good riddance! Hopefully they'll shut-down.

Wasn't Warner found guilty of fixing the price of a CDs in 2002? (the answer is yes) Maybe that has something to do with the decrease in profit. If your illegally inflated profits are suddenly subject to market forces your profit will decline with or without digital downloads.

Aren't they still making a profit? (yes) Maybe if Warner Music started treating people who want music online as customers instead of criminals (I BUY music online, but still have to deal with DRM BS) they would fare better on the balance sheet.

The music industry needs to face the music: They are no longer in a product-based industry, they are now supplying services. The music CEOs should look to the Rust Belt of midwest to see what happens when you resist such a change in the market.

Poor - Poor Warner Music_

Let's all cry and feel sorry for Warner Music ONLY making $150 million thru music downloads_

[sarcasm] Damn - I really wish they had made at least $250 million_ [/sarcasm]

Right now there are a lot of companies with aging execs that, try as they might, just don't get technology. This was fine when you could just hire techs to keep up, but when the very paradigm changes and you continue to try and apply the same old strategies b/c in truth you have not idea what you're doing, well, you need to either cut away the old growth or risk rotting out the whole thing. This is a very simple example of a management issue and I'm sure in 5-10 years when we look back it'll be an obvious text book example.

Yeah, shut them all down. We don't need no stinking music.

It's more than just needing to treat their customers with greater respect or easing up on DRM or embracing new technology. Sure, it's those too, but there's something a h*** of a lot bigger: quality. Most people I talk to about music express one or both of two sentiments: that new, big-label music sucks, and that the best new music out there is coming from independent labels and artists delivering their own music, direct to the customer.

The big-five labels focus on piracy and the lower profits of digital downloads because they can't bear to face the fact that they don't seem to be any good at attracting or cultivating talent. Maybe they were when they were younger, or maybe the people who could have long since retired, but those who are running things now just can't hack it. Until this changes the big labels are going to remain in trouble.

You've hit it square on the head. The big labels don't want to accept that the independents are regularly releasing a better product, and that's where the customers are going.

I don't want the majors to completely crumble. I just want them to suffer a great deal. A near death experience will usually bring about change. Let's see what it does to the major labels.