Lower prices mean lower quality: Producers
Lower prices mean lower quality: Producers
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Sony BMG International's local agents in Jakarta have responded with confusion on Monday at last week's announcement by the Indonesian Recorders and Traders Association that they would start selling original CDs, VCDs, and DVDs for between Rp 10,000 and Rp 12,500 on local market in a bid to compete with pirated copies that are sold for around half that amount.
Current market prices for licensed imports range from Rp 75,000 to Rp 90,000, while recordings of local artists by local CD producers sell for Rp 35,000 to Rp 45,000.
Sony BMG International's assistant printing and promotion manager, Sundari, told The Jakarta Post that it would be "hard to sell CDs at such a low cost due the high outflow for taxes, royalties, and production costs."
Musica Studio's production officer, Yus, also cited production costs as a factor making it impossible to sell quality CDs, VCDs or DVDs at such low prices.
"The disks are made of plastic, which are derived from petroleum products, and the price of oil just keeps going up," he said Monday.
Bambang Arbiantoro, operations manager for Sony BMG International, confirmed that there was "no way" that production costs could be lowered enough to sell at the prices suggested by the association without decreasing quality.
"We wouldn't dare downgrade the quality of production," he said. "What is clear is that price reduction cannot be achieved by lowering production costs or cutting royalties."
Sundari agreed that any reduction in royalties would be "grossly unfair" to the artists who created the music.
"The company has already reduced the price of albums by domestic artists to as low as Rp 35,000, which is already cutting into the company's profit margin. If we had to reduce the price further, that would mean lessening artist's incomes."
Bambang said that the technology used to produce CDs is the same, regardless of whether they are originals or pirate copies. However, the quality of materials used is quite different.
"Basically there is no difference in the technology used by licensed recording companies and pirates. The pirates simply downgrade the quality of materials used to make the CDs," he explained, adding that his company always used the highest quality materials.
He said that an original audio CD has a thin acrylic layer to protect the injection-molded piece of clear polycarbonate plastic from the laser points of CD players when the discs are played. This protective coating is not present in most pirated audio CDs, meaning they are easily damaged even after being played only a few times, he said, adding that this can also affect the quality of the CD player. Another problem with pirated CDs is that the polycarbonated plastic used is often recycled, resulting in poor quality.
He also cited the production value of packaging for original recordings. "Original CDs are sold with jewel and polystyrene boxes, which adds value to the CD itself, while pirated copies use common printing technology," said Bambang.