Via Boingboing (who got it from Itch.in), this insert was found in a CD by the band Coldplay, published by Virgin Records. I have nothing against Coldplay, although they are not high on any list of favorites either. I even have a sort of grudging respect for Virgin, however much their anti-corporate corporacity (something like mass pseudo-demassification) has worn thin over the decades (try as they may, they won't match Ralph Records). In any case, the overly aggressive "antipiracy" scheme has to be traced more to the corporation than to the artists, who will probably be blamed. A couple of notes here: 1) the strategy of telling people what they can do with products they have purchased is not likely to win lots of friends for the recording industry in this period of intensive decline caused by their failure (not for the first time) to adapt to new technologies that change the structure of the market, and 2) the declaration of contractual obligations of which one party is not aware until it is too late (the "contract" is hidden inside the shrinkwrap) should not get them too many micrometers past the door of a courtroom. Music publishers are sprinting toward a brick wall by trying to use repression as a response to their general decline, while there is good evidence to question the assumption that downloading and filesharing damage sales, and reason to suggest that these activities might increase sales, especially of work by lesser-known artists. But then, closing ranks is a sign of an institution in decay, and opening possibilities is a sign of emergent creativity.
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