FUCK CRASS!!!!!!!!!!!

After reading this I think you might throw all your Crass albums away. Please pass this on to others.

2 days ago, Mediafire advised Anarcho-Punk.net that a complaint concerning a copyright law was filed against Anarcho-Punk.net at Mediafire related to 7 albums by Crass. We're talking about albums released 30 years ago and not the remastered stuff.



In the result of this, Mediafire deleted all CRASS albums but they have also banned multiple accounts of Anarcho-Punk.net and Pirate-Punk.net. In total, over 3000 albums are now deleted because of their greed.

The following albums are concerned by Crass complaint :
Crass - 1978 - Reality Asylum (7'')
Crass - 1978 - The Feeding Of The 5,000 (Lp)
Crass - 1984 - You're Already Dead
Crass - 1979 - Stations Of The Crass (Lp)
Crass - 1980 - Nagasaki Nightmare (7'')
Crass - 1979 - Peel Session (7'')
Crass - 1981 - Penis Envy (Lp)



Update : during the last hours this article have been shared a lot of time, including on Crass' and Southern Records' official Facebook pages. They deleted all posts and banned everyone who shared the link. Obviously, they don't want their fans to know that crass is a pro-copyright band, they prefer to lie and pretend to be fighting against capitalism. Crass, who used to be a band against censorship and fighting for freedom of speech, have betrayed their ideas again and they are now censoring everyone who dare to critise them.


- A capitalist law

Crass are using a capitalist law named Digital Millenium Copyright Act to close our Mediafire account. The anti-capitalist movement has been fighting against this law since its creation.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Mi ... yright_Act

There is no more difference between the opportunistic methods of Crass and music industry's big labels like EMI, Sony or Universal.


- Over 3000 albums deleted because of Crass

After the copyright complaint by Crass, over 2000 albums are now deleted from Anarcho-Punk.net, a website built by anarcho-punks and where it's clearly written everywhere that bands can just contact us at any time to ask us to remove their albums. On top of all, 1000 other albums of french punk bands (who are also agreeing with file sharing) from Pirate-Punk.net were deleted because they were on the same Mediafire accounts.


- The world's biggest anarcho-punk music database destroyed because of Crass

Today, because of the band who is bragging about being the precursor of anarcho-punk, almost all albums of the world's biggest database of anarcho-punk music is destroyed. That's over 2000 albums from bands who were not against file sharing which are now offline because of the traitors from CRASS who have decided to use to their advantage the capitalist system they were fighting against.

During the 4 years anarcho-punk.net has been online, hundreds of bands showed their support to our project and to file sharing - we could write a very big list and that would include a lot of cult bands from thecanarcho-punk scene and beyond.
But Crass decided to impose their opinion against file sharing to the majority of bands who supported it. Hundreds of bands just lost their right to be shared for free because of only one band who was against it.


- Crass, a capitalist band who betrays what it always stood for

Yes, I'm really talking about Crass, this anarcho-hypocritical band who's bragged about giving away albums for free in their biography during the '80's. They even produced a couple of albums specifically to give them away, including 20,000 free copies of the album "Sheep Farming". They've also bragged about never touching a single dollar of profit in the whole history of their band and always selling albums at the cost of production. If internet and file sharing existed in 1980, Crass would have supported it and they would have given their albums away for free through file sharing.

Is that their definition of "fighting against capitalism" ? These people pretended to want an anarchist society but they can't even take a friendly agreement between anarchists without using capitalist laws and system. They pretend to fight for anarchism but they can't even act the same way we would in an anarchist society.

Crass is now officially and undeniably a capitalist band who betrayed all of their ideals. They're now using capitalism to defend their own interests : personal profits, whatever is the price to pay, even if other bands should be penalized by their actions and even if it implies licking the asses of the bourgeoisie. We notice the same logic from the big capitalist companies that don't care about others in their ultimate quest for maximum profits.


- Anarcho-Punk.Net, a website respecting artists where they can easily contact us to remove their albums

Crass could have simply contacted Anarcho-Punk.Net and asked us to remove their albums. A friendly agreement could easily have been made and their albums would have been removed in less than 24 hours. It's clearly written on our website that Anarcho-Punk.Net will remove any album if the band or the label asks - the moderators have done this many times during the past. Instead of doing that, CRASS preferred to use the CAPITALIST SYSTEM and it's LAWS against anarchists who are supposed to be their comrades.

In 4 years of existence, it is the first time that a band files a complaint against us at Mediafire, without even taking the time to contact us. They prefer to make an agreement with capitalists rather than seeking an agreement with anarchists. It's very ironic that the only band to ever use copyrights against us is the band who's selling the most albums among all those present on our website.


- A personal revenge against a website who dared to critisize Crass

The members of Anarcho-Punk.Net strongly critisized the change in Crass' attitude during the past few years. The criticism turned around the attitude of Steve Ignorant that had been doing an over-priced tour where he made tens of thousands of dollars in profits. $25 per ticket, 2000 tickets sold per show, and around 20 shows. Do the math. And that's not even including thousands more made off albums/merch sold. Members of the forum also critisized the price that Crass are selling their remastered albums for.

We, at Anarcho-Punk Collective, think that it's understandable that some members are perplexed to see a band making so much money when they built their reputation on being a non-profit band. We also think it's understandable to question the price of a remastered album multiple times more expensive than the original used to be - specially when this band used to print "do not pay more than 3$" on their albums. On top of all, we feel that the other 2000 downloadable albums shouldn't have to pay the price for Crass' decision to fight file sharing. We also feel that because members of this forum critisized Crass, it isn't a valid reason to act the way they did and not even try to contact us to sincerely ask us to remove their albums.

During the discussion with Crass (see below) our interlocutor insisted on the fact that members of Anarcho-Punk.Net forum "hates Crass anyway". All this makes us believe that they filed a copyright complaint against us because they had something against Anarcho-Punk.Net and wanted to take revenge because we dared to critisize their attitude - a strongly capitalist attitude, let's admit it.

After we told Crass we were from Anarcho-Punk.Net during our discussion, they became somewhat antagonistic and then suddenly stopped answering us.

That might explain why Crass acted like that against Anarcho-Punk.Net but doesn't do anything about the MILLIONS of other websites that are sharing their albums, a lot of them even making money from the music they share.


- Crass pretend to be against copyrights laws

If you visit Crass' official Facebook page, you will find out that 50% of the things the band "likes" on Facebook are anti-copyrights groups. For example, they have been strongly standing against SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) but on the other hand they told us that they believe an author should have absolute control over his work, which is exactly what SOPA aims to do. Actually, without laws like SOPA it wouldn't be possible for Crass to request their albums to be removed and they're claiming they should have the right to do it. But this right couldn't be possible without laws like SOPA, so it's pretty hypocrite for them to pretend to be fighting against it.


- Discussion with Crass on Facebook

I contacted the official Crass account on Facebook and I waited for their answer before posting this article. Here's their answer where they clearly admit having filed a complaint with Mediafire while supporting that artists should control their copyrights. They obviously have an huge grudge against Anarcho-Punk.Net because the community dared to strongly critisize their capitalist methods and the thousands of dollars of profit they are making from anarchism. Revolution for money, like they said.






- Lies

Crass defend themselves with numerous lies, beginning by pretending that they have not been able to contact Anarcho-Punk.Net directly. Then they end up contradicting themselves while pretending to have contacted us via Southern Records. This is totally false, neither the band or the label contacted us a single time. If they did, we would have just deleted all of their albums like we have always done with similar cases in the past. We don't like what they have became and we would have agreed to remove their albums if they asked us, since it could only prove that they have become greedy.

Crass also claim to be selling albums at production cost (a big lie when we see the price they are selling their new remastered albums). Do they seriously think people are stupid enough to believe that even 30 years after the publishing date of their albums they still have not sold enough albums to pay back their production cost during the '80's, which would justify their opposition to file sharing of albums released around 1980 ???

They pretend that it's not their fault and Mediafire doesn't delete an account just because of a single complaint. Well, it's not a single complaint but SEVEN different complaints about SEVEN different Crass albums. I repeat it again : Crass is the ONLY BAND to EVER file a complaint against us in 4 years so THEY and ONLY THEY are responsible for the closing of our account and the removal of over 3000 anarcho-punk albums.


Consequences for Anarcho-Punk.Net

We appealed our case on mediafire and they confirmed to us that our account will remain locked. Now we must move to a new kind of system that will be based on a torrent tracker or a FTP system. Either way, none of the albums will ever get deleted but it will cost us an around $200 for a new server, additionally to what we are already paying. We're not Crass, we're not full of money so we will need to find new ways of raising money since we can't just sell a bunch of overpriced remastered albums and sue people sharing them. That's the price to pay to stay true and authentic to what we believe in, but we're willing to pay the price. Unlike Crass, the ideals we believe in and what we stand for is worth way more than thousands of dollars.

Want to help us ? Send a donation or buy a t-shirt from http://english.ni-dieu-ni-maitre.com


- Spread the word about it

To all of you, like me, that had huge respect for what Crass were, what they stood for, what they were fighting against... Here's what our "anarcho-punk heroes" have become, here's how low they have sunk, willing to do anything to make more money - exactly what they have always pretended to be the antithesis of. A band that used to make no profit at all has now become a band who's trying to make the maximum possible profit. If that's not your definition of anarchism then take a stand against it and let's show them that's not what anarcho-punk is all about.

This article must be spread widely. Copy it in your blogs, post it on your facebook page, show it to your friends. We must spread the word about what Crass has become. This band doesn't have anything to do with anarchism anymore and it must stop being considered as an icon of the anarcho-punk scene but instead be considered as what they really are : traitors, impostors, capitalists and SELLOUTS.

Let's give them the reputation they deserve.