iTake-Over The Recording Industry in the Digital Era [Hardcover]

For more than a decade, record companies have warned of the dire consequences of illegal downloading of music and the imminent demise of their industry. Though many mom-and-pop record shops have indeed disappeared, the big record companies have not only survived but, according to Arditi, have strengthened their dominance of music culture. Far from being defensive reactions to widespread digital piracy, the prosecutions of Napster and the passage of legislation by Congress were part of an offensive strategy on the part of record companies to maintain their profits. Arditi divides this book into four main parts: Transformations in the Recording Industry, on the move to digital; The State in Music, on the role of government; The Recording Industry and Labor; and Digital Distribution and Surveillance. In each section the author shows how society has lost as corporations gained advantage. However, as Arditi concludes, despite the efforts by the record companies, the consuming public and performing musicians refuse to acquiesce totally to the industry view of how music should be consumed today. A valuable resource for those interested in the future of music in society. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readers.Throughout the book, Arditi consistently responds to industry-initiated narratives (whether artist- or label- or RIAAgenerated) with concrete data either directly to refute or contextualize within a larger framework, thereby arriving at a more credible conclusion. The strength of Arditis writing is in this construct, and it can be terribly effective: even in the first chapter, he calmly sets up the International Federation of the Phonographic Industrys (IFPI) analysis of the dwindling retail value of music in the United States between 19952009 and then contrasts it with Nielsen SoundScan numbers from the same period, which show a remarkable increase. . . .[T]he content of the book...is undoubtedlyexcellent.David Arditis book is an excellent study of the music l3.