2nd Recording Industry Fine Exposed.

[GhostShip]

They seem to be just paying the fine and shrugging this off folks  

http://www.newsday.com/business/printedition/ny-bzpay234524723nov23,0,2533028.story?coll=ny-business-print

Warner Music Group, the record label of such stars as Madonna and Green Day, agreed to pay $5 million to settle a payola investigation by the New York attorney general's office, acknowledging that some employees had engaged in radio promotions that were "wrong and improper."

It was the second such settlement obtained by Attorney General Eliot Spitzer from a large record label. Sony BMG agreed in July to pay $10 million to settle a similar action.

Warner Music, based in Manhattan, is the third-largest record company in the United States. The label aggressively promotes its music to radio stations because radio airplay is the biggest driver of music sales.
"The evidence accumulated so far shows the practice was pervasive," he said. But he noted that once Warner officials were told of the widespread problems, "they changed their behavior."

In a statement, Warner Music apologized for the conduct and said the company "looks forward to defining a new, higher standard in radio promotion."

The agreement says Warner promoters even manipulated the listener-request process, hiring teams of people to place calls to radio stations pretending to be listeners, increasing the perceived popularity of a particular song. The company's promoters also offered incentives such as air fare, electronics and tickets to top sporting events and concerts to radio stations to increase the play of certain recordings.

Federal and state laws bar record companies from offering undisclosed financial incentives in exchange for airplay. In years past, payola was used to bribe disc jockeys, who decided what songs to play.

Is this the sort of behaviour we are being asked to turn a blind eye to ?
These are the same companies attacking folks computers with trojans and undermining folks right to fair play and privacy, they should have been fined more to show that the judiciary takes this issue seriously.

[lysander]

I think there are limmits on how much you can fine the companies, unfortunately. Also, it wouldn't really matter how much money you charge them; they'll still manage, somehow, to pay it off and keep on chugging. What woudl be far, far more detrimental to the music industry as a whole, in my opinion, is if this story got spread around more. Most people have no idea what payola means, let alone that the recording industry is bribing radio DJs to play certain songs. That kind of practice is something that I'm sure a lot of people would feel outraged enoguh about to make real change.