No Rock And Roll Fun

NEWS FROM AUSTRALIA: The Australian version of the BPI and RIAA, the ARIA is getting very vexed indeed over a chap called Phil Tripp. Tripp publicly (very publicly - in The Age, rather than just on a blog) rubbished the ARIA figures for the number of downloads taking place in Australia. For its part, Undercover spins again, saying that it doesn't really matter - the number of downloads isn't significant, it's that it's happening at all. But we'd disagree there - that the Record Industry is inflating to absurd levels the size of the challenge facing it means that the calls its making for changes to the law and demands for legal action is being done on a false basis. If downloading isn't an epidemic at all, but merely an event, then the reactions of the labels and their pliant placemen in parliaments is being totally overdone. They're shouting 'fire' in our busy theatre when there's only a smouldering.