Imago said:

This statement from someone whose Avatar is a man's groin with a sock in it?

(In an old southern slave voice)

OOOOOHHHH!!!! Somebody said Prince...shh shh shh you don't do, say, or bring up da masta's name...shhh shh shhh awwww lllaaawwrrdd ...da masta's gon sue....run, hide, he gon get your hide, you gone get whipped!!!!!

Wow, and these are fans? O yee of little faith. Just a week ago you all were showing pictures, talking about what it would be like to meet Prince, how much you love him, etc. This week, you're ready to tar and feather him in the town square--get real!

1. Websites sell ad space and get PAID. This allows those of you who spend time on the sites to see whatever you're looking to see. The websites don't pay any royalties to anyone, except of course the shareholders who own stock in the corporate entity.

2. I've seen You Tube a couple of times and frankly, the concept of putting stupid videos of oneself on a public site which is not regulated makes me think the participants lack self-esteem, have no life and do it only because SOMEHOW they truly believe they might get "discovered" and become famous like some of the other non-talented reality-tv idiots. YOU BEEN HOODWINKED, BAMBOOZELED! - Our Man deserves to be in better company!

3. Grow up! Prince and the Record Industries have a legal right and obligation to protect their intellectual property (the music, videos, photos). That's business and it's really not--all about the $$. However, You Tube IS making money off of you and you don't even realize it. You support it! But when it comes to it is your belief that he should take the hit? (Of course this should be said for any artist.)

4. You say this should help Prince with marketing-- bull sh*t watching the videos on You Tube is not and does not make anyone go out and buy anything--that's the whole point of putting them on the website, HELLO. Be honest, you're not going to go out (and haven't gone out) to purchase any video you've seen on the ANY website. People download whatever they can these days (remember the pictures) and use them for their own purposes.

5. There have been photos of Prince on various websites that, well, let's say he probably would like out of circulation--we've all laughed at them, but imagine if it was you! I can honestly say that there's at least one picture of me in the 80s that I wouldn't want circulated. (And, I'm sure there's at least one photo of you--at some point of your life--that you would make you cringe. ) Just because Prince is famous doesn't mean he has no rights! Let's just suppose that he does want to start a family and change up his style a bit--shouldn't he have the right to determine how he is portrayed in the public?

6. The music business is having some problems by its own admission--much like the movie industry went into a dive when DVDs were first released. This is a corporate battle, plain and simple. Like the stock market adjusts itself, the same is true in this instance.

7. I believe as another Orger suggested, eventually all of this will make sense to us. You may have gotten mad at Prince before, but he always comes back with a solution. We should support him in this.

what prince and his "yes men" haven't comprehended is that this action just killed any interest in his future work from future generations...


so...what do we die hard fans get in return? more concerts with hits medleys and purple rain encores.

Imago said:

This statement from someone whose Avatar is a man's groin with a sock in it?

How can someone who earlier this year released a song as free and fun as "The One U Wanna C" be such a killjoy?

Now lemme pull out The Motels CD and listen 2 Total Control...
U may have 2 do a search on that 1.

I back this move 100%. If YouTube and flickr and all of the rest of the user-content services are worth x billion (some of them more than most production companies and some record companies) then they should PAY to have content which attracts users and sells advertising. Users, meanwhile, aren't entitled to upload copyrighted materials like promo vids etc but because those are the things that attract other viewers, the likes of YouTube smokescreen the issue with 'It's our users and we want to protect their freedom' (nobody mentioned HQ...yet) in order to postpone the day when they're gonna have to share their profits with those whose work forms part of the value of their offering online.

Prince just put that day on their calendar!

Don't confuse the issue of 'fair use' with this (as HQ has done tediously).
We're talking about Rupert Murdoch and other media getting Prince and other content for free and I'm not surprised that Prince the businessman wants his cut.

I look forward to Prince cutting deals which will result in spectacular exclusives, special events, huge profile/press and the like on these services and enable him to resume making lots of amazing vids (a la Gold period), smoking spectacular one-off events and offering concert tickets at £31.21 (or did y'all forget?)

One thing about Prince you can rely upon and that is that HIS profits get redistributed to fans NOT shareholders.

Haters, get on the MF beam with this and support what will be an epoch-making venture that'll energise Prince TO THA MAX.

"He will be victorious"

I look forward to Prince cutting deals which will result in spectacular exclusives, special events, huge profile/press and the like on these services and enable him to resume making lots of amazing vids (a la Gold period), smoking spectacular one-off events and offering concert tickets at £31.21 (or did y'all forget?)

The haters' logic is so monomaniacal ('Boo Hoo! I can't do what I want and Prince hasn't released what I want therefore my human rights have been infringed. Waaaaah. I want me mam!') that the intelligent view of what Prince is ACTUALLY up to is all but obscured on the fan sites.

Here's a coupla points and patterns that others (more interested in Prince in all his machinations) will undoubtedly recognise.

1. Prince likes to make a lotta stuff
2. In the WB bag, he made a lotta stuff which has remained unreleased because, as when WB had him, they still don't consider it worth releasing. This covers the past.
3. Since WB, Prince has released a lotta stuff when he's in the mood
4. Prince wants his masters back from WB
5. Prince's market-value dropped right off the scale in the period since WB. This was entirely at Prince's discretion.
6. A deal may have been done based upon the lower market-value. Go figure
7. We are waiting. And I, for one, am LICKING MY MF LIPS

Of course all you hater-geniuses out there will hear none of it. Prince is just the big bad man who thinks your photography sucks, isn't he?

Well this just in: IT SUCKS

[Edited 9/14/07 2:05am]
[Edited 9/14/07 2:06am]

Prince won't win anything against Ebay or The Pirate Bay. We'll all continue to download free Prince music and Prince vids and there's nothing he can do about it. Personally, I'll never purchase another Prince product again -- only illegally download it. Prince will have to be happy with whatever millions he already has. He's a loser.

now that's just embarassing!
i can see y he'd wanna lock that stuff away