Downhill Battle

Quarterly Report, Fourth Quarter 2003*

*extended quarter, covering August 26-December 31, 2003

Project Reports

In-Store Labeling Project
    -6,000 CD labels sent to activists in US, Canada, and around the world. Many thousands more have been downloaded and printed. [LINK]

Peer-to-Peer Legal Defense Fund
    -Downhill Battle developed a unique peer-to-peer system to distribute donations directly to recipients.
    -Nearly $4,000 was raised for people who have been targeted by the RIAA lawsuits. [LINK]
    -The Defense Fund received coverage in several major newspapers. [LINK]

Flyer Campaign
    -Thousands of flyers downloaded, printed, and posted around the world.
    -16 original flyers now available in 3 languages. [LINK]

Stop RIAA Lawsuits Coalition (stopriaalawsuits.com)
    -The Coalition brought together almost 200 websites to call for a boycott of RIAA music until the lawsuits end. [LINK]

Interview Series
    -Began a series of interviews with prominent independent musicians, record labels, and other music luminaries. [LINK]

Music Player
    -Partnered with OEbase to provide the Downhill Battle music player, which features streaming music from independent labels and unsigned musicians. Listeners can buy albums from OEbase through the player. [LINK]

Press Coverage

-Quoted or reported on in many major newspapers including: the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, San Francisco Chronicle, New York Post, Associated Press, Reuters, and CNET.com. [LINK]

-Appeared on COMCAST television and FOX25 Boston.

-William F. Buckley said about us, “An organization called Downhill Battle (downhillbattle.org) fights strenuously for the Jane Does of this world and helps to mobilize legal defense and a legal and moral armory of arguments.” [LINK]

Website Statistics

-Over 300,000 unique visitors to downhillbattle.org since its launch on August 26.

-Over 250,000 unique visitors to whatacrappypresent.com in two weeks. The site topped blogdex.net and popdex.com for several days.

-iTunes iSbogus is the most linked iTunes-related site on the internet other than iTunes itself according to Google. The page also topped blogdex.net and popdex.com at its peak. [LINK]

-Approximately 3,500 emails written this quarter.

Quotes of the Quarter

-THEIRS: In a Reuters article, RIAA spokesman Jonathan Lamy said about Downhill Battle: "It's an uphill battle for these folks to offer anything worthwhile." [LINK]

-OURS: After the RIAA hired the Director of the ATF, Holmes was quoted in the NY Post: "If they have the same success stopping downloading as the ATF had stopping illegal gun sales, I don't think downloaders have anything to worry about." [LINK]

Failures

-Downhill Battle did not meet its quarterly objective of eliminating all five major record labels. This goal has been rescheduled for completion in Q1 2004.

-Downhill Battle has no money.