IMSTA Bulletin - May 2007
The Frankfurt Musik Messe 2007 showcased our latest public exhibit and proved to be a great event. We would like to thank Musik Messe for the generous support of IMSTA. At the show our staff had some surprisingly aggressive confrontation on more than one occasion with software thieves and their defenders. Every lame excuse in the book was trotted out to justify their illicit actions.Here are just a few of the arguments presented by the pirates:
- There were bogus charges about the price of software being too high.
Software tools are far cheaper than any comparable hardware solution and products fall within a wide price range. You don't have to use the most expensive software solution anymore than you have to drive the most expensive car.
- New software versions are replete with bugs which mean you must use a crack until they are stable.
Apple Powerbooks had a flawed battery that resulted in a recall. Would that be considered a' bug.' Does that justify stealing one from a store to 'try it out first.' Imagine justifying stealing a car off a lot because you heard it was being recalled.
- The greed of the software companies is boundless.
This is a spurious argument that denies companies their right to set prices for their products. Customers can choose to buy from a wide range of products at every price point. What right do you have to tell Porsche that their prices are too high? You can drive a Ford, or if that's still too expensive you can ride a bicycle, and if that's still too expensive then you can walk.
- Poverty rates among most musicians in Germany are high and they cannot afford to buy software.
Funny they can afford to buy a laptop and a desktop and a sound card and a keyboard controller and a pair of powered speakers and a few microphones and a microphone pre-amp and a couple 19' LCD monitors and an external hard drive and on and on. But there is never enough money for software? This in a country with a per capita GDP of $35,204, by comparison China is $7,600 and India $3,700. 'Poor' is a relative term. 'Poor' musicians in Germany are not allowed to steal a loaf of bread from a supermarket either. Respect yourself and respect the hard work of others.
Confrontations aside, we had a great show highlighted on March 31 by the most successful Software Day we have ever organized.
Best Service: Klaus Kandler. Celemony: Anselm Rossler, Carsten Gehle. Arturia: Frederic Brun. DMN: Manfred Reurup. C-Lab: Burkhard Burgerhoff. ESI: Chess Lim
A total of 50 companies participated by allowing their staff to wear our trademark blue T-shirt, some chose to display the shirt inside their booth because of dress code restrictions. The total list of companies participating in software day are: AAS, Access, Algorithmix, Arturia, Best Service, BIAS, Brainworx, Cakewalk, Chris Hein, Citronic, C-Lab, Digidesign, Digital Musicians Net, Drumagog, ESI, Fab Filter, Freehand Systems, FXPansion, IK Multimedia, IRCAM, Keys To Sound, Klemm, Magic Systems, MI7, Mix Vibes, Modarrt, MOR, MUSE Research, Music Marketing, MXL Microphones, Native Instruments, Novation, Focusrite, Oxford Plug-ins, PC DJ, RME, Rob Papen, Steinberg, Synthax Canada, Terratec, Time & Sapce, Ueberschall, u-he, UVI, Vienna Strings, Wysiwig, XLN Audio and Yellow Tools. Sincere thanks to the 200 people in Hall 5.1 who wore our T-Shirt to show their support. Don't forget to follow up by joining IMSTA and implementing our program in your company. You can make a difference. You have to believe. You really can. Details of our program are here Industry Member's Guide.
Cakewalk: Brandon Ryan. Fab Filter: Frederik Slijkerman, Floris Klinkert. Katharina Kuehler. Focusrite: Giles Orford. KeyToSound: Voltz, Brian, Jason Wolf.
IMSTA JAPAN: New Alliances Brewing
Seiji Murai meeting last week with synth legend Isao Tomita about forth-coming IMSTA International Song Competition
IMSTA is making its first foray into Asia with the establishment of IMSTA Japan. Long time industry stalwart Seiji Murai is the Executive Director of IMSTA Japan and in his capable hands we are confident of a very bright future. It is no secret that Asia has some of the highest piracy rates in the world and this may be the biggest challenge facing software companies in general. Seiji Murai has been involved in software from the beginning having invested in Opcode, Digidesign and Steinberg. We warmly welcome him to the IMSTA family.
MEMBER PROFILE: Rob Papen
Rob Papen operates a tiny 1+3 software company that bears his name in the Dutch city of Echt. His software synthesizers - Blue, Albino, Predator - have touched the musical lives of thousands around the world . Rob himself is a musician and a certified synth nut with a large personal collection. He shares the frustration of the music software community when his products are cracked and posted on the internet within days of release. To add insult to injury the thieves who download the warez versions contact Rob for tech support and even try to register their stolen serial numbers. The frustration level of Rob is palpable as the warez problem appears so utterly hopeless. In true spirit of our campaign Rob has decided to fight back as is evident from posts on his KVR forum. He acknowledges that it is a long road, but at the same time it is a fight that we as a community have not joined. Go Rob Go. We've got your back.
We are also happy to welcome new members from distributors - Arbiter Group from the UK, Music Link from Australia and Halilat from Israel. Thanks for joining guys and to the Australians congratulations on the fabulous Cricket World Cup win.
ON THE BOXES: Cubase Studio 4 | Wave Arts Power Suite 5
We landed a pretty big fish when Steinberg announced that the "Buy The Software You Use" badge will be on all of their product packaging. The new Cubase Studio 4 boxes have the IMSTA logo as part of the product. Special thanks to Andreas Stelling, Frank Simmerlein, Jörg Beckmann and Jonas Baumbach for making this happen. Wave Arts from Boston, MA also joined the fray and shipped their Power Suite 5 product in a box adorned with the Buy The Software You Use badge. Thanks to Bill Gardner for his support of the cause. We will like to remind members of the importance of this simple, inexpensive method of fighting piracy. The artwork for the badge can be found here.
IMSTA AD COMPETITION: Help us create Effective Print Ads
We are fortunate to have the help of the major industry publications in running any ad we create. However, we are not advertising professionals and our ads are, well let's be honest, pretty basic. The truth is, amongst our members are some full-time, professional ad geniuses who can communicate ideas in amusing, effective and memorable ways. We are calling on you - yes you - to come to our assistance and enter an ad in the IMSTA Ad Competition. This project is being spearheaded by Jörg Beckmann at Steinberg in Hamburg Germany. If you have ad ideas or you can create an anti-piracy ad then please contact Jörg. We need everyone to pitch in here.
MEMBERSHIPS: Join Up, Pay Up and Do Your Part
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IMSTA is the best and only advocacy program the music software industry currently has for fighting piracy. We are fighting piracy on levels that go beyond the obvious. We are trying to change behavior. In order to do this we need a few simple things done by tens of thousands of people - yes, you are one of them. To start, we need you to join IMSTA. To do this fill out our Membership Application Form. Next we do need you to pay your membership dues for 2007. This is a small but vital contribution that you will make to our campaign. We use your money to pay for the things that we can't get volunteers to do. If you haven't paid yet, please do it now. Finally, we need you to begin the process of implementing the program in the Industry Member's Guide. For starter, put the IMSTA Badge on your website. This is as easy as 1, 2, 3. One thing for sure is that we cannot succeed without you. |
See you next month as we introduce IMSTA UK
Ray Williams
Director
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'BUY THE SOFTWARE YOU USE'
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International Music Software Trade Association
PO Box 250813 New York, NY, 10025, USA Tel: 212-865-4792 Fax: 212-665-8707
12 Upjohn Road, Unit 8, Toronto, ON M3B 2V9, Canada Tel: 647 477-8080 Fax: 416 789-1667 |
