Some Liability Stuff

For this weeks blog I’m focusing on liabilities within the recording industry and the entertainment industry as a whole.

The first case I came upon was rather disturbing in nature really. A woman named Nicole Westmoreland is suing Cash Money Records because she was allegedly sexually assaulted in the studio’s bathroom. She said she was at the studio to make a business proposal and was assaulted before giving the presentation. Her serious claim to liability was that the alleged assaulter was a friend of the studio owners and they were aware that he was dangerous. I find myself agreeing with the woman in this case that the owners are liable. The owners claim that her story about what occurred is incorrect and that the company “is not liable for criminal acts of an employee, unless they should have foreseen those acts were going to occur.” As owners, they are responsible for knowing who is in their studio and that the people they allow to be there, whether employees or friends, on the company’s property and on the company’s time, represent them. While no one should plan for sexual assault on their studio’s premises, criminal acts are something that should be considered when thinking about liabilities.

The next case I found was much simpler and definitely a cut and dry outcome. Recently, Dr. Dre has been sued by Paramount for failure to pay his bills. They are claiming breach of contract and over a large sum of time that Dre had rented out the studio. The Studio is suing for $1,220,500 and it seems they’re going to get it. These kinds of cases always seem so ridiculous to me. Dre’s got plenty of cash to pay and all he had to do was pay it by July 13^th. Now I’m sure he’s going to have to pay more and he looses a valuable industry relation over money he’s now going to have to give them anyway. Without knowing more details, shame on you Dre.

The third I looked into is more of a movie issue, although the premise is the same across many more media outlets. Back in 2011, the company behind The Hurt Locker (Voltage Pictures) decided to sue 24,583 different people over sharing their movie over the Internet. Now this is by no means a new issue and companies are suing over this torrent stuff everyday, but what I found interesting is some of the defendant actions. ISP information is tricky and has a lot of available loopholes. If the ISP information is stored in RAM it’s not solid evidence what’s its relating to. Some people claim it was others using their Internet that committed the offense. And where the servers are located that provide the files, may make the United States unable to even touch the information. But in 119 motions the judge decided to dismiss all of them. Now I am an avid believer in the fact that downloading is a good thing and unstoppable at this point. The industry needs to learn to adapt and change the way it does business. This is such a horrible step in the wrong direction and simply a money grab. The article states that Voltage is interested in offering settlements to the parties. If half of the people accused accept, the company makes more money off of them then the movie made in the box office. Why not just make them pay double blu-ray rates for the loss? 24,000 people giving up 120 bucks is still almost 3 million. Can they really justify loosing that much? Regardless of how I feel about it, this whole torrent thing isn’t going away. Studios and other entertainment companies should just start to anticipate and compensate.   

Native Changes the World

Avid has just released the new Native Thunderbolt. This amazing new device allows any Pro Tools user the ability to use Pro Tools HD on any computer. Instead of shelling out 13k for cards and 3k for an interface, this devices takes the position of the cards at just 3k. For anyone who doesn't know what I'm talking about here, here's a small breakdown. Pro Tools is available for anyone for a few hundred dollars and can be used on any computer. Pro Tools HD is far more powerful and far more expensive and normally requires specific cards and computer abilities to run. This has in the past made HD only available to full production studios or rich pricks who feel they need this sort of system in their home. Native brings this price pont way down. While the number is still high for the home user, it's perfect for small studios. 


Now you may be thinking, "Changing the world is a bit strong, don't you think?" It may be, but it just might change the music world. I have discussed a multitude of times about how home studio recording is a bittersweet movement that may threaten the integrity of the recording industry, but I think that this kind of stride is PERFECT. 

The price point means that it won't be idiots in their garage buying it. It'll be start up studios who do amazing work with little money that will realize the potential of an investment into this technology. The analog to digital battle is still roaring and while analog will never be dead completely, this a step in the direction of digital. This is also a step in the direction of smaller budget albums and more money for artists. While this may seem like a leap, I assure you it's not. 

With this new technology, small studios can make better recordings. These small studios won't charge as much and produce the same quality recordings. Bands can use less money to produce an album and ultimately no have to recoup as much for the recording process. This can lead more overhead and give bands the ability to try and experiment with new pricing options to counter the loss on record sales. Assuming any of this happens, Native changes the world (music world).

In a sad attempt to round this out to something about Management, I would say this why I feel it's important for managers to keep up on technology. Maybe look for a studios with this sort of technology in it. They can be guaranteed that lower cost studio really knows what they're doing and they get a little bit more security that they're doing all they can to get the best quality. Either way when I can afford it, I'm buying one.