Thanks for the (bad) news Tom. By the way, my butt is copy-protected.

i continue to be amazed at the sheer stupidity running rampant at the labels.

is there nobody there who's willing to step up and say, "hey, this won't work..."?

Eric, I notice you did a piece on this last week. Sorry I didn't notice it before - I was just so chafed about this I had to say something. I was hoping people might go in search of Velvet Revolver info on the release day and find this so they could change their minds.

Damn, this pisses me off!

I would say this is a different story Tom, but thanks for the concern: the story I linked/babbled about only makes passing reference to this particular release - you make the point much more pointedly.

Yeah, all the kids were just chomping at the bit to rip and burn this one! Now sadly I have to wait an extra day before dowloading the Dangermouse mash up of this. I hear they will next be copy protecting the Lawrence Welk back catalog.

Yup, real effective. For those of you who have heard of bittorrent, the full album has been available as of a few days ago.

Keep in mind I am not advocating dling mp3s and not buying the cds.

This kind of nonsense will surely cost them sales. Why do I want to pay money for a purposefully defectively manufactured product?

Why do I want to actually pay the money for something distinctly inferior to what I will be able to download for FREE? I might be willing to pay the money for a physical CD just to save fooling with it, but if I can't rip mp3s to listen to on my computer (the main way I actually consumer music), then screw it.

Then again, many people such as myself would be in the range of somewhat interested in a Velvet Revolver album, but less than dedicated. Most of us will probably do the obvious thing then, and just ignore the record entirely. Are these people worth the bother?

Al, that's exactly what's wrong with this. And I think it's on purpose, but a double-edged sword of sorts that only benefits the company's cause. If people respond positively and buy it, then the label can say "See? People don't care if it's copy-protected, so we can use this on everything." If they don't, they can take two routes - saying that either the band failed to ignite a spark, or that people skipped the CD and found illicit copies instead. Either way, it only bolsters their arguments.

I saw the CD at lunch, by the way, and the sticker on the cover is easy to ignore. It has a big "VR" logo on it and beneath it is some text that looks like legal mumbo-jumbo - you really have to READ this small label to grasp what it is saying. I thought it was going to be a big sticker that said COPY PROTECTED but it most certainly is not. It's there, and you notice the sticker, but the way they did it is sneaky. For $9.99, I would have taken a shot on the album, but I certainly won't now. The frustration is not worth the bargain.

The people who will be hurt the most will be retailers. Chances are this disc won't work in a lot of DVD/combo players, Macs, Linux boxes, etc. And of course the disc will go back to the retailer accompanied by a pissed-off ex-customer.

And those 300,000+ iPod owners?
BMG: Screw them, they're little people

Already downloaded it :)

It'll hurt retailers? Good! Everybody up and down the food chain should get some kind of heartburn for this nonsense. It'd suit me just fine for K-Mart to have 10,000 returned VR CDs to have to ship back to the record company, or for Amazon to get tens of thousands of VR returns. That would make a delightfully nuisome batch of practical problems, and a loss of money just for the extra handling and shipping of all these defective products. That'd be a pretty good, undeniable expression of consumer dissatisfaction.

Are the days of music activation coming? RFID tags, debit cards.

Pretty soon privacy will only be a memory.

Remember when ...

The people who will be hurt the most will be retailers.

It may hurt them in the right now, but it will eventually hurt the labels, too, as retailers opt to not carry copy-protected discs. And really, are we all that worried about Best Buy/Circuit City/Target/Walmart/etc. hurting because the product they've chosen to sell us won't work the way it's advertised? Isn't it their responsibility to carry things customers want? Well, we want CDs that play wherever we want them to!

I bought the CD today before I knew it was copy protected. How'd I find out? The hard way. I bought the disc over my lunch hour and played it in the Kenwood deck in my Jeep with no problem. Fat dumb and happy. Took it inside and wanted to rip it into MP3s to play on my Archos.. That's when the MusicMatch software keeps failing about halfway through ripping the first song. After I AutoRun the CD, I find out that the only approved way to rip the songs is some sort of encrypted WMA that my Archos MP3 doesn't support.. Fark!!

Corvus, and anyone else in his situation, follow this link to see how to get around the issue.

Al, et al, the problem with the massive returns scenario is you are presuming that the majors and retailers think that far ahead. They don't.

Shipping Gold and Returning Platinum is seen as something good at distributors since they only think in a quarterly time-frame. Nothing else matters. As long as the commissions and volume discounts get paid, they don't care.

This decision to sell this VR disc was made over 12 weeks ago, and returns don't kick in for another 90 days, with the credit for the return 90 days after that. The major record business machine has no rear-view mirror.

Interesting, Jim, that's something I hadn't considered (or even thought of - I just assumed it was like a normal business, but, as we all know, the music industry is anything but a normal business.)

Alright then, the only feasible option is just to not buy it at all!

The credit card companies will win if people start charging back the sales, just like they win with online purchases and chargebacks.

They'll just bang the retail merchant which in return will have to raise the price to compensate for the loss margin which will drive more people online to purchase and the wheel will keep spinning until someday there will be almost no music sold in retail stores -- just plastic or tickets with one time redemption codes.

Then the malicious hackers come in.

This is a very slippery slope.

Tom, what the record biz likes to do is point at the book biz, and say, "you think we're screwed, look at them?".

Basically, distributors pre-sell a title to retail and rack-jobbers (Walmart, etc) about 12 weeks before street date. The sales reps take commissions on those sales. So they try to sell all the units they can. The customers get discounts based on volume, so the more they order, the more margins they get.

The album finally ships. The sales rep gets his commission at the end of the quarter. Which is the end of the sales cycle.

The retailer gets the product. Stocks it. 90 days later whatever is left is shipped back to the distro. for credit. 90 days after that the credit is rolled around on the retailer's account, since they've already bought into several sales cycles of shipments. They get their spiff every cycle for volume, co-op and contra.

As long as the wheel keeps spinning, nobody cares about the records.

OH HELLLLL YEAHHHH!!!!! That link to fix the problem actually worked! I was able to copy the VR cd into mp3 format, and with realplayer, make another audio cd, or make an mp3 cd. YEEEEEAH. Did the music industry REALLY think they could stop us? I mean, after all, if they didnt make the price of CDs so incredibly high with the ridiculous overhead, (and we all know it only costs like $2.00 to make a cd, but yet, they charge us $15.00 for it) people wouldnt be so inclined to copy. Maybe one day they'll learn.

OH HELLLLL YEAHHHH!!!!! That link to fix the problem actually worked! I was able to copy the VR cd into mp3 format, and with realplayer, make another audio cd, or make an mp3 cd. YEEEEEAH. Did the music industry REALLY think they could stop us? I mean, after all, if they didnt make the price of CDs so incredibly high with the ridiculous overhead, (and we all know it only costs like $2.00 to make a cd, but yet, they charge us $15.00 for it) people wouldnt be so inclined to copy. Maybe one day they'll learn.

does this work?

Looks like it, thanks Eric!

This whole business about copy-protection is sickening. It makes me wonder if the overpaid record execs put any thought into the psychology of what they are doing? I mean, I wasn't planning on burning copies of this particular CD until I found out that they were trying to make it "impossible". Now I am burning copies of the VR CD for all of my friends and relatives (LOL). Well, actually just my sister...Came out good, too!

Thanks for this story. I agree totaly. I have been posting to Velvet Revolver's Message board under the heading; BOYCOTT THIS CD !
To help, go to VR's Site:
http://www.velvetrevolverforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=5199&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0
GNR's site:
http://www.velvetrevolverforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=5199&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

Metal Slim, I commend you - you got right raked over the coals on the VR message board. Maybe something you can bring up if this all starts up again is that you are attempting to send a message about how you feel about copy protection. Think about this: the copy protection only hurts the people who paid for the music - not the people who are downloading the illicit copies. Since both you and I now have declared that we will not buy this album with copy protection, who has really been hurt here? Only you and me. File-sharers are still going to find this album, and we will be without. Legitimate sales of this album were lost due only to their label's insistence on using this half-assed protection scheme.

I don't care how easy it is to get around this copy protection - it's the principle of the matter. Sometimes you just have to stand up for something you believe in. If you feel strongly, stick to your guns. Maybe you'll affect others who might otherwise have not even paid attention. I, for one, am convinced that the copy protection "warning" sticker is purposely designed to look like a copyright warning, something that most people will not notice. And after this weekend, I have proof - a friend of mine looked at the CD and didn't take note of the text under the band name on the sticker until I explicitly pointed out the actual words about copy-protection. This is what the label is banking on - that people will unwittingly buy this album and bolster their stance that people don't care about the copy protection. I think it's deceptive. I expected to see a fairly large-sized font that read "COPY PROTECTED" but instead something found what looks like legal jargon in 6 pt. text. They've covered their butts by putting it right on the cover, but they've taken steps to minimize it, that's for sure. It's deceptive, plain and simple, and I will not have my money going toward something like that.

Thanks for your support Tim ! I hope others will post on these message boards as well.

While I do think that copy-protection on a CD is BS, there are other ways to fix this problem and still pay for your music. Rhapsody and ITunes both have the album for legal download and I know Rhapsody has no copy protection (not sure on ITunes since I despise non-CD quality compression). I bought the CD and it works fine in all 6 DVD players in my home (3 computer, 2 home, X-Box), my car stereo, and my ancient Sony 6-disc changer.

Excellent discussion - thanks for starting it Tom, and thanks to all for contributing. Posts like this have actual, immdiate REAL LIFE ramifications and it's great to see people share information to help each other out.

Napster also has this CD available for listening for streaming and/or download (ten bones a month or you can take a free trial).

The problem there is, of course, that Napster/Itunes/Rhapsody/etc. only offer up crappy lossy-compressed files. Why anyone would ever, ever pay for those, I can't imagine. Until these services decide to start carrying lossless file-types like FLAC/APE/SHN, you're wasting your money.

Like I said above, the problem isn't that there is copy-protection we have to work around - it's obviously easy to thwart. The issue here is that the label doesn't want me to have a duplicate copy of VR's album, and that's not only unfair, it's violating the copyright law's fair-use policy. Buying this album sends the message that we don't mind being told we can't keep a legal, lossless copy of the discs we pay for. That, my friends, is absolute bullshit.

Tom - I think you missed what I was saying. If one is already paying for the monthly Napster service then this CD is available, in its entirety, for local play without paying for any songs separately :)

As for lossless files, I don't care about that for hearing on my computer whether I would like the songs or not. I use these services to preview albums and most people already listening on lowend computer speakers don't care about this either because you can barely tell the difference with crappy speakers.

Now for those with high quality Bose and/or other high end speakers, yeah, then that makes a big difference.

Sampling music before buying is why I use these online services though and anybody using the Napster service doesn't need to pay anything extra. That's what I'm saying.

And I should add that what I suggested is a totally legal method of listening to this Velvet Revolver CD without paying them any money directly. Yes, indirectly, the artist is being compensated by the monthly Napster fees, but let them all fight over 10 bones a month from a zillion people, I don't care.

For 120 buck a year it's one of the best ever ways for music consumers to preview tons of music. No more wasted money on CDs that suck.

Looks like the copy protection is having no effect on sales, Tom

While Musicmatch crashed Itunes worked just fine.

To get around the DRM:
1. Right-click My Computer, hit properties.
2. Hardware Tab, hit Device Manager
4. View -> Show Hidden Devices
5. Under 'Non Plug and Play Drivers', find 'SbcpHid'. Right click on it, hit Properties.
6. On the Driver Tab, hit Stop.
7. Now you're rocking. Rip away, my friends.

What the fuck is the big deal with copy protected disks?? U buy the album because you like the music, and want to support your favourite band/s. Downloading the music from the internet is what's fucked up the music industry. If everyone downloaded illegal copies then the artists would not get their royalties from it and would go broke therefore it wouldn't be worth their while to make music in the first place. Who gives a shit if a disk is copy protected, it's to try and stop fuckers like you lot from ripping them off. Grow up and pay for the privilege of listening to them. And another thing - CD prices would come down if everyone actually paid for them rather than downloading them.

Oh yeah, I bought this disk cos I love Guns 'n' Roses AND V.R. and it works fine in all my cd and dvd players.

Shocker,

your just wrong. THe music industry does not need the labels to make money. The labels are the middle man, and now the internet is replacing them. Their are other alternatives to selling art, than the current system.

And besides, most bands bennefit from downloading (this is well substantiated). Increases exposure. More fans is where their real money is. This provides all sorts of buisness opoortunities, including increased ticket revenue, sponsership, and memrobilia sales (cross-marketing etc). Besides, bands want to heard. If they're being heard, then they make a very decent living.

The only bands that stand to loose money in these situations are the metallicas and the britney spears types who sell tens of millions of copies.

BEsides, when record companies are bending us over a barrell, fucking us in the ass, and taking our hard earned money, why shouldn't we level the playing feild.

It was record companies that decided 10 songs was worth 25 of our hard earned dollars. Thats ludicrous. IF thats what we have to pay for music than I only have the option of listening to three or four bands a year. IS that how art should be distributed?

Copy protected discs punish people who DID pay for the music. They pay their money and they end up with a broken product that does not work properly.

People who download illegally are the ones who never have to worry about copy protected discs, because someone always breaks the copy protection and puts the digital files on the file-sharing networks.

In other words, copy protection achieves the exact opposite of its stated goal. It punishes people for legitimately buying music, and rewards people for illegally downloading music.

That is the big deal with it. It's just plain damn stupid.

But despite copy protection Velvet Revolver remains unlistenable garbage.

Dave

Geeez! What ever happened to the excitement surrounding the release of your favourite bands' new c.d.? Just go and buy the dam thing, smoke a few joints while listening to it and don't fret over the fact that you can't copy it! The record industry is a right load of crap and will continue to find ways of rubbing the buyer raw. At least be thankful you don't live here in England where we pay higher prices for music than anywhere in the world! LONG LIVE THE BOOTLEGGERS!! I suspect the next VR release will be much better than this first one, what do you all think?

Captain Willard, the excitement is killed off by the fact that people aren't allowed to listen to the album where they feel like it. As an Ipod user, being prevented from copying an album makes buying that album a non-issue: it won't happen. I won't buy copy-protected discs on principle - I know how to get around the copy protection (if you read the site I linked to in the main article, you would too.) Luckily, I'm missing absolutely nothing by not owning Velvet Revolver's album - it's a dreary 80s throwback, and a poor one at that.

I suspect the next VR release will be much better than this first one, what do you all think?

Well, it can't be much worse than this one.

I see your point, I'm not an ipoder so I didn't consider that road. Perhaps I am a dreary 80s throwback too! And no it's not a great album but I really do think in time they could make some great music. At any rate good luck to you and the ipod.