No Rock And Roll Fun

IRISH EYES NOT SMILING: Figures from IRMA (the Irish record industry consortium) suggest that music sales in the Republic fell 20 per cent by value, but only ten per cent by volume. (Interestingly, Business World.ie makes a Freudian slip and calls IRMA the RIAA during the course of this report.) Of course, this is due to illegal downloading and not because, perhaps, Irish consumers are ordering their music from elsewhere in Europe where it's cheaper. In fact, isn't it a little bit ridiculous to be measuring the Irish market alone when it's part of the Eurozone? Isn't it like giving a read out from the North Carolina market, say?

Meanwhile, back across the Atlantic, there's mounting concern over claims that the RIAA are dressing their staff up as police and pretending to be a law enforcement agency. They also appear to be deciding that anyone selling any records who isn't stood in a shop with a barcode scanner and a department given over to Playstation and XBox games must have pirated records - from the report here, at least. This shouldn't come as a surprise - remember the Industry tried to stop Amazon from selling second hand records, and if they've got a bunch of hired goons out hunting down pirates, it won't hurt any if they try and close off a few legitimate businesses if they're harming the RIAA bottom line, too. We're just wondering how long it'll take for the RIAA to start up its own army.