Re: Bootleg advice needed...

[stewarte@ucscc.UCSC.EDU (The Man Who Invented Himself)]

Hairy frogs from Neptune forced wlp%sdcsvax@calmasd.Prime.COM (Walter Peterson) to type:

>IMHO the one and only "fair" price for a bootleg recording ( or book,
>etc. ) is $0.00; in other words *DON'T BUY IT*.  Think for a moment.
>Do you really like Kate ?  Do you really admire her talent ? Do her
>songs speak to something inside you ?  Then why do you want to cheat
>her ?
>
>I have heard all of the rationalizations for bootlegs; "most of the
>money for legitimate copies goes to middlemen", "the ones really
>getting rich are the record company ( publisher ) execs and owners",
>and so on. Well, when you buy a bootleg copy, the "suits" don't get
>their pound of flesh ( unless they are also getting a
>piece-of-the-action from the bootleggers ), but the artist also gets
>NOTHING.

I think you're confusing "bootlegs" (which almost always refers to 
unauthorized releases of otherwise unavailable recordings) with 
"pirate" copies (unauthorized releases of _available_ recordings).
While both are illegal, the former does not compete with legitimate
recordings; nearly all bootlegs are bought by fans who already own
all the artist's legit releases, and would buy more of same if said
artist would get off his/her butt and record more.  Pirated recordings 
are straight-up ripoffs by any definition, and record companies seem to 
be much more concerned with stopping them that bootlegs (as they should be).  
The only person who's really in danger of getting ripped off by bootlegs,
in my opinion, is the consumer, because boots vary so wildly in quality.

Anyway, the bootleg referred to in the original question was definitely
a bootleg as I have defined it, not a pirate copy.  

Note that my opinion has no legal basis whatsoever.

-- Stewart
-- 
"Bell peppers are like marketing.  Celery is like, uh, 
 distribution channels or something."
				-- Tim Ruckle
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