Following in the footsteps of a few artists before her, the Australian singer/songwriter Joss Stone has begun encouraging fans to share her music online, going as far as to call piracy “brilliant”.
In a recent interview, the artist admits she loves music but hates the music industry and feels that most artists are brainwashed by the industry.
When asked after a recent concert how she felt about piracy and unauthorized downloads on the Internet, she replied, “I think it’s great…yeah, I love it. I think it’s brilliant and I’ll tell you why,” Stone continued. “Music should be shared. [...] The only part about music that I dislike is the business that is attached to it. Now, if music is free, then there is no business, there is just music. So, I like it, I think that we should share.”
“It’s ok, if one person buys it, it’s totally cool, burn it up, share it with your friends, I don’t care. I don’t care how you hear it as long as you hear it. As long as you come to my show, and have a great time listening to the live show it’s totally cool. I don’t mind. I’m happy that they hear it.”
Late last year, the rapper 50 Cent made positive statements for piracy, and bands like Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails have even offered their albums on their own sites, disregarding the record labels. More recently, Kidrock told fans to “steal” his album all they wanted.
Result for: great time
Officials from Microsoft have now confirmed that their Xbox 360 console line will be seeing a price cut, at least in Australia and New Zealand.
The Elite and Premium models will drop AU$80 to AU$579 and $AU649 respectively, while the Arcade will drop to AU$349, making it cheaper than the Nintendo Wii in the region.
Last week, KMart fliers showed that a $50 USD price cut was coming for the Premium model in the US, but Microsoft has still not confirmed the cut, or what the price drop would be for the Elite and Arcade models.
Data figures have shown that the 360 is currently being outsold by the Wii by a 4:1 margin and that the PlayStation 3 is also outselling the 360, although it is by a smaller margin. The PS3 sells for AU$699 in Australia and the Wii is priced at AU$399.
Jeremy Hinton, Australian Xbox group product marketing manager added, “We’ve got a track record showing that whenever possible we want to pass on savings to the consumer. We thought this was a great time to do that.”
When asked if Microsoft was disappointed by the 360’s performance so far in the region, Hilton said, “If you look at the dollars going through the till over the past 12 months you’ll see consumers are buying more Xbox 360 products than any other platform - the entire package of console, software and accessories. So we’re very pleased with how it’s tracking.”
Of course, Hilton neglected to add that the prices for the console in Australia are still much higher than it is in North America and even Europe especially considering that the Australian dollar is now almost equal to the US dollar.
