RIAA site hacked

The friendliest place on the web for anyone that follows U2.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
whenhiphopdrovethebigcars said:
Great to see you?re working on your thesis.

Erm...
I'm still here...

But I promise I'll be offline soon! I really do.

In the meanwhile, I also found the other article. It was actually MCA that spend millions on a pop 'star' that did not sell.

-
Pop Singer Fails To Strike a Chord Despite the Millions Spent By MCA
Here's the link to the original article (WSJ requires registration and I don't know if the link still works):
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,4286,SB1014678641479060480,00.html?mod=Page+One
Here's a link to a message board that has the full article:
http://velvetrope.starpolish.com/ub...d=allposts&Main=140177&Search=true#Post140294

C ya!

Marty
 
I confess to not being as technically inclined as many others here when it comes to computer technology. More about that in a second.

Back in the 70s and 80s, if you were to copy a cassette or record to another cassette, there would be significant degradation in the quality of the music. I never new anyone back in the 80s that decided to give up buying music from the store because they could copy it from a friend on cassette. I now have friends that will probably never buy another compact disk ever because of the ability to download and burn ones own CDs. It is my understanding that one can download music from another persons harddrive and burn it to a CD without any degradation in soundquality. I've been told this by a friend who works for EDS and is a musician with his own recording studio. I consider him to be very knowledgable on this techincal issue unlike myself.

I understand that the recording industry was still making mountains of money with Napster around, but I would still say there were thousands of people who decided not to purchase and album because they could get for free from Napster.

The Key here is what will things look like 10 years from now, with these technologies more available and used by the general population. What will the effect then be with file sharing and other exchanging of undegraded music on the music industry.

This year, it seems that the impact is starting to be felt. More and more people are getting this technology and learning about Kazaa and other things and this is starting I think to impact the industry. If it has not yet, I think it will in the future.

There is simply no incentive to go to the store to buy something when you can get it for free without leaving your house.
 
Popmartijn said:


Erm...
I'm still here...

But I promise I'll be offline soon! I really do.

In the meanwhile, I also found the other article. It was actually MCA that spend millions on a pop 'star' that did not sell.

-
Pop Singer Fails To Strike a Chord Despite the Millions Spent By MCA
Here's the link to the original article (WSJ requires registration and I don't know if the link still works):
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,4286,SB1014678641479060480,00.html?mod=Page+One
Here's a link to a message board that has the full article:
http://velvetrope.starpolish.com/ub...d=allposts&Main=140177&Search=true#Post140294

C ya!

Marty

Who R U on the Rope? Do tell :)
 
Music sales dip; Net seen as culprit


By Jim Hu
Staff Writer
April 16, 2002, 8:15 AM PT


Global music sales declined for the second consecutive year, a dip the recording industry blamed on the proliferation of free music swapping on the Internet.
In 2001, worldwide music sales dropped 5 percent to $33.7 billion, according to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), a record industry lobbying group. That figure is down again from the 5 percent drop in 2000 to $37 billion.

For a more accurate comparison, the IFPI adjusted all 2000 sales figures to 2001 exchange rates in calculating the percent differences.



The recording industry maintained that demand for music has not waned, but that sales have been hurt by the presence of free file-swapping services, such as Kazaa, Morpheus and LimeWire, and by the proliferation of CD burners.

"The industry's problems reflect no fall in the popularity of recorded music: Rather, they reflect the fact that the commercial value of music is being widely devalued by mass copying and piracy," IFPI Chief Executive Jay Berman said in a statement.

As proof, the IFPI said a survey conducted in three of its top markets--the United States, Japan and Germany--showed a direct comparison between CD burning and file swapping and a smaller appetite for music purchases. In the United States, about 70 percent of people who downloaded songs and burned them onto CDs and 35 percent of people who downloaded more than 20 songs a month bought less music. In Germany, 18 percent of 10,000 people surveyed said that burning CDs caused them to buy less music.

However, some industry analysts are skeptical that file sharing and CD burning on their own are hurting CD sales. They say the market share slide may highlight the cyclical decline from the late-1990s boom instead of the presence of new technologies.

"I think it's a very convenient scapegoat, but in reality...is more complex," said Aram Sinnreich, an analyst at research firm Jupiter Media Metrix. "The least statistically relevant factor is file sharing because there's very good empirical evidence to show that file sharing alone without a CD burner has a salutary effect on CD sales."

Still, Sinnreich agreed that combining file sharing with CD burning could dampen the desire for someone to buy CDs.

The decline in CD sales varied by region: Sales declined by 4.5 percent in the United States, 9.6 percent in Canada, 9.2 percent in Germany, 8.6 percent in Italy, 9.8 percent in Austria, 14.8 percent in Denmark and 9.4 percent in Japan.

Meanwhile, sales in France and the United Kingdom were up 10 percent and 5 percent, respectively. The IFPI attributed the increases to strong demand for local artists despite the decrease in demand for artists outside those countries' borders.
 
whenhiphopdrovethebigcars said:
Who R U on the Rope? Do tell :)

First, I want to declare that I was offline for a short while and did what I had to do. :)

Now, on the Rope I'm just a lurker, not registered. What's your nickname there?
For the moment Interference is enough for me. The Rope is also more for people in the music business and I'm just an IT guy.

Sting, you are partly right about some people not buying CD's because of Napster (and the rest). That happens, always (back in the days I think there were also people who copied records on blank tapes and never bought those records). The interesting part, however, is that many studies point out that 1) many people buy more because of file-sharing (discovering new music, testing music first, not being discouraged by shelling out a lot of money for a worthless CD) and 2) that heavy users of those file-sharing programs buy more than 'light' users (and buy more with a significant factor, x6 or so).

OK, time for me to go to bed. I have to be able to listen to music tomorrow! :D

C ya!

Marty
 
I dispute the studies which show that heavy users of file sharing buy more CDs than non-users. Remember, thats based on unscientific survey. Most heavy users of file sharing would say anything to defend the practice including that it makes them buy more music which is illogical.

If you can get something for free without leaving your house, there is no reason to leave your house to get it again and in the process pay for it. My friends celebrate file sharing because they say they no longer have the need to buy CDs.

Think about it, any product that can be duplicated and then distributed for free by others is not going to good sales wise the more available the free distribution becomes.
 
Fiel-sharing DOES lead to many people buying more music. I wouldn't have 90% of the cds I own if I hadn't been able to download a copy first. Most of the music I listen to is foreign, and the albums are released six to twelve months later in the US, if at all. Instead of paying $25+ to order it from overseas, I download it and burn it to CD. Then I buy it when it's finally released in the US. Why do I buy the CDs at all? Because I like liner notes, and because I like the bands enough to contribute to their album sales in the US. I love music, and it's aesthetic to own a real CD, just as a lot of music fans also buy releases on vinyl.

I also would not have gone to ANY of the dozens of concerts I went to last year and spent hundreds of dollars on merchandise if it hadn't been for file-sharing.
 
I understand what your saying and thats great for you. But most people are not hardcore fans of any artist and don't really care about the liner notes. All of my friends usually lost their CD cases or booklets.

Most people care about the music. If they can get for free without paying 20 dollars, their going to do that. Only the minority care about the liner notes. One of my best friends is a hardcore U2 fan. He has met the entire band, been to Bono's house and Windmill lane studio's.

Yet, his sister sent him a burned copy of ATYCLB two weeks before it was released. Its a perfect copy, I have listened to it and compared. He has never gone out to purchase ATYCLB despite the fact that U2 is his favorite band. If he can get for free, he feels no need to go out to the store and purchase it. I imagine that are many more casual music listeners or U2 fans who feel the same way.
 
STING2:

I agree with a lot of what you are saying simply as a matter of "right and wrong" according to what I believe. Personally, I don't download anything off the net that is commercially available as a matter of principle (I won't get into the reasons right now), plus I am somewhat of a CD collector and I like to have the genuine copy. But can't you agree that CDs are WAY overpriced? The records companies would still make their money and there would be more units sold and fewer pirated copies if they priced them more reasonably at $9.99 - $11.99 as opposed to the $17.99 - $19.99 that they sell for at Sam Goody or Coconuts. I do not agree with it and I do not participate in it, but I do see the piracy trend as a response to the ridiculously high pricing trend for music; hell, you can get 2-disc DVDs for less than some single CDs these days.

~U2Alabama
 
The majority of people who don't buy CDs, these casual listeners, are downloading music like Britney Spears and Eminem, who aren't exactly hurting for cash or record sales. The "struggling artists" benefit from file-sharing because more people are able to hear their music and spend money going to shows and buying the CDs that the casual music fan couldn't care less about.
 
meegannie,

I have yet to hear of a band go platinum because of File Sharing. I have friends that have struggled to get something going, and File Sharring sure has not helped. Again, there is no reason for a consumer to go out and pay 20 dollars for a product that he already owns through file sharing.

U2Bama,

I might could see one getting CDs at the Military PX for $ 11.99, but there is no way that a retailer could profit if he only sold the product for 11.99. If you adjust for inflation, Compact Disk cost the same as they did in 1988. The list price for most Compact Disk in 1988 was 15 dollars. Inflation easily explains the increase. You can't expect to pay 1988 prices in 2003. So I really do not see there being any high pricing trend although I'd have to sit down with the the actual average retail list price from the particular year and then the math with the annual inflation rate from each year to determine if Compact Disk cost more or less than they did 10 or 15 years ago.
 
I'll just add that file sharing is basically impossible to stop. The only solution I think is CD encryption. If that is not possible then be prepared to say goodby to the music business and the process that has brought us great artist in the past like U2.
 
STING2 said:



I might could see one getting CDs at the Military PX for $ 11.99, but there is no way that a retailer could profit if he only sold the product for 11.99. If you adjust for inflation, Compact Disk cost the same as they did in 1988. The list price for most Compact Disk in 1988 was 15 dollars. Inflation easily explains the increase. You can't expect to pay 1988 prices in 2003. So I really do not see there being any high pricing trend although I'd have to sit down with the the actual average retail list price from the particular year and then the math with the annual inflation rate from each year to determine if Compact Disk cost more or less than they did 10 or 15 years ago.

IMO this is totally untrue. I as you know live in Canada. Prices for Cds here are, for new releases, 14-18$ CND. This translates into 9-12$ US. How can you explain this? And on the other side of the spectrum in the UK they pay much more for cds then NA's do.

There is alot of money in the MI and if they had lower prices they would be able to sell more copies. The highest priced cds in Canada are usually 20-25$ for classics or double discs, why are they so low here?
 
STING2 said:
I have yet to hear of a band go platinum because of File Sharing. I have friends that have struggled to get something going, and File Sharring sure has not helped. Again, there is no reason for a consumer to go out and pay 20 dollars for a product that he already owns through file sharing.

In several year-end lists last year there was this album Yankee Hotel Foxtrot by the band Wilco (released in Spring or so). Some other magazines, however, did not count the album as a best-of-this-year as it had been out for almost 2 years. When they recorded their album their label (Reprise, IIRC) did not deem it commercial enough and decided not to release it. The band then put the whole album on the Internet as a free download. Months (to a year) later and the album was finally released (on Nonesuch, IIRC, with a very ironic twist as it is a sublabel of the original label that did not want to release the recording). The result? It is their highest selling record of their carreer (entering the charts around #15 and immediately selling more than their last album had sold in its entirely in the USA). So file-sharing does increase sales and there are many people who want to buy an album even if they have MP3's of it.

Oh, and there is Weezer. They have also put their songs (or at least demo's of their songs) online and still continue to sell well (their last album Maladroit is Gold).

C ya!

Marty
 
Lots has been said to dispute STING's argument, but these quotes really put it in perspective:

STING2 said:
I dispute the studies which show that heavy users of file sharing buy more CDs than non-users. Remember, thats based on unscientific survey.
STING2 said:
My friends celebrate file sharing because they say they no longer have the need to buy CDs.


This next one has less to do with file-sharing as it does with cd-burning. If it's an exact copy (read non-MP3 sourced) then it's likely that your friend's sister had a copy from an original source, like an advance CD. In which case file-sharing had nothing to do with it.

STING2 said:
One of my best friends is a hardcore U2 fan. He has met the entire band, been to Bono's house and Windmill lane studio's.

Yet, his sister sent him a burned copy of ATYCLB two weeks before it was released. Its a perfect copy, I have listened to it and compared. He has never gone out to purchase ATYCLB despite the fact that U2 is his favorite band. If he can get for free, he feels no need to go out to the store and purchase it..


So, where's your argument? How is file-sharing hurting the record business?
 
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STING2, the Artists are going to continue to make music and they'll continue to make money one way or another, even as file sharing proliferates. The market is evolving.

Are you concerned that recorded music is going to disappear from the face of the Earth?

The folks at the RIAA simply haven't pulled their heads out of the arses yet and instead of trying to figure out how to adapt to the changing market they're making their last gasp attempt to stop the evolution. Ain't gonna happen.









------------------------------------
:eyebrow: Stamp out "silliness" :eyebrow:
 
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I'll state it to you again, people are downloading and then burning CDs instead of going to the store to purchase the product.

There have been some interesting examples that File Sharing has helped to promote a band and I'm sure that is true in a few cases currently. What I'm talking about is what will the NET effect be in 10 or 20 years time? The number of people with High speed internet access, CD burners, and file sharing software will grow significantly more than it is today.

If one can then throught that process get undegraded music, there will be no reason for them to go and purchase it at the store. If it is slightly degraded but in general sounds the same, the effect could still be the same.

When home taping came out, I never heard of anyone declaring they would never desire to buy records or tapes in the stores. Today with CD burning and File Sharing, there are loads of people who have stated to me that they have largely stopped buying compact disk. A trickle today, can well be a flood in this direction tomorrow.

Bonoman,

I can't explain why Compact Disk are so much cheaper in Canada than the USA except that it looks like the music business like to equate the US dollar to the Canadian dollar in terms of pricing. 14-18 dollars Canadian is about what the # price would be in the USA. Problem is the Canadian Dollar is not worth as much. This same thing has happened with U2 concert tickets in Canada. Their not priced correctly in comparison to American prices. Their either the same or lower when they should be higher because the Canadian dollar is weaker.

The lower price might stem from the fact that doing any type of business in Canada including promotion and distribution, and renting out Arena's and Stadiums, is also cheaper in Canada. When you overhead cost are cheaper at every level, then the price at the check out counter will be lower. Some of it has to also do with Demand in Canada for Compact Disk. Similar pricing to the USA adjusted for the currency rate may have been a failure in the past. Those that work in the USA but live in Canada have it made!
 
Pub Crawler,

Not that it would disappear completely but the effect would be to ruin the industry to a degree that many artist never ever become known to the public or decide to not pursue a career because the chances of succeeding dramatically decline because the ability to make a profit has been damaged.

By the way its not historically true that Artist only made money when they tour. Tours are expensive and back in the early 80s the average price of a ticket was only around 10 dollars. Most world tour would lose money. Again only the top artist would make serious money from touring, just like only the top artist get the high royalty rates.
 
meegannie said:
Fiel-sharing DOES lead to many people buying more music. I wouldn't have 90% of the cds I own if I hadn't been able to download a copy first. Most of the music I listen to is foreign, and the albums are released six to twelve months later in the US, if at all. Instead of paying $25+ to order it from overseas, I download it and burn it to CD. Then I buy it when it's finally released in the US. Why do I buy the CDs at all? Because I like liner notes, and because I like the bands enough to contribute to their album sales in the US. I love music, and it's aesthetic to own a real CD, just as a lot of music fans also buy releases on vinyl.

I also would not have gone to ANY of the dozens of concerts I went to last year and spent hundreds of dollars on merchandise if it hadn't been for file-sharing.

YES! exactly. i would NEVER have gotten into these bands if it werent for mp3s.

1. radiohead
2. pink floyd
3. sigur ros
4. beck

ok thats just four i could think of, but i also bought doves and coldplay and pretty much all the music i buy is from what ive downloaded first.

i will download mp3's till the cows come home. im going to load my computer with albums and albums worth of material, i dont give two shits about the recording industry. if they stopped with the shit they push theyd learn their approach is wrong.
 
Sting -- your argument about CD prices is a waste of time so stop using it. In 1987, I'm sure Joshua Tree cost $15. But a CD player at the time cost $500. Its not only inflation, its also supply and demand and the adoption of new technology. If you want to compare prices, compare the price of an $8 tape in 1987 to the price of a CD now. That's a 60% increase in price in 15 years. If economic inflation was at 60% over 15 years, we would have SERIOUS economic problems.

You can buy CDs for $10. Go to Disc-o-rama, the best record store in NYC where new CDs are only $10. And they are legit, liner notes and all. Its possible.
 
You bring up a good point with Supply and Demand. Certainly, the price has matched demand for past decade or so. Its only the last two years that CD sales have fallen. Some say its the lack of quality, others like me believe that the proliferation of file sharing and CD burners is a major contributing factor. The ability to get music for free has certainly reduced the demand for any music that one has to pay for, just as it would with any product or service.

Compact Disk have never been the same price as cassettes. Cassettes by 1991 were on average 11 dollars. I don't know about 1987, but I can assure you that I got a multiple disk changer Compact Disk for less than 200 dollars back in 1988 and a friend got a Compact Disk Walkman for less than 100 dollars.


Your assertion that 60% inflation would mean that we would be in trouble is false. I did caculate the cost of Joshua Tree Stadium tickets in 1987 and did the inflation math with each years annual inflation from 1987 to 2002. The result was a U2 Joshua Tree ticket at 19.50 in 1987 was a little over 30 dollars in 2002. That means that inflation from 1987 to 2002 is in general a little over 50%. Ok, not as high as 60%, but close enough.

But, your caculation of a 60% increase for an 8 dollar tape is wrong. If you were to equate the 8 dollar tape in 1987 with the 20 dollar Compact Disk in 2002, that is actually a 150% increase in price. I actually don't have cassette prices for 1987, but know they were 11 dollars by 1991.

Compact Disk are cheaper today than they were 15 years ago. I'd argue that their cheaper than they were 10 years ago when records were gone and cassettes were being pushed to the back. I have not done a caculation yet that would exactly show the difference in prices between 1992 and 2002 yet.

At best, you might be able to make an arguement that Compact Disk are overpriced by 4 or 5 dollars if you want to make them the equal of cassettes. I don't make that equation and think that at most Compact Disk are overpriced by about 1 or 2 dollars if at all.

If you can really get an album like ATYCLB for only 10 dollars(in the first 2 years of release) without it being a special sale or anything, realize the retailer is making little if any money selling it. U2 currently takes in 25% of the suggested retail price, in the USA for ATYCLB, of around 20 dollars. The 5 "corporate" members of U2 get about a buck each off the top. Then comes the charges for producers, engineers, record company, and anyone else that gets a cut before the album makes it to your local retailer.

After an album has been out for more than two years, many artist in the past gave their albums to record clubs at a reduced rate, with the artist recieving a reduced royalty rate as well. This gives retailers and others a better chance making good profit from and album that continues to sell well beyond its initial promotion or 2 year period of release. This would definite help explain some of the low prices at some retail outlets with slightly older or old product. At 10 dollars for a new U2 album, I'd estimate the retailer is making pennies if anything at all.
 
well for the fact that cds are much cheaper to make then cassetes it should be cheaper.

U2 take 25% of the suggested sales price...well simple lower the SSP. Listen all this is about is bottom line and the fact is that ppl in the MI are overpayed and if they were to have to take a pay cut then thats something they must accpet. We make say 50000 a year (if we are lucky) they make 10 million. Well i'm sorry but maybe the demand used to be there but it isnt anymore and for them to just jump up and down crying isnt going to do anything. Pay cuts happen and if you ask me within the next few years we will all see entertainers (music, TV, movies) and athletes taking pay cuts. The NFl allready has a cap, NHL looks to be going that way and maybe they should introduce that in the entertainment bus.
 
Sting,

I agree that the $11 tape in '87 is the same as the $17 CD in '03, *but* you cannot tell me that the cost of making a tape is the same as the cost of making a CD. It takes a few cents to make a compact disk these days, especially when they are being produced in such prolific quantities. The record companies are wasting huge amounts of money on senseless marketing and promotion and then pass that cost on to the consumers. So I should pay for Britney Spears', J Lo' s, Aguilera's, and boy bands' marketing?? No way.

And if all that money is not going to marketing, you are going to tell me that it costs that much to sell a CD for a decent profit?? Someone is surely getting rich off of the current prices. Whether it is the artist, record executive, or middle-man, the consumer is being charged too much and the advent of online music is showing that people are less likely to buy a CD with crap music on it and are demading better value.

Think about it this way: why do movies on DVD and audio CD's cost the same amount of money? Are you going to tell me that studio time costs as much as a full scale movie production? Yet the retail price is about the same. Why is that? Yes, I have already considered that they charged for the $8 movie ticket. Regardless of how much a movie makes, though, the DVD prices are relatively constant.

Could it be that the music business is keeping more of the profit than they really need to? Sounds likely to me.


AJ
 
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This is a business remember. U2 has every right to decide how much they want to be payed for its albums and concert tickets just as I have every right to charge what ever I feel is appropriate for products or services I produce myself. Its the option of the consumer of course to not purchase my product. It should not be the option of the consumer to duplicate and distribute my product for free if it damages my business.

Remember this is business and there is no such thing as being overpayed. The market in general decides how much people will make. If the proliferation of free product damages the Music business to a certain degree in the future, then we will be less likely to get to know talented artist or the next U2. Such artist or the next U2 will be less likely to pursue a music career and more likely to keep it as hobby that only their friends and maybe a few people in their local area will know about.

If the pie of money thats available shrinks its the up and coming acts that will suffer the most. The record companies will cling to their veterans who continue to sell. They will have less money to risk on the next U2. In fact, if such a situation had existed 25 years ago, I doubt any record companies would be going to Dublin to sign a new band. Few did it back then, and with less money there is no way any would of considered it.
 
Hawk269,

This is business and who are you or I to decide what is "needed". How would you like it if someone came in and cut your salary in half and told you it was because you did not need it. The Market decides the value of the product.

Is it wrong for U2 to ask 4 to 5 dollars per album sold? Do you have any Idea how much promotion cost in a hundred different countries around the planet? If you think its to expensive don't buy it. But who are you or anyone to decide how much someone sells their product for? Who are we to decide how much an artist charges for their product? Did you ever think about artist who only sell a few thousand copies of an album?

Again we live in a free market economy where the market determines the price of anything. I don't think you would like the planned economy of the Soviet Union where prices were "fixed" and people rather than a market attempted to determine what people should make.

Don't hold artist to a standard that you don't hold yourself or anyone else that owns their own business or sales their own products. If I decide to sell anything I own, I'll sell it for what ever amount of money I think the market can bare. Thats business.
 
Sting,

I am just describing the reality of the situation here. People want better prices or a better value for their money. You are defending the right of the people to determine these prices and, as a result, the fate of the record industry. Of course they have that right. I agree with that completely. Yet it will be the consumers who refuse to pay $20 for a CD with only one good song on it when they can download it instead.

So, when the record companies cry foul, maybe they should look in the mirror instead of blaming Napster and Kazaa. Maybe it is time to find some real talent - diverse artists with several good songs, who can tour and play well live. Maybe it is time to stop promoting bands like O-Town and N'Sync. The market is not willing to pay for one-hit wonders as much anymore and there is not a damn thing record companies can do about it.

As far as holding anyone to a standard, I will let the market determine the fate of these greedy bastards. They will get theirs when people stop buying their crap and it will signal the end of a corporate controlled oligopoly, which is today's music business. There's no need for price fixing when our market is perfectly capable of spoiling their party.

I don't want a planned economy. I look at online music as total freedom of choice in music. The challenge is for the industry to add more value to their current offering to justify the current prices.

Last, since when does art have to be a big business? Whether U2 would be around today if they did not have the incentive of being rich is pure conjecture on your part. I think they loved to play music, right from the start. The money was the gravy.

AJ
 
U2 may be around today, but its the record business that you have to thank for a big part of knowing who they are. There are a lot of people in the business that worked very hard against the odds to help U2 break worldwide. Besides incentive there are often financial obstacles and other promotion task that are to difficult for a garage band to overcome without record company support.

As the reason why there have been negative Compact Disk sales the past two years, I think the proliferation of file sharing and CD Burning is playing a huge role. I could make the same questions about the overall quality of music 5 years ago, yet 5 years ago the music business was booming.

I think that when people can get a desired product for free, its going to have a damaging impact on that business that is trying to sell the product no matter what the circumstances are.
 
STING2 said:
How would you like it if someone came in and cut your salary in half and told you it was because you did not need it.

Now this brings me back to the 1980s...

;)

Melon
 
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