals for five years, and is still doing so, and is just now fighting the ISPs? Are they going to fight the government next? Who’s running this ship? And in what name? Believe me, it’s not about music, this campaign is all about the major labels. And the major labels are one of the most hated entities on the planet. Whose business has been marginalized, with most people claiming good riddance!

It’s the wild west out there. Innovators aren’t even worrying about charging for music. They’re giving it away, now that the majors have made it free. They’re not waiting for an ISP deal, they’re living in the twenty first century now. Meanwhile, the majors have laid off so many people there’s almost no one working there any longer and they want more of the artist’s pie to make their numbers. If this is the future, I want no part of it. Nor do the Eagles, Jay-Z, Madonna, Radiohead and every mid-level act with its contract coming up. If no one listens to the radio and MTV doesn’t play any music, why do I need a major label? With cunts who tell me what I can and cannot do, don’t pay me and tell me I should be grateful to have a deal. Bullshit.

I’m crying foul. I’d love it if the ISPs offered legal music. I’d pay ten bucks a month for all I can eat and keep. I already pay Time Warner $165 a month, ten dollars more is fine. But, they don’t tell me how much TV I can watch, they don’t shut my Internet down, they don’t insult me, they stay out of my way.

If only the label stayed out of my way. If only the acts they purveyed didn’t stop beating me over the head in the media, telling me how great they are. If only the "hippies" in Silicon Valley Mr. McGuinness rails about were in control of music. Then maybe we’d live in a better universe. I always loved that hippie music better than this pop crap anyway, didn’t you?

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