MP3tunes declared bankruptcy after years of fighting EMI in the court

May 11, 2012 11:11 GMT  ·  By

The copyright-dependent industries have been enjoying their government-backed monopolies for decades. As with any monopolistic business, the music labels, the Hollywood studios and so on, have become complacent.

They don't want things to change, because no change will ever guarantee them the easy income they've been enjoying so far, even if they were to adapt, compete and be successful in the market according to the new market conditions.

The answer, for them, isn't to compete and win, it's to not compete and win. Unfortunately, that's what they've been doing so far.

Case in point is MP3tunes, the pioneering music locker service which has been sued into oblivion by EMI and which has now filed for bankruptcy even though they won in the court.

EMI didn't really care if it won or not, its goal wasn't "justice," wasn't to protect its artists, it was to snuff out competition, to kill anything that might threaten its revenue sources.

And it's won, MP3tunes is legal, there are now several music cloud lockers, from Google, Amazon and Apple, all of which are legal, but MP3tunes is dead and it was the legal fees that killed it.

Because, even after MP3tunes was declared legal, EMI appealed and then appealed some more, not necessarily in the hope that it would win, but to make sure that the lawsuit drags on enough and is costly enough to kill MP3tunes.

Obviously, EMI is dead as well, it's not buried yet, but dead nonetheless and in the process of being chopped up and sold in pieces to the remaining three major music labels, further solidifying their de facto monopoly.

Inevitably, the three remaining music labels will continue to cannibalize themselves, while the music industry moves past them.

Artists don't need labels any more, new and well-known artists alike are exploring all sorts of alternatives to making music and making a living at the same time, though not necessarily by selling music. But as the major labels sink they'll make sure drag down with them as many as possible.