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The Virtual Tip Jar
kemokid writes: "At last, an example of what Courtney Love was talking about. Fairtunes is a site set up to allow users to tip musicians directly. You can read the Music Dish news story about it." $269 and change donated so far, I'm interested to see where this one goes.
What struck me about Coutrney Love's interview was that so much of her concept of an artist is derived from the manner in which hollywood and the recording industry treat artists.
When she uses terms like "creative person", or talks about how good recording execs are at masssaging the egos of their "talent", she's revealing how much she has bought into the whole system of maintaining stables of "talent". I mean really, who says artists have to be treated like gods, or treated by fans, distributors, managers in the manner the recording industry treats them? What Courtney Love is really saying, is that she likes the way the recording industry execs treats her, and wants internet content companies to massage her ego in the same way. Whether this is how all artists want to be treated is a different matter altogether.
The nonsense about the sound quality of MP3s preventing someone from enjoying the performance is another strawman. The problem generally is that someone used a bad encoder, or a damaged recording to make the MP3. If one does it appropriately, MP3s have very good sound quality. If you're listening to something interesting, even an LP makes for an interesting listen. If you're listening to bad music, using a better format won't change anything.
This attitude towards technology is not surprising at all. It feeds in perfectly with the strategy of the recording industries, where increasingly bad content (and yeah, I'll call it content if I want to Courtney, little of the mass entertainment produced by the music industry counts as art in my book) is released using increasingly sophisticated technology. Witness the quality of films produced by Hollywood, it has been steadily declining, as the quality of special effects and distribution media becomes better. Something most people have seen occur on the web, flashy sites, dumb content, high co-ordination with the point when LA become home to web-development companies.
In sum, I think Courtney makes some great points in the essay. The distribution system used by the music industry is broken, and serves only their own purposes. It would be great to see an independent distribution mechanism arise which is efficient, and capable of rewarding the people who are most important to a music recording (or a book for that matter). Some of them may well require managers, or editors, to guide them (clearly Courtney excepts to have someone like this), but this fucntion should not be foisted on the distribution company. Why should artists who are mature enough to handle themselves, have to see some of their earnings diverted towards paying psychologist-managers to look after enfant terribles? Why should consumers have to pay more either? If the artist requires therapy, they should foot their own bill.
The problem is, pop artists rely more on a cult of personality than their art. The recording industry loves it because they control the media that creates personalities (Hansen, Britney Spears, Jenifer Lopez, Leonardo DiCaprio). I'm more interested in the substance. So I'm not particularly interested in what Courtney Love does, but rather what she produces.
-- Equity lord of the Trill Consortium
What's wrong with middlemen is that unless they add significant value to the transaction, they are parasites. If so, everyone else involved would be strictly better off if they were eliminated. If the middlemen eat 90% of the transaction costs (by no means unreasonable if you're talking about music), if the musician could deal directly with the consumer, you could quintuple the amount the musician gets, while halving the amount the consumer pays.
As to middlemen, let them find jobs where they are producing something of value, or performing a service, or even being middlemen in a transaction where they can add value (e.g. almost anything where the product can't be distributed instantly anywhere for practically nothing).
If you think our economic system is built upon shuffling money around endlessly without actually producing anything of worth, maybe you should study some economics. Think about where the money is coming from at the start of the transaction, and where it could go if it weren't being siphoned off every step of the way. People who think that adding frictional costs to transactions is a good thing ("it's food on someone's table!") are the same sort of people who think "I can't be overdrawn, I still have checks left!"
- Can see total contribs to date for entire site
- Can see total contribs to date for individual artists
- Can contribute via credit card
- Marketspeak free (the fine print re: credit card fees is refreshingly clear and frank)
- Tip amounts are free-form entry (i.e. no "$10, $100 or $1000" drop down)
- Can leave message to send to artist (of course proof that they read it is missing, but whaddya gonna do)
- Very simple and fast site
Some of the music I own is so good I'd be willing to use a site like this to tip even after buying the album.I have to wonder though: What do the artist's contracts look like? Do they have to split these tips with their labels because they are revenues generated from jointly produced work? I can see how they'd get around this if I were tipping a band member (just a person-to-person transaction). But I'm tipping by band name--not really the same thing.
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Linux MAPI Server!
http://www.openone.com/software/MailOne/
(Exchange Migration HOWTO coming soon)
I wrote an essay on why I think this is a viable economic model for all IP based on the self-interest of the donor. Personally, I like to call the general concept "mass-market busking" and any such freely-redistributable product "buskware".
In short, the reason you donate is that it sends a message to the world that there is money to be had in making something you like. You aren't donating primarily to support one specific producer, but to reward, and thus encourage, the behavior of making such products and releasing them for free distribution.
The key to making it work is for each buskware producer to give full public disclosure of how much money they receive, with as much information about which product it was for as is available. This is the payoff for the donor, as other people can look at this and think "Hey! He's making money at it, I should try, too!" (conversely, they are discouraged from following the example of people who don't make an adequate profit).
Music is something of a special case, as most music isn't tailored to a particular audience, and people generally don't seem to prefer that it is, but at the very least you are encouraging musicians to believe that they can distribute their music freely, without signing on with a big label.
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Despite rumors to the contrary, I am not a turnip.
This is what Gene Kan of Gnutella was talking about in the "Future of Digital Music" hearing I believe: incentivizing "pirates" to create new legitimate business models. Well here's one. A virtualization of the street performer's protocol. Think of a street performer: some people walk by and drop a coin in a hat, others do nothing, thereby technically "pirating" the performer's music without compensation. The recording industry's answer is to jail everybody who doesn't pay, or create some cumbersome locks on the music so that nobody will want to even listen to it, and the whole business is driven away and dissolves. A protocol like this recognizes that some people *won't* pay, but those with a good heart will. I recognizes you simply can't *stop* people from not paying, but you *can* make it easy for those who want to.
Even better, this money goes *right* to the artist (sounds like it at least) circumventing every middle-man down the line slicing his share off. I think this could turn the tables so that now *artists* are in control, and instead pay for the services of the recording industry.
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
I will use tipping in New York city as an example of how this can be a huge success.
$269 is a good gesture, but its only that -- a gesture. That doesn't pay bills, keep food on the table, or make it worth the hassle for the artist to keep on creating...reality, artists need money -- real money.
Most of my friends in NYC have worked as waiters at one time or the other and currently do so now while in school. One of them is a bright kid who is currently working on Nanotech research at the Rochester Institute of Technology yet he frequently waits tables while in school instead of looking for a better job.
Why is this?
In New York city, everybody tips. There is a social stigma associated with people who do not tip. When Hilary Clinton ate a meal at a restuaraunt and didn't tip, it made front page news in some tabloids. Because of this it is normal for waiters to make anything from $100 to $200 a night depending on how busy the restaurant is. Working five days a week that is comparable to what most people make after a gruelling 4 year degree in college.
I think this is a good first step, but we need to improve on this idea. You can't really count on the generosity of others to make a living. What if waitresses didn't get a salary but instead relied entirely on tips?
They do, most waiters/waitresses make half of minimum wage. Obviously no one is making a living on $80 a week (after taxes) for 40 hours of work.
How do convince people that they are ethically obligated to donate money into this tip jar?
Easy, bombard people with information about tip sites until they feel socially obligated to do so. If all 20 million Napster users suddenly started getting hit with banner ads advocating tipping the artists whose music they were downloading, how many do you think wouldn't? Especially if the payment process was easy. Heck, if I could click a link from Napster everytime I downloaded a good song to throw a dollar or two at the artist I would. Multiply that by a few million and you have a new distribution model that pays artists a lot more than the current butt-fucking that the RIAA gives artists.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
I think this sort of thing could have some serious potential.
:-> ) when they know that he is the one getting the money, rather than some middle man.
The thing about these sorts of scheme is that they believe that fundamentally most people are honest, as was demonstrated by King. The record industry (and movie) work on the principal that if people can steal it they will.
I believe that the latter arguement has got human nature fundamentally wrong. I don't mind paying for a CD/Video but what I do mind is the fact that these things cost so much and most of the money goes to the middle men. This is especially true with CDs when the artists get relatively little.
This sort of thing works because most people don't mind paying Steven King 1USD a chapter (as long as there arn't too many chapters
The same could work for music. When we are all downloading music direct from the artists we cercumvent the distibution companies, removing them froom the loop. Most people would be willing to pay a reasonable amount direct to the band on an honour basis, and with costs so low you wouldn't have to ask for much.
I live in York (england) and at the Minster (big church) they don't charge you to look around (partly because they can't), but they do request that everyone make a voluntary donation of a suggested amount, and most people do. Admitidly it being religious probably helps, but I have seen a similar scheme used for other historic buildings. This works because people are generally willing to pay for what they get.
The same is true for musicians, artists, writers, movie makers and software writers. If people like what you have done they will more than likely pay for it because they want more.
What people object to is paying through the nose for a CD only to find out that it is rubbish when they get home.
With the advent of digital distribution for music, books and films (digi projectors and broardband?) we could (eventually) see the sidelining of the distributers, and money going direct to artists on an honour system. At which point piracy becomes moot and everyone is happy (except the RIAA and MPAA of course).
A little utopian (and rather long winded), but we can hope. King has already shown that it can work for the well known artists, it just remains to be seen how it scales down to the up and comming ones who have no publicity machine or well known name. Mabey.
Paul Leader