Kiss’ Gene Simmons: “Be litigious. Sue everybody. Take their homes, their cars.”

While participating in a panel discussion at MIPCOM 2010, Gene Simmons, bassist of hard rock outfit Kiss, had some harsh suggestions and comments on the effects and his suggested response to file sharing:

Make sure your brand is protected. Make sure there are no incursions. Be litigious. Sue everybody. Take their homes, their cars. Don’t let anybody cross that line. The music industry was asleep at the wheel and didn’t have the balls to sue every fresh-faced, freckle-faced college kid who downloaded material. And so now we’re left with hundreds of thousands of people without jobs. There’s no industry.

Simmons went on to tell a parable about the grasshopper and an octopus, no wait, it was this:

But that little fox went back with a free egg and told all the other little foxes about it, and then the foxes overran the farm, killed all the chickens, took all the eggs, and didn’t pay for it. Now the farmer lost his farm. His wife divorced him and went with another farmer who was smarter. The kids ran off because the spineless farmer didn’t have enough sense to kill the fox. The trucks that delivered the chickens-they’re all out of business. The stores that sold them-they’re out of business. Why? Because of one goddamn cute little fox. So don’t let any cute little foxes get near your henhouse!

Just in case you weren’t following this one, file sharers are the fox and I guess, music is the egg. The chicken represents Stonewall Jackson.
You can find Ars Technica’s more detailed analysis here.
Source While participating in a panel discussion at MIPCOM 2010, Gene Simmons, bassist of hard rock outfit Kiss, had some harsh suggestions and comments on the effects and his suggested response to file sharing:

Make sure your brand is protected. Make sure there are no incursions. Be litigious. Sue everybody. Take their homes, their cars. Don’t let anybody cross that line. The music industry was asleep at the wheel and didn’t have the balls to sue every fresh-faced, freckle-faced college kid who downloaded material. And so now we’re left with hundreds of thousands of people without jobs. There’s no industry.

Simmons went on to tell a parable about the grasshopper and an octopus, no wait, it was this:

But that little fox went back with a free egg and told all the other little foxes about it, and then the foxes overran the farm, killed all the chickens, took all the eggs, and didn’t pay for it. Now the farmer lost his farm. His wife divorced him and went with another farmer who was smarter. The kids ran off because the spineless farmer didn’t have enough sense to kill the fox. The trucks that delivered the chickens-they’re all out of business. The stores that sold them-they’re out of business. Why? Because of one goddamn cute little fox. So don’t let any cute little foxes get near your henhouse!

Just in case you weren’t following this one, file sharers are the fox and I guess, music is the egg. The chicken represents Stonewall Jackson.
You can find Ars Technica’s more detailed analysis here.
Source

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