Slashdot Mirror
Musicians on Internet & Filesharing
reverseengineer writes "A Pew Internet & American Life survey asked (large PDF) 809 artists and 2,755 musicians, songwriters, and publishers about how they use the Internet, and whether it has been beneficial or detrimental to their success. Results (larger PDF) are quite interesting, with near 50-50 splits on a variety of questions involving fair use and filesharing. A quote from Pew's summary: 'Across the board, artists and musicians
are more likely to say that the internet has made it possible for them to make more
money from their art than they are to say it has made it harder to protect their work
from piracy or unlawful use.' Here is the NY Times summary [ Free registration blah blah ] of the survey."
Pew File-Sharing Survey Gives a Voice to Artists
By TOM ZELLER Jr.
Published: December 6, 2004
The battle over digital copyrights and illegal file sharing is often portrayed as a struggle between Internet scofflaws and greedy corporations. Online music junkies with no sense of the marketplace, the argument goes, want to download, copy and share copyrighted materials without restriction. The recording industry, on the other hand, wants to squeeze dollars - by lawsuit and legislation, if necessary - from its property.
Advertisement
The issue, of course, is far subtler than this, but one aspect of the caricature is dead on: the artists are nowhere to be found. A survey released yesterday by the Pew Internet and American Life Project, an arm of the Pew Research Center in Washington, aims to change that. The report, "Artists, Musicians and the Internet," combines and compares the opinions of three groups: the general public, those who identify themselves as artists of various stripes (including filmmakers, writers and digital artists) and a somewhat more self-selecting category of musicians.
Most notably, it is the first large-scale snapshot of what the people who actually produce the goods that downloaders seek (and that the industry jealously guards) think about the Internet and file-sharing.
Among the findings: artists are divided but on the whole not deeply concerned about online file-sharing. Only about half thought that sharing unauthorized copies of music and movies online should be illegal, for instance. And makers of file-sharing software like Kazaa and Grokster may be unnerved to learn that nearly two-thirds said such services should be held responsible for illegal file-swapping; only 15 percent held individual users responsible.
The subset of 2,755 musicians, who were recruited for the survey through e-mail notices, announcements on Web sites and flyers distributed at musicians' conferences, had somewhat different views. Thirty-seven percent, for instance, said the file-sharing services and those who use them ought to share the blame for illegal trades. Only 17 percent singled out the online services themselves as the guilty parties.
"This should solve the problem once and for all about whether anyone can say they speak for all artists," said Jenny Toomey, the executive director of the Future of Music Campaign, a nonprofit organization seeking to bring together the various factions in the copyright wars.
Ms. Toomey, whose group helped draft part of the survey, believes that artists are usually underrepresented in the debates about the high-tech evolution of the industry.
"These decisions need to be made with artists at the table," she said, adding, "it's not enough for both sides to reach out and get an artist who supports their position."
Indeed, big-ticket acts like Metallica and Don Henley have famously denounced illegal file sharing. And the Recording Industry Association of America, which has filed thousands of lawsuits against individual file-sharers, often invokes musicians as prime movers in its crusade.
"Breaking into the music business is no picnic," its Web site reads. "Piracy makes it tougher to survive and even tougher to break through."
File-sharers, on the other hand, often point to high-profile performers like Moby and Chuck D who acknowledge that the online swap meet has provided them with valuable exposure.
"I know for a fact that a lot of people first heard my music by downloading it from Napster or Kazaa," Moby wrote in his online journal last year. "And for this reason I'll always be glad that Napster and Kazaa have existed."
Without questioning the convictions of artists who feel strongly one way or another, however, the Pew survey appears to show that the creative set is both mindful of the benefits the Internet promises and ambivalent about the abuses it facilitates.
"The overall picture," said Lee Rainie, the director of the Pew Project, "is that the musician-ar
That all the statistics have a 4% margin of error. With that much error it can really turn the tables any way they want.
- Your stupidity got you into this mess, why can't it get you out? -Will Rogers
From the summary:
Results (larger PDF) are quite interesting, with near 50-50 splits on a variety of questions involving fair use and filesharing.
OK, so everything is split in half.
'Across the board, artists and musicians are more likely to say that the internet has made it possible for them to make more money from their art than they are to say it has made it harder to protect their work from piracy or unlawful use.'
OK, they think the internet is good...
So... which is it??
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
Yes the internet is a great way to distribute music. However this does not mean its OK to download music without the creators permission. It is their choice where and how their creation is made available, not yours.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
The artists that lose big are the big artists - but most artists are struggling. The big challenge for 98% of artists isn't combating theft, but rather getting their name and work known enough to be in demand. Personally, I believe that any artist looking to get recognized would be wise to put their work out on the peer-to-peer network, with links to their websites in the filename info. Unfortunately, people like the RIAA (who represent the other 2%) who are making this kind of thing difficult.
Its legality cannot be discussed as long as it is always refered to first and formost as ILLEGAL filesharing.
This is another way of starting a sig with this and ending it with that.
I think you can reasonably accurately predict (with some exceptions of course) where an artist falls on the "Internet Good" or "Internet Bad" debate based on how famous they are.
Those that are already famous want to wring every cent out of the fame they've worked hard to get and therefore loathe the Internet's ease of file sharing.
Those looking to become famous love the Internet's ease of file sharing because it enables more people to be more easily exposed to their music.
I'm a big tall mofo.
23% of respondents were not home.
54% of respondents pretended like they were not home.
20% of respondents were undecided.
6% of respondents had no front door.
There was a 3% margin of error.
Unknown host pong.
So this is a little bit about what the artists believe the effect of filesharing has been on them, but I'm sure it's hard for anyone to really know. This doesn't tell us too much about what the actual effect of filesharing is on the artist. So many factors change over time how could you attribute your increased/decreased success to any one factor confidently?
BBC News Link.
Linux Wireless Hardware in the UK
I think this really underscores the issue and shows how the RIAA is not representative of the musicians thoughts and concerns.
Most musicians, especially struggling musicians, enjoy using the Internet and File Sharing programs to share their music (See pdf) . However, most feel that their work should be protected and they should get some sort of compensation from it (a perfectly justifable argument. Can't make much music if you're starving) (See pdf).
How are the above to concerns and attitudes towards file sharing in line with the RIAA's past, recent and future actions.
Also, this was an anonymous survey so it'd be interesting to really see who fell where (pop stars vs local bands).
-Teiresias
Why do musicians go for recording contracts anymore? It is obvious that the vast majority of them recieve no significant ongoing income from record sales. Most small bands seem to make more money touring. For them to have succesful tours, people need to hear their music, record labels don't help with this. Sure there are people who have made vast sums of money from the record industry, but most make very little or worse end up in debt. Its an expected value problem.
"brxref
if i was going to admit dowloading music with a fileshare programme i would also say that it has meant i buy more music than i used to.
Try some of my favourite from a self published artist, Janis Ian
The real question is if idealogue file-swappers will respect the wishes of those who DON'T want their material being swapped around on P2P networks.
If you don't respect the wishes of those people, you violate the idea that this is for the artists. That includes Metallica, even if you hate Lars Ulrich. You can't pick and choose your moralities.
I don't get why copyrights don't matter in P2P articles but they matter in "GPL source code theft" articles.
The concept of trying to poll certain musicians to reflect what all musicians as a whole think about the internet seems flawed. Considering how many genres music spans, how could you get an accurate reflection? How many punk bands made it into this poll?
time is a perception of a being's consciousness
time is your 6th sense, the wierd ones are 7+
The other 50% couldn't manage to open the pdf file.
The greatest benefit for musicians is the consumer's ability to browse online and download one song at a time. Buying a $20 CD is an option when you're in high school with a summer job, after you've bought your computer and new clothes. It is not an option when you're paying for college, paying off your first new car, your wedding, your first home, your yearly vacations, etc.
(initial comment: many thanks for flagging the large PDF documents clearly as such!)
We get to hear quite a lot from the "industry" side of the music business; it's nice to get a little balance from those "other" people who are also involved in some way with the music business, the actual creators.
I'm not surprised they're split over the issue, personally -- the future of music distribution is not at all a clearcut thing, and even the artists need someone, somewhere to be paying them for their work. Naturally, there are many more solutions that will work for the artists than there are solutions that will work for the industry that has developed purely to advertise and distribute their work through very limited, specific channels...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4067031.stm
Movies are a different animal than music and it seems reasonable to protect them. Movies require huge investments by the studios compared to music. Movies also are the only product of actors. I can see recorded music serving primarily as an advertisement for musicians live shows. Movies aren't performed live, the movie is the only product (excluding merchandising). If people started sharing video recordings of plays, I would see no problem with that. With plays, the main product is still the performance in the theatre.
"brxref
This article shows a more accurate view of the study in my opinion. Someone with mod points please mod it up.
Even though most of the "news" is not properly fact checked, and is blindly accepted as true, I have issue with the article that says:
Indeed, big-ticket acts like Metallica and Don Henley have famously denounced illegal file sharing. And the Recording Industry Association of America, which has filed thousands of lawsuits against individual file-sharers, often invokes musicians as prime movers in its crusade.
Metallica, yes, Don Henley, dunno.
Metallica can continue to charge $75+ for half full concert venues (vs $35 and sold out, no pun intended).
Don Henley on the other hand is no sympathizer for the RIAA.
The Eagles have their own recording company and they are not RIAA members.
Also, this url, http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0217-01.htm, has more info straigh from Don Henley's mouth (pen, keyboard, whatever).
Music "piracy" usually only hurts the suits at the recording companies. I have a hard time feeling too sorry for them. They're making their living by charging artists for advertising and distributing their work, and the internet makes that very low cost or free. The business model has changed, and the recording industry has not changed with it. A band can now make a very professional recording all on their own, advertise it, and distribute it for next to nothing. The suits just haven't realized it yet.
-- Gargonia
Never play leapfrog with a unicorn.
People always seem to think they're better/ know more than they actually do.
Someone won the nobel prize in economics by showing that people don't always act in there own best interest.
Here is the NY Times summary [ Free registration blah blah ]
Usually they require a DNA sample or your first-born child!
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
'Across the board, artists and musicians are more likely to say that the internet has made it possible for them to make more money from their art than they are to say it has made it harder to protect their work from piracy or unlawful use.'
Copyright is supposed to stop me from copying a CD, not stop me from using it.
On the subjec (partly at least) this is definitely an interesting read for a point of view the public seldom gets to hear: Courtney Love does the math, By Courtney Love
Who in their right mind pays $20 for a CD?
For example...I just picked up the NIN - Downward Spriral DualDisc release. Not only does it include the remastered CD on one side, but it has both 2ch and 5.1ch high resolution mixes on the other side. Guess what...it cost $13.99.
Again...who pays $20 for a CD? Maybe at the local mall record store, but last time I checked (at my mall at least), no one is buying CD's at the mall.
Best Buy, Circuit City, Walmart, Target, etc. are typically $5-$7 cheaper per disc than any typical mall record store
... Only Wookies share Light Stock Freighters with Scoundrels.
Here, "use the internet" can mean anything from communicate with agents or people who book gigs or recording engineers or fellow musicians, to communicate with fans, to put up web sites with band info, sample tracks, etc. Most people wouldn't think of "having all my work traded on file sharing systems without my permission" as "how I use the internet." So a conclusion like "across the board, the internet helps artists make more money" is disingenuous. Note that I'm not saying that the net is good or bad for musicians, just that such a broad conclusion is dopey.
The vast majority of these artists have signed over control of their IP to a second party - ones whose opinion of the Internet and filesharing are well-known by now. Talk is cheap and actions speak louder than words. The artists' opinions for a poll/survey are one thing, but that is not generally reflected in the contractual agreements they voluntarily execute.
I suspect that over the long term, rather then having 1 megastar for every 1000 aspiring artists, you will have many different niche artists of middling fame, known to their fans though not beyond.
Those that are currently struggling anyway really have nothing to lose from filesharing, and plenty to gain.
But the mega star types will have an eroded fan base as the fans find music more directly in line with their personal tastes. And artists who peaked early will not be able to coast on their old glories for nearly as long. Songs that would have made them hit big will not sustain them as long as people will just buy one copy when they hear it the first time, and probably just grab copies after that. Or just rip their original to new mediums as the medium changes.
END COMMUNICATION
Movies are a different animal than music and it seems reasonable to protect them.
It may *seem* reasonable to protect something, but that doesn't mean that it *is* reasonable.
There is nothing you said that supports your supposition that it *is* reasonable to have different laws with regards to movies and music.
And if you take successful movies that are generally acknowledged as *good* movies, you'll see that file sharing has done nothing to harm them (take Spiderman, for example), whereas movies that are generally acknowleged as *bad* are hurt by filesharing.
This leads one to believe that filesharing of movies is used by people to determine if the movie is worth seeing or not.
Exactly the point the article makes.
All the media articles on this topic take the angle of file sharing, but the Pew report is actually about how musicians view the Internet - file sharing fits under that umbrella, but is not the whole story. So, while 50% of musicians felt "file sharing" copyrighted materials should be illegal, 'Across the board... is actually referring to how musicians view the "Internet".
Recap and links on this topic
Radio promotion is so skewed towards the big labels. They have backdoor payola, fine. In a competitive market, alternative (not music type) stations would form to serve that niche market. That hasn't happened for a couple of reasons, media conglomerates and the crackdown on internet radio. I understand why record companies wouldn't want some internet radio station playing Britney Spears (makes it easy to pirate), but why do they care about artists they don't try to promote to traditional radio. What does a record company lose if an internet radio station is playing Elliot Smith and Ben Folds? God forbid those artists actually attract a following. I think it all comes down to the RIAA wanting to control the exact type of music we hear, and making it very dificult to hear anything else. I know that there is some internet radio, but it is very obscure thanks to the RIAA
"brxref
"Nine out of ten artists agree that the practice of recording a movie or TV show on a VHS
tape to watch at home at a later time should be deemed legal under the fair use provisions
of copyright law."
Wow. I didn't know Jack Valenti had an album out.
Same story, some like it some don't. If you were a part time musician working at Red Lobster throughout the week the internet has the posibility for world exposure. If you are a pop singer who doesn't write you own material and has a huge record deal you'll probably try your hardest to protect your assets. I have definitly bought some albums through iTunes I would've never heard of otherwise... also non-mainstream record label sites that offer free downloadable mp3's allow me to hear the music first which if I like the song I buy the album.
I'm getting tired of all this "hurting the business" stuff. I live in Iceland where we have a national statistics institute run by the government that monitors record sales, movie attendance, rentals, sales etc.
File sharing is huge in Iceland, about 10% of the nation use the largest P2P network every month, and there are several other domestic networks and the plethora of foreign networks. P2P started to hit it big 4 years ago.
Record sales have been up 11% each year, we hold the world record in movie attendance, movie sales up 26% since last year and so on. You should also note that the average movie ticket costs $14, rentals are $8, CD's and DVD's are $30-45.
This is not a strange coincidence to have this burst along with the growing of P2P networks. And don't give be crap about being an island in the north-Atlantic - movies are usually screened here before the "previews" in the US. Hell Sigurrós the world renowned Icelandic band even have their own P2P network!
An article about file-sharing gets illegally copied, not just once, but several times into this forum!
Really it's more like...
37% were sleeping in until 4pm
33% had their phone disconnected for non-payment last month
18% couldn't hear the phone over the drums and Marshall stacks
12% were intoxicated to the point of being temporarily incapacitated
Yes, creativity does beget more creativity because that's how creativity works. Programmers understand this quite well because most programs build on something already written (something most likely not written by that programmer). Lawyers understand this quite well too, the work they do is building on casework that came before.
Statements about turning out something "good" are remarkably subjective and not convincing in the least. One hit wonders in the popular music world conflates creativity with the a profit-minded process music studios.
The question isn't whether it is easy to do ("isn't like turning on a faucet"), the question is who will be able to determine the course of culture, those with a lot of published copyrighted works which are heard or seen daily (and therefore have financial incentive to pursue monopoly) or the people living in that culture who don't have the same use of the publicly owned airwaves and established movie theaters.
I think Lawrence Lessig who has studied this at length would disagree with your assertions.
Digital Citizen
IT was my understanding that this was already legal under the provisions formerly known as Fair Use. But the MPAA and RIAA are dead set in removing that little tidbit completely from the Copyright laws.
But I wonder if that also means that 9 out of 10 feel the same way about digital media sources, and from that, I wonder how many out of 10 own a Tivo, but wont admit it??
"Our funds have never taken part in toxic or death spiral convertible financings of any sort" -BayStar's managing partne
Artists is such a relative term.
I mean people like Britney spears who have others write her songs for her and tell her how to dance and what promos to do and what not, now can they really be considered artists?
In my mind artists are people who care about making their craft/art first then selling it secondary.
So in light of this article these people have to ask themselves, do they care more about having people share in their wonderful creation or just care about the dough?
Just food for thought...
As many people are learning these days, getting a recording contract is basically the same as getting a loan. But -- Courtney Love's ramblings notwithstanding -- a lot of musicians (like me and the others in my band) are willing to enter these deals because:
1) The "loan" buys you recording time, publicity, transportation, expenses, per diems, etc. Things that a starving band can rarely afford.
2) The "loan" is repaid from CD sales. And that's the fair trade because we realize that chances are slim to none we're going to sell enough CDs to cover our costs. But this isn't a bank we're talking about. Nobody's going seize your home or car because your CD sold 100 copies.
3) You typically get to keep merchandise revenue. And that's the silver lining: even though you never see money from your CD sales, you get to earn money on the road.
So, given that a band's goals are usually to afford to keep playing, recording and performing, a record deal sounds ideal. If you end up being the 1 in a million who "makes it" then you're obviously set. If you don't, then at least you got to "live the dream" for a lot longer than you could have you if you had to foot the bill. Along the way, you make some decent press, build up a fan base and basically have a great time.
Win-win I say.
(footnote: since we were dropped by our admittedly shitty label we've made decent money selling CDs and songs online at places like iTunes -- but still nowhere near the amount we received from our "free" loan which paid for our last CD's production and then some).
I remember a time when there was an internet radio station called "Soma FM" available for free on the internet.
(Slashdot even had some stories when they were forced to close down)
They played a lot of _very_ interesting music I never heard before -
and that you wouldn't get on your typical commercial radio station either for that matter.
That was the time that I actually bought the highest number of CDs I ever did in my Life!!
I remember more often than not, that I heard some _really_ amazing stuff there - and simply opened another tab on my browser, went to amazon and just ordered a bunch of CDs.
- It's been some time now that I bought any CD at all - not because I 'd be downloading stuff or such
rather because I just wouldn't know what to buy - the stuff on mainstream radio just isn't worth it..
just my 2 cents
perl -e 'printf("%x!\n",49153)'
but...wait for it....
Bill Gates should ban the mp3??
Feel free to make jokes about the hair. Thanks to this guy, I found out that I'll never make it in the business, as I am a 30-something musician in the midwest.
Well, it was fun while it lasted.
Courtney basically stole this from an earlier piece by her archenemy Steve Albini. Of course, who isn't her archenemy these days...
Movies also are the only product of actors
Actually I would put forth that is not strickly true. Popular actors do make money on movies to be sure, but they have something else of value - lifestyle!
Think of how much money is made by the obsessive tabloid industry just trying to find out anything they can about actors and actresses. What I have wondered for a while is why actors do not capitalize on this - for instance if they are having a wedding let magazines big on the right to send in photographers. People are apparently interested enough in the lives of stars to support a whole industry, no reason actors shoudl not take advantage of this.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
If cheapcds.com has it, it's usually $13-$16 (including shipping). They have a surprisingly large selection, too.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Take a look at some of the student/indy films in the past two years. For a small sum of, say, a few thousand bucks, people are making short films that easily rivals anything hollywood is putting out, including special effects.
no
It's just in the last 100 years that we have had movies and recorded music, and you know what? We did just fine without them. So who the f*ck cares if technology turns their industries into B2B instead of B2C? -- that's right, businesses still have to pay to use songs just like before Napster.
Maybe instead of trying to make us all keep watching something archaic like a movie we could actually interact with the story in realtime. Imagine just what would happen if they spent $200 million on making Call of Cthulhu?
So there goes that's justification, sorry.
- It's not the Macs I hate. It's Digg users. -
They are different, but there is no amount of difference that can say "Oh, it's copyright should be strictly enforced, and that one over there, no, not so much."
It's kind of like saying it's murder to kill a nun, but maybe not much of a crime to kill a drug addict. They are both murder. I hate to use a fairly lame analogy like that, but it is a similar kind of reasoning. You are trying to rationalize, or perhaps justify, one behavior over another for peripheral reasons that fundamentally don't change the truth of the copyright infrigement.
Fundamentally, the copyright holders do have the law on their side. What they don't seem to understand is that from a practical perspective, becoming so overbearing and maniacal is going to hurt them in the long run. People buy media they can relate to, it's kinda hard to relate to media that threatens and would like to spy on you.
Here.
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
However this does not mean its OK to download music without the creators permission.
We have the creator's permission to make and spread music. Ephesians 5:19; Psalms. But given the Constitutional prohibition on establishment of religion, what matters under U.S. law is whether we have the author's permission. Problem is that even if you write what you think is an original piece of music, it may turn out that you are not the author.
The artists are given temporary control
To anybody who participates in the creation of a recording or other work of authorship, how is life plus 70 years "temporary"? It sounds more like a prison sentence for a double murder than an acceptable bargain to promote the progress of science and useful arts.
No creativity does not.
Craft begets more craft.
I know a lot of *GREAT* craft songwriters. They understand structure, know what the general public loves and can distill it down to something palletable by the masses. But there is a difference between craft and art. Art requires creativity. Craft requires repetition. The two are useful together and a good craftsman can put out passable works that get heard...but thats when they are simply building on the works of others and taking the credit, hence most top 40 musics.
If p2p application makers are held responsible for illegal file-swapping, should not gun makers be held responsible for the illegal use of their products?
I stole this signature
well if the RIAA was taken out of the picture, how would they get there money?
The RIAA drives up radio ad rates. If the major labels weren't paying the radio stations through so-called independent promoters to play their songs, then demand for airtime would be lower, and artists could afford to put a song on the radio as an advertisement to buy the album. (Credited payola is still lawful.)
I'm not going to shed any tears over the RIAA losing money but to pretend filesharing hasn't had a huge impact on record sales is ludicrous. When I was in college in the mid 80's I bought a lot of music as did a lot of my friends. I run a medium sized message board now and I can tell you the majority of my college-aged posters pay for very little, if any music. They download almost everything they listen to and burn their own mixes from their downloads.
I mean seriously! Who cares?! Are musicians so smart that they can think for themselves? If that's the case, then why does every musician in the world want the right hand of some major record label up their arse?! These are the same people that complain about having to bow to corporate pressure, just to get aforesaid hand. They are artists, and as we all know, artists are stupid. Besides they moan and bitch a lot and refuse to get real jobs.
Problem is that the P2P networks promoted by stories in the MPAA-member-owned TV news media are the networks that largely shun independent music. These networks include old Napster during its prime, FastTrack, Gnutella, Suprnova BT, etc. The TV news media seem to ignore eTree BT and other sources of independent music.
Don't think so. In the past, with eg. CD-only distribution, CD sold = profit made. Therefore: megastar = many albums sold = lots of profit (probably small part for artist, but hey). So being famous is roughly coupled with lots 'o money flowing in.
Zero-cost distribution a la P2P decouples this. At least in theory, an artist could be extremely popular, and still get 0 money. Or, if only CD's were sold at high price and copy protection would actually work (fat chance), an artist might get very rich, but with few fans.
As a result, an artist might have to choose between: maximize profits, or maximize fame. And then act accordingly. I suspect that most artists would prefer fame, as long as they can make a living somehow.
The musicians that perform the underlying scores within film and television should also be considered. They collect royalties based on CD/DVD/Syndication (etc) as dictated by their union. So potential losses associated with pirated film/tv also impacts the "unknown" musicians associated.
"Unfortunately, people like the RIAA (who represent the other 2%) who are making this kind of thing difficult."
Really? Let's see.
*posts seed to supernova*
*watches rise in hits on server*
Damn! The RIAA/MPAA/Vienna Boy's Choir is keeping people from getting my music. How dare they!
I wonder how many of those 2/3 would say bong makers and sellers are responsible for illicit marijuana use.
Linux at home
I'd like to believe that is what is going to happen, but there are a few important things to take into consideration.
The wierdest, most difficult to address assumption is the idea that people don't currently like what they really like. I'm inferring that from your idea that people will go more 'more directly in line with their personal tastes.' It seems like a logical assumption from the standpoint that if you were given 5 choices before, once you've been given 50 that included those 5, you'd statistically pick new things. But I think that reasoning ignores certain aspects of what makes stardom and pop culture exist in the first place.
People like to like the things that other people like. There are advantages of being into pop culture. It's a lot of common ground to have with strangers. You can talk about it and establish the overall persona of a person on fairly neutral territory. The statement "Did you hear the lead xylophonist of 'Lurch Cadets' had albino triplets?" isn't going to be as effective at deteriming how you relate to another person as talking about something you actually both already know about.
I think that independent artists will rise independently of any pop-culture fall. When you consider how many times people hear the same songs over and over again, there is plenty of room to have both massive pop culture and niche involvement.
Uh, huh. And all the above is different from say a geek working for someone else verses either contracting, or starting their own business, how exactly?
Let's not forget that a lot of artists sign deals with RIAA-affiliated labels, only to have the label decide not to "push" them. The label can just sit on their work, and the artist has no recourse. They can't release it on their own because the label owns it. They can only sign a label deal if they sign over the rights. If the label then decides that you aren't the "in" sound, you are basically dead in the water. They control the content and the delivery system. Hopefully with things like satellite radio and the internet, this can change.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
What they believe will influence their future creative efforts and distribution choices more than what is objectively true, where a difference exists between the two.
Im an aspiring musician who doesn't have time to try and get discovered. So I offer my original compositions for free download on my website to help me get recognition. So far, I've gotten some positive feedback, and it makes me glad to know that people are hearing my art. If you'd like to hear some of my work, you can download it free with out registering anything at my website www.distortionfile.com. I'd appreciate any feedback, and I hope this is informative to this topic of discussion!
If only the internet was around before Metallica's collective head outgrew this planet. I would love to hear their answer to this question in 1990 (provided the internet was then what it is today) Metallica became who they are because of "the word on the street". Once they hit it big, they steadily declined in quality, IMO. The Black Album was their big commercial success, and they haven't been the same since.
(I actually think they haven't been the same since And Justice For All... and the Black Album was them jumping the shark. It still rocked, but in more of a mainstream way. Give me Master of Puppets any day over that album.)
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
So, I dislike Courtney as much as anyone, but this is just BS. She's telling a similar tale, but she didn't "steal" anything from Steve Albini. Albini's take on this is a classic that should be read by all thinking persons who want to develop an informed opinion on this subject. His tale is much more gloom and doom, however... The band ends up in the hole. At least in Courtney's story, the band gets $45,000 to live off of, and ends up with a $0 balance. I could tell you a personal story about ending up in debt to a record label... Does that mean I stole it from Steve Albini? Yes, I realize this is Slashdot, but it only takes a moment to think before you post.
i'm the jedidiahmarkfoster your parents warned you about
I can't remember the last time the RIAA has been heard claiming that "the artists need compensation!!" Fact is, that argument died a long time ago as it was pretty widely revealed that artists weren't getting compensated regardless that it's the RIAA and the various publishers who wanted to get paid for music distribution.
While some artists out there haven't been following the facts I think it's pretty widely accepted that distribution via internet, regardless of the means, is good for artists' exposure and it's really as simple as that since most people, if they appreciate the work, will buy it in spite of the fact that they may have downloaded it previously and time and time again, I find myself doing exactly the same thing not intentionally or out of some righteous drive, but rather from a "superior product" or "original source" desire. So as long as they keep pressing CDs, that's the way I'd buy them. Same goes for other media as well...
I think the publishers and marketers should wake up to the fact that there is still more than enough demand for the product they've been marketing all these years and that it has been shown time and time again that the net is no threat to their revenue. I recognize the fact that it's a "protect it or lose it" kind of thing, but they needn't be so agressive about it.
"What I don't get is why there's always posters like you who assume things like this."
Talk about asking a stupid question.
Maybe because people on Slashdot saying stuff like this.
And that's just two stories. There are plenty more were that came from. Or were you just under the impression that everyone would develop amnesia?
In any event, your post is strictly ad hominem. You're portraying the successful artists as greedy and spiteful, implying that their opposition to internet piracy is based entirely on some unnatural love of money. Personally, I don't think that this is true (and file "sharers" are themselves not immune to charges of greed). But, as with all ad hominem arguments, even if these are are their true motives, it doesn't mean that their conclusion is necessarily wrong. Thus, their circumstances are irrelevant to the question of whether file "sharing" is right, wrong, or somewhere in between.
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
"And why is that a bad thing? Doesn't the GPL use existing law to try and enforce the intent of copyright, while copyright law in general has become too twisted and meaningless to be useful?"
No. Actually that would be the original BSD license with atribution. Copyright originally was protection against people (publishers?) grabbing someone's material and claiming it as their own (plagerism). Money only indirectly factored into it.
With the GPL I don't have to keep atribution with the code (nice to, don't have to).
Also despite slashdot opinion (and it's myopic world view). Copyright is the lifeblood of modern day society. All of modern day society.
Always wanted to say that on Slashdot.
Anyway, the musicians generally aren't going to be up in arms.
Then again, they're not really the ones making the money.
It's the suits that are beating on Washington about it, they're the ones with the most to lose. They have no artistic talent, and if the Music Industry fails, music and musicians will survive.
It's the record execs that won't. They're protecting their own asses, not the asses of the musicians.
I'm a huge fan of the Internet and the way it empowers me to share my stuff with the world (as demonstrated here and here) :)
"hey, could you pass me a paper towel? er.. I mean... DEPLOY ABSORBTION PANEL!"
1> Let people trade mp3's for free, not full quality audio.
This means that you have to decide what quality is free to trade (64K mp3 for example). So medium quality mp3' are free to trade (advertising); but, if you want full quality audio you have to pay for it.
2> Anything that plays, records or copies music has to retain and display the artist name, disk title, track title. That includes cd players. Now, when you have a copy of something that you would like to buy, you know what it is
Bands don't make money off of albums anymore so they are not concerned with making money through the sale of records. What does concern them is that their work is distributed, a job traditionally done by record labels. File sharing speeds up their rise to fame by out performing the record labels in distribution. Fame is what they are after because it makes them money. Appearances, product promotions and concert tours are where they make all the money now; the more famous they are the higher price they can demand from these things.
The labels stopped paying artists for their work years ago, so as far as most musicians are concerned the RIAA can rot in hell. Note that it is "Recording Industry Association of America" and not "Musicians Industry Association of America". I remember seeing something on VH1 about one of the late 90's pop singers going 11x platinum and each member of the band only making $50,000 in real money that year.
If you're really interested in supporting your favorite artist copy the CD and give it to five friends; then order a T-Shirt from them and go to their concert next time they are in town.
So true.. he who controls the language controls the discussion. Same with the word "piracy".
Just another musician who hates having to pay the RIAA for every blank CD-R he buys...
ERROR 144 - REBOOT ?
nytimes genlink gives the urls a rssuserland account suffix. most handy. bookmarklet included on page, which works from the nag screen of the article wanted too!
nytimes genlink gives the urls a rssuserland account suffix. most handy. bookmarklet included on page, which works from the nag screen of the article wanted too!
The following website links to a book by Prof. Lawrence Lessig of Stanford on copyright issues. He actually argued a case in the Supreme Court two or so years ago against the continous extensions of copyright limits by Congress which prevented a lot of material entering the public domain. (He lost and explains why in the book)
http://www.free-culture.cc/
He has good historical examples explaining how big media uses the law and technology to curtail creativity. Discusses everything from the lawsuits on college students by **AA to those of RCA on FM inventions in the 1930s. Definitely a good read by anyone interested in copyright issues.
By the way, Lessig is Chairman of the Creative Commons Foundation.
I, myself, am a musician that takes advantage of this technology. We (my band) are electronic musicians and our target audience is a small niche in the market. And here's some shameless self-promotion. Crumbly Check out my music on our official website. We started our own record label called "Mad Habit Recordings" and we release our own material for sell via the internet. This has drastically increase our profits, as selling your own CDs at live shows and other such money making activities are labour intensive and hardly worth bothering with. Also, even though we move a relatively small volume of our music, we still make way more than if we were contracted through a major recording label.
Also, Visit our website. Our music caters to the geek crowd. (Not that you people are geeks, but the pocket protectors don't help.)
10. I make so much that I started my own label so I could hoard even more from other artists.
Not my best day today ...
...
large PDF vs. 302K PDF
Not that Coding Theory should be everybody's darling, but
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
Go find a musician who owns an iPod or similar device. Then ask him if he actually bought all the music he has on it. Chances are he didn't. I know a lot of musicians and they use P2P to download songs just like the rest of us.
Oh, but it's okay if they do it.
Korea! it's In Korea
In Korea, only old people spell it 'Corea'
Required reading for internet skeptics
pertinent data to make those judgements about the effects of file sharing on their marketshare.
Shhhhh.... don't say that too loud. That's actually what this whole fight is about: we don't need a record industry anymore. For about the same price as their instruments, musicians can rent (and, increasingly, buy) professional quality recording facilities. With the Internet, musicians can distribute their music on a pay or free basis for the cost of the van they drive to gigs.
Record companies aren't worried about lost album sales from filesharing. If anything, they probably appreciate the increased sales it brings. What record companies are worried about is that musicians can get exposure without signing a contract. That's what this is about, and how this fight goes will determine a lot about the kind of future working musicians will have for the next decade or so.
All's true that is mistrusted
A copyright protects a work of art. An example would be a song I recorded. My copyright doesn't prevent anyone else from recording their songs. There is a very little loss to society by affording me many years of copyright protection.
A patent protects a mechanism that produces something, like music or the reproduction of music. A patent probably protects the codec I use to compress my recording, and possibly the equipment I use to produce my song as well. These patents could prevent others from making their own music. The loss to society is greater, and therefore patent protection must be shorter.
Michael Geist, a Canadian law professor, has released a two-part study on the financial impact of peer-to-peer music
downloading on the Canadian music industry and on the artists. Part one demonstrated that recording industry loss claims
are greatly exaggerated and that the P2P is only marginally responsible for sales declines with the focus on CRIA's own numbers and many alternate factors behind the moderate sales decline. Part two concludes that Canadian artists have not suffered financially, noting that lost royalties from diminished sales have been more than offset by the collection of nearly $120 million in private copying levies [registration required - use use jimbo@mailinator.com/password to login].
How many people have gone and copied complete poems? How many have gone and copied complete journal articles? How many have copied sections of books? What people copy is a factor of technology not morality. Think about where things were five years ago. People shared songs, not movies, and maybe they shared some movie clips. The only difference with the library is that there the technology is not improving.
This post written under Gentoo-linux with an SCO IP license.
In a related item, law professor Michael Geist, in his weekly column discusses he financial impact of peer-to-peer music downloading on the Canadian music industry. He says that Canadian artists have not suffered financially, noting that lost royalties from diminished sales have been more than offset by the collection of nearly $120 million in private copying levies. Professor Geist is Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-commerce Law at the University of Ottawa.
That is a tale that has seriously slowed down bands that I've grown to love, like Abandoned Pools and Kidneythieves; both bands started out very promising, but then their record companies decided not to push them, so they had to fight their way out of contracts to be able to actually create music again. (and, as a side, note, neither band would I have discovered and bought the music of were it not for p2p filesharing).
in the meanwhile I can tell you as a musician, I've been helped out a fucking lot by the internet. I'm very poor right now, and my recordings aren't going to increase very fast until that changes, but if/when that does change, you can bet that people are going to hear it, if they hear it, through xmms/winamp.
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
Okay, you use a single data point; so will I:
I for one have never bought a normal-priced CD in my life, except second-hand from friends that needed the money. As a college student in the early nineties, after the rent was paid there was never enough left over for elective purchases like that. [Before that, my family wasn't any richer either.]
Yes, some of us students don't just go out and buy everything we want. And we are not weird, though perhaps we ARE unpatriotic to the economy. This situation is NOT legitimately called a "loss" by the recording industry.
But since a friend recently introduced me to p2p, I have been discovering some artists that are well worth supporting, [as soon as I can find a job again.] Vienna Teng for example rocks, but her stuff is too rare to find on p2p. Likewise Kerry Cox. Very much worth supporting when I have the money, and telling friends about when I don't.
Unemployed I either have access to some music for free, or none at all. Either way, nobody is getting money from me that doesn't exist. That's reality economics. There is no loss.
So drop that industry-cooked fiction about "people used to go out and buy!"
An artist is "one who creates art". Regardless of whether they're doing it for love or for money. And regardless of whether or not you personally approve of their reason.
Lifeblood you say? Bullshit says I.