Letters to the Editor
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Wow.
That's impressive. Really. I didn't know such arrogance was even possible. *snicker* The music industry really is teetering on the brink of explosion (if you'll pardon a mixed metaphor).
Money in that fund would be distributed to the record companies, and thereby to artists, according to statistics on how often songs are trading online
Oh, like the money that comes in from album sales, right? Meaning that the record companies would get 98% and artists would get 2%, if they're lucky? Recording artists only make money from concert appearances, dude, not from sales of their music (unless they sell HUGE numbers of CD's) - ask any musician signed to a contract. That nice arrangement you're touting would be great for us out here in internet land, but it wouldn't be any better for the people actually making the music. The only way they'll benefit is to switch to direct sales, as some are now doing. Combine THAT with the pay-monthly licensing idea, and you've got something revolutionary; something that would stand a very good chance of destroying the bloated music industry for good.
Which sounds wonderful to me. To hell with the maggots in suits already; it's time they found an honest living.
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Googly hippyness!
You could have picked a better example. As successful corporations go, I think Google is actually about as counter-culture and hippy as you're going to find. Much more so than Apple, to pick on your other poster child. If you wanted to hold up an example of a Silicon Valley standard that's as anti-hippy as any that exists, may I humbly submit Oracle, Cisco or 3-Com.
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Paul is completely right
Paul is completely right.
The argument that complementary industries don't owe each other money is correct. But, with the music industry it's completely different. A few tech businesses boomed in large part due to the exploitation of stolen (yes, STOLEN..pragmatically speaking it's STOLEN goods) property. That makes it a completely different scenario.
I also agree that the prevailing attitude is 'I will STEAL whatever I want online, screw the music biz suits' ... but this attitude is covered up by various faux-noble-sounding arguments on why it's ok to STEAL music. All of which I've heard. None of which stands up to critical thinking.
What about recording artists who spend a year or more devoting their lives to making an album, who rarely tour, only to have dickheads STEAL it online. I guess those people are out of luck, huh? Too bad.
No wonder popular music as an art is dead, or dying.
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Drop that dumb motherfucker from 20,000 ft
Right on to a Joshua Tree.
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It is sad...
"What about recording artists who spend a year or more devoting their lives to making an album, who rarely tour, only to have dickheads STEAL it"
Yes, it is terribly sad that after putting so much work into their music the standard contracts that most bands sign with their labels ensure that while all of the record companies investment will be recouped everything that might go to the bad will be eaten up by label fees, promotional costs, or simply excluded from the sales records on a technicality.
Did you know, for example, that Thomas Dolby didn't make a penny off of "Blinded By Science" because most of the sales were of the EP, which was, according to his contract was a promotioanl item (even though it was sold at retail for $5.00) so the profits from the sales did not go against his advance, nor did he get anything for them once his advance was paid back.
So yeah, it is sad when people steal money from artists.
Rarely touring makes it worse, since your label doesn't usually get a peice of the t-shirt and poster sales, which are about the only place most bands make any money.
Now personally, my iPod is filled with music that I have ripped from CDs that I purchased, which is perfectly legal, so I don't see why Apple should pay the record companies AGAIN for that. I might start downloading music now that there are some legal DRM free options though.
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Stepping outside concepts of property
While record sales have definitely dropped and will likely continue to drop as a result of the bad attitudes of record companies, I'd still say that the record companies are looking at this the wrong way.
The fact of the matter is that when I want to purchase a song, if I have a secure, fast and convenient access point to that music, I will purchase it. And when I don't, I will look for other means to acquire it. If the music industry would get out of its own way, they could make a decent living. They don't want a decent living. They want a never-ending gravytrain fueled by young talent and cheap labor.
I just cannot stop laughing at the record industry and their humorless, greedy attitude. This is what comes of a society obsessed with concepts of property. If all you understand is ME, MINE, OURS, the internet will never make sense. Because, at its fundamental level, online music is just information melted down from keyboards and instruments into kilobytes. That's all it is. And that information can have a value equivalent to Viagra spam or the works of Shakespeare. We choose that value. But whatever the value, it's still more or less endlessly copyable once it hits digital technology. The concept of property loses its finite aspect.
The basic principle of music and art has long rested on its ideals, realistic or not. We buy music from musicians that stand for something, that rest outside the norms of everyday capitalism. So when the market turns against you, you can't both keep your cache as a social outsider and STILL clamor for bigger and bigger piles of money. (And, let's face it, U2 is effing RICH. No one can tell me that I'm taking food out of their childrens' mouths.)
If you keep treating your customer base like retarded captive prisoners, they are going to rebel, because you're not selling them a necessity, you're selling them a luxury.
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To say that file-sharing isnt stealing...
Is to say that music and other forms of art have no worth, and that the artistst that produce them add no unique value.
Farhad, would you email me a word version of your new book, please? I hear its good, and I'd like to share it with all my friends. Thanks in advance.