Music Industry: Shame on you for leaking those Guns N’ Roses songs!

by Richard

The history of the recording industry is less a trajectory of artistic and technological advances in music than an unremitting lesson in tragedy and resilience. In what seems to be a sick contrivance of the music gods, Michael Jackson’s death occurred only months after the 50^th anniversary of “The Day the Music Died”—the fateful date of Buddy Holly’s demise in a freak plane crash. Over the course of this ominous half-century, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has suffered the untimely passing of Elvis Presley, John Lennon, Jimi Hendrix and Kurt Cobain, along with dozens of other setbacks like Napster and Ashlee Simpson.

But neither the unfortunate deaths of yesteryear’s stars nor the legal setbacks of today can compare to the irremediable damage caused by the infamous Guns N’ Roses/Dr. Pepper incident which transpired at the close of the 2008 calendar year. Because the only person who tells Axl Rose what to do is Axl Rose. And Dr. Pepper. But especially, Dr. Pepper.

So when Dr. Pepper got sick and tired of always making soft drinks and not listening to Guns N’ Roses, they put their foot down. If Axl Rose agreed to release their tentatively titled album “Chinese Democracy”—the highly anticipated tour-de-force of hard rock that had been ruminating deep within Rose’s impenetrable psyche for over a decade—then Dr. Pepper would agree to quench every American’s thirst with a refreshing can of Dr. Pepper. This is what we in America like to call “corporate responsibility.”’

But then something terrible happened. You see, not everyone in America—and certainly not everyone in Axl Rose’s inner circle—enjoys the crisp, succulent taste of Dr. Pepper. One opponent in particular disliked the unassuming soda with such fervent passion that he schemed to deny the beverage to as many Americans as possible. How did he do this? By releasing the first nine songs of Chinese Democracy to the general public, internet-style. This act of reckless sharing may not have proved so troublesome had not the internet been so good at sharing things. It always is! Like as soon as hot celebrities such as Rihanna and Vanessa Hudgens and Tom Arnold take naked pictures of themselves on their iPhones, the internet is always the first to know about this!

That is why as soon as the internet found out about Chinese Democracy, everyone knew about it. Even Dr. Pepper. How confusing for them!! What were they supposed to do now, release like only the first nine milliliters of a can of Dr. Pepper? This made Dr. Pepper feel confused and cheated by Guns N’ Roses’ sanctimonious fans—the very people the venerable soda brand had promised to shower with delicious drink!

So it is only natural that because Chinese Democracy was released in a half-assed sort of way, Dr. Pepper should release its sodas in a half-assed sort of way also. Therefore, the company devised a bureaucratic and circuitous system of online soda-redemption that confused even the thirsiest Guns N’ Roses fans. Axl Rose was not pleased about this, since he had already promised to share part of his own Dr. Pepper with Buckethead.

The correct course of action, of course, was to file lawsuit against the original distributor of the nine songs on Chinese Democracy. Because in America, we make examples out of people to show other people what is not allowed. Like when T.I. was found guilty of unlicensed gun possession, we put him in jail for like 1.5 months. This is what everyone with stakes in the album, like the RIAA and Axl Rose and Dr. Pepper, wanted to happen to the song leaker in question.

So on July 14, 2009, the infamous Chinese Democracy pirate was prosecuted to the full extent of the law. In addition to serving two months of home confinement, and subjecting his home computer to government inspection at least a couple times a year probably, and promising to record a public service announcement, the man was also sentenced to a year of probation. All key players involved in the debacle agreed that this was the most appropriate form of punishment, because confining someone to his living room is the number one way to stop him from going on the computer. And also because appearing on national television is something that young men at no point in their lives aspire to do.

In comparison, Minnesota housewife Jammie Thomas-Rasset was ordered to pay $1.92 million to the RIAA in recompense for downloading over 24 individual songs on the horribly anachronistic and embarrassing file-sharing program Kazaa. Which is pretty egregious, even for an incident that does not involve Dr. Pepper.

In conclusion, here is what we learned from Chinese Democracy-gate:

• · No one tells Axl Rose what to do except Axl Rose and Dr. Pepper

• · Nothing says corporate responsibility like a crisp refreshing soda

• · If  you cross Axl Rose by releasing copyrighted music, you will at the very least get slapped on the wrist for it

• · It It is a million times worse for a housewife to download 24 songs on Kazaa than it is for an industry insider to leak half of an album that is decades-in-the-making

• · The internet is really good at sharing naked pictures of Tom Arnold