I once worked for Telus. This comes as little surprise to me.
Telus is a greedy, evil, employee - hostile compmany that has nothing but contempt for it's workers and it's customers. As an employee I was treated like poo. As a customer they are worse. Telus has more officially registered complaints against them than any other telco in Canada.
This is a perfect example of how monopoly companies grow into huge organizations that spit on thier customers.
I feel sorry for the employees. Telus needs to have government intervention take place for this to be resolved.
Even more reason to consider VOIP and drop your phone line for good.
I feel better now. I'll go away and get back to work now . .
Let's just say it like it is.
The reason the Bush administration wants to cut space exploration is because The U.S. president is a complete moron. George W. Bush is easily the least intellectually gifted president in U.S. history, and it surprises no one that he can't understand the most basic principles or benefits of pure science. Hell, he can't even pronounce "Nuclear" properly although my 8 year old can.
"Sounds like if you don't have any musicians of your own, you're not much of a band. Is this some big name charity CD?"
- - nope, it's just a large, complex, very ambitious album. Hint - Got any Peter Gabriel CD's?. Look at how many musicians played on it and how long it took to record. Get the idea?
"4 weeks in a good local studio for about £3000" seems cheap to me"
Dude, if you can record an entire album for three thousand pounds stirling, then I have about 100 I'd like you to produce!
Reality Check everyone. I work in the music industry, and I have been working on ONE album since June of last year. We work in the studio 3-5 days a week, every week. We will be done sometime around Oct - Dec.
The COSTS for making this record (which I think should be awesome, but I can't talk right now . . um . . but I want to . ..) will easily exceed $500K USD. Hiring musicians, singers, flying them in, putting them up, and working thousands and thousands of hours with gifted professionals adds up.
The MONEY to recoup these costs will ONLY come from media sales (CD, MP3 etc). Touring does NOT make money, except for the mega-acts. No income from CD sales, no new CD's.
I can guarantee you that *Those* morons who think music should be free - if all music is free then this album, and any one like it would NEVER get made and you folks out there who are decent people and music lovers would NEVER get to hear it.
Where does this idiotic attitude come from anyway?. You don't expect the book in your hand to be free, you don't expect the latest X-Box game to be free, so what is the big deal about PAYING to BUY a recording that some group of people may have spent a huge personal fortune and spent YEARS to create?. If it's good, what is the problem with the CREATOR getting paid for it? So some dickhead can rip it off? Uhhh No.
Actually, it's more like this;
1. Steal underpants from People
2. Amass thousands of them
3. ?????
4. Profit!!
The amazing thing about me, is the *quality* of my suggestions . . .
And the practicality . .
"Do the maths: if the band can sell 100 discs, which isn't that hard, then they cover the cost of the production."
- Yes, but not the costs of recording. The recording costs can easly amount to 100 times the mechanical reproduction costs.
"Once you get word-of-mouth advertisement happening, then you can start making your money from playing live shows."
Well, as someone who has toured . . . . .
Very few acts make money on the road. For most acts, the cost of travel, shipping gear, tour busses, crew etc far exceeds the revenues from performance. In fact, the majority of concerts you see are there because the record label pumps in money in what is known as 'tour support'.
You are 100% dead on when you say the cost of putting a demo or CD together is expensive.
However, for most musicians their income will come from CD sales, and radio licence fees. Performance, except for the ULTRA huge acts, generally costs money.
BTW - I think the 5/c per song idea is *great* as long as that money goes to the MUSICIANS and not some record label. Come on you guys, you can't possibly say that *FIVE CENTS* to download a CD quality file is 'too much'. You would be able to download 100 full length songs at CD quality for FIVE BUCKS!!! Dude, that's less than two Latte's!!.
I totally agree with you about your comment re: blockbuster/garbage/utter crap movies and crap music like B. Spears, Whitney Houston , Shania Twain etc. Those movies and albums are made for the sole purpose of making money and nothing else.
Interesting - your comments on examples like "repo man" (one of my favorite films ever). Yes, no doubt - the indie film makers are making the best films in the world, at a fraction of what it cost to make Titanic ($100mil) and Riddick ($200mil). This is because an independent project leaves the creative control to the artists (directors, writers, actors) and not to the pin head studio execs who are always trying to make crap sequels to films that were crap in the first place. Hence, the creative vision can have follow-through and integrity.
However, those indie films still cost a lot of money to make. Not a hundred mil, but Repo Man still cost over a million dollars to make. Blair Witch something like $100K. Those movies got made because someone invested money into what they thought was an inspired creative process, and took the leap of faith that they would get revenues from it to - at bare minimum - offset the cost. Don't be fooled into thinking that people will make movies like "Repo Man" if there is no way to make some money with it, or at least break even. There is absolutely NO way that those films would never have been made if there was no way the costs to make them could possibly be recouped. Who would want to invest money (i.e. the executive producers) into a film project that was going to be given away for free?. Would you do it?.
So yes, artists will always create art because they are compelled to do it. Without a revenue stream however, many of those artists cannot execute what might be their grand vision. However I find the attitude that artists should not be able to make a living at it simply bizarre. Why shouldn't an artist be able to be rewarded financially so they can work full time at their craft?. Why should a creative computer programmer be rewarded, but a creative musician or film maker not?. Why do you expect someone to put thousands of hours and thousands of dollars into a film or album, so you can enjoy it for free?. You don't expect the latest X box game to be free do you?. So what is the difference between that and a killer-great album or film?
Sorry, I just don't agree that art is without value. I think that artists deserve to be rewarded, and I think it is essential that a mechanism exists whereby the creators can derive benefit from those who use the work they have created. I think that paying for the music you listen to, or the film you watch is absolutely essential for the process of film making or record making to exist.
Anyway, my 2 cents for the day. Rant complete. . . .
Well, I agree with you that the world certainly doesn't need more 'Boy Bands' or teenager schlock like Ashley Simpson. But if musicians don't get a cent for the music they make due to MP3 file sharing, I disagree that it will get better.
How can an artist be an artist unless they can afford to do it?. For example, you can't record and album, master it and produce it without cash. Same thing for films. I think you don't need kazillions to do these things (unless you are Metallica), but you do need some way to pay your way, otherwise you simply cannot execute.
"To true artists, profiting from their art it is secondary notion, if it exists at all"
I agree with this 100%. The only problem is you would never hear it or see it since it could never be made into a record.
Hey folks, we have all been able to copy Intellectual Property for decades and decades. Remeber the tape recorder?. It did exactly the same thing as CD copying now. Remeber the digital audio tape recorder (DAT)?. Everyone in the music industry was completely freaking out, going mental and trying to ban the evil devices. That actually worked. You don't see DAT machines in most peoples homes do you?. Every recording studio in the world however uses them.
So, copying music is not new. Cassette decks did that in the 70's, reel-to-reel tape machines did it in the 50's.
The only thing that has really changed is the ability to easily distribute copied I.P. such as music. Distributing free or pirated casettes by mailing them all over the place would be a pain the butt, so nobody did it. It's very easy however to email an MP3 to someone, so everyone does it.
By the way, I am both a musician and a programmer. I have an album coming up for release and yes I do worry about how many people will be playing my CD without me seeing a single penny from it. Dude, if artists can't generate income from their crafts, there won't be many good recordings coming around. Recording an album is a VERY time consuming and expensive proposition. Not many musicians will be willing to do it for free or at a loss.
So if everyone expects, demands and is eventually provided with totally free MP3 music sharing, how on earth can the people who MADE the music manage to keep doing it?
If you wrote a computer game, taking hundreds of thousands of dollars and months of your time, would you be OK with people just playing it for 'free' while you worry about how to pay the banks back?
There has to be a solution for this, but the end result can only be that people must pay.
Slashdot Mirror
I once worked for Telus. This comes as little surprise to me. Telus is a greedy, evil, employee - hostile compmany that has nothing but contempt for it's workers and it's customers. As an employee I was treated like poo. As a customer they are worse. Telus has more officially registered complaints against them than any other telco in Canada. This is a perfect example of how monopoly companies grow into huge organizations that spit on thier customers. I feel sorry for the employees. Telus needs to have government intervention take place for this to be resolved. Even more reason to consider VOIP and drop your phone line for good. I feel better now. I'll go away and get back to work now . .
Let's just say it like it is. The reason the Bush administration wants to cut space exploration is because The U.S. president is a complete moron. George W. Bush is easily the least intellectually gifted president in U.S. history, and it surprises no one that he can't understand the most basic principles or benefits of pure science. Hell, he can't even pronounce "Nuclear" properly although my 8 year old can.
Hey, Lego nerds will still get laid more often than Ham Radio nerds, who never get laid.
"Sounds like if you don't have any musicians of your own, you're not much of a band. Is this some big name charity CD?" - - nope, it's just a large, complex, very ambitious album. Hint - Got any Peter Gabriel CD's?. Look at how many musicians played on it and how long it took to record. Get the idea?
"4 weeks in a good local studio for about £3000" seems cheap to me" Dude, if you can record an entire album for three thousand pounds stirling, then I have about 100 I'd like you to produce! Reality Check everyone. I work in the music industry, and I have been working on ONE album since June of last year. We work in the studio 3-5 days a week, every week. We will be done sometime around Oct - Dec. The COSTS for making this record (which I think should be awesome, but I can't talk right now . . um . . but I want to . . .) will easily exceed $500K USD. Hiring musicians, singers, flying them in, putting them up, and working thousands and thousands of hours with gifted professionals adds up.
The MONEY to recoup these costs will ONLY come from media sales (CD, MP3 etc). Touring does NOT make money, except for the mega-acts. No income from CD sales, no new CD's.
I can guarantee you that *Those* morons who think music should be free - if all music is free then this album, and any one like it would NEVER get made and you folks out there who are decent people and music lovers would NEVER get to hear it.
Where does this idiotic attitude come from anyway?. You don't expect the book in your hand to be free, you don't expect the latest X-Box game to be free, so what is the big deal about PAYING to BUY a recording that some group of people may have spent a huge personal fortune and spent YEARS to create?. If it's good, what is the problem with the CREATOR getting paid for it? So some dickhead can rip it off? Uhhh No.
Actually, it's more like this; 1. Steal underpants from People 2. Amass thousands of them 3. ????? 4. Profit!! The amazing thing about me, is the *quality* of my suggestions . . . And the practicality . .
"Do the maths: if the band can sell 100 discs, which isn't that hard, then they cover the cost of the production." - Yes, but not the costs of recording. The recording costs can easly amount to 100 times the mechanical reproduction costs.
"Once you get word-of-mouth advertisement happening, then you can start making your money from playing live shows." Well, as someone who has toured . . . . . Very few acts make money on the road. For most acts, the cost of travel, shipping gear, tour busses, crew etc far exceeds the revenues from performance. In fact, the majority of concerts you see are there because the record label pumps in money in what is known as 'tour support'. You are 100% dead on when you say the cost of putting a demo or CD together is expensive. However, for most musicians their income will come from CD sales, and radio licence fees. Performance, except for the ULTRA huge acts, generally costs money. BTW - I think the 5/c per song idea is *great* as long as that money goes to the MUSICIANS and not some record label. Come on you guys, you can't possibly say that *FIVE CENTS* to download a CD quality file is 'too much'. You would be able to download 100 full length songs at CD quality for FIVE BUCKS!!! Dude, that's less than two Latte's!!.
I totally agree with you about your comment re: blockbuster/garbage/utter crap movies and crap music like B. Spears, Whitney Houston , Shania Twain etc. Those movies and albums are made for the sole purpose of making money and nothing else. Interesting - your comments on examples like "repo man" (one of my favorite films ever). Yes, no doubt - the indie film makers are making the best films in the world, at a fraction of what it cost to make Titanic ($100mil) and Riddick ($200mil). This is because an independent project leaves the creative control to the artists (directors, writers, actors) and not to the pin head studio execs who are always trying to make crap sequels to films that were crap in the first place. Hence, the creative vision can have follow-through and integrity. However, those indie films still cost a lot of money to make. Not a hundred mil, but Repo Man still cost over a million dollars to make. Blair Witch something like $100K. Those movies got made because someone invested money into what they thought was an inspired creative process, and took the leap of faith that they would get revenues from it to - at bare minimum - offset the cost. Don't be fooled into thinking that people will make movies like "Repo Man" if there is no way to make some money with it, or at least break even. There is absolutely NO way that those films would never have been made if there was no way the costs to make them could possibly be recouped. Who would want to invest money (i.e. the executive producers) into a film project that was going to be given away for free?. Would you do it?. So yes, artists will always create art because they are compelled to do it. Without a revenue stream however, many of those artists cannot execute what might be their grand vision. However I find the attitude that artists should not be able to make a living at it simply bizarre. Why shouldn't an artist be able to be rewarded financially so they can work full time at their craft?. Why should a creative computer programmer be rewarded, but a creative musician or film maker not?. Why do you expect someone to put thousands of hours and thousands of dollars into a film or album, so you can enjoy it for free?. You don't expect the latest X box game to be free do you?. So what is the difference between that and a killer-great album or film? Sorry, I just don't agree that art is without value. I think that artists deserve to be rewarded, and I think it is essential that a mechanism exists whereby the creators can derive benefit from those who use the work they have created. I think that paying for the music you listen to, or the film you watch is absolutely essential for the process of film making or record making to exist. Anyway, my 2 cents for the day. Rant complete. . . .
Well, I agree with you that the world certainly doesn't need more 'Boy Bands' or teenager schlock like Ashley Simpson. But if musicians don't get a cent for the music they make due to MP3 file sharing, I disagree that it will get better. How can an artist be an artist unless they can afford to do it?. For example, you can't record and album, master it and produce it without cash. Same thing for films. I think you don't need kazillions to do these things (unless you are Metallica), but you do need some way to pay your way, otherwise you simply cannot execute. "To true artists, profiting from their art it is secondary notion, if it exists at all" I agree with this 100%. The only problem is you would never hear it or see it since it could never be made into a record.
Hey folks, we have all been able to copy Intellectual Property for decades and decades. Remeber the tape recorder?. It did exactly the same thing as CD copying now. Remeber the digital audio tape recorder (DAT)?. Everyone in the music industry was completely freaking out, going mental and trying to ban the evil devices. That actually worked. You don't see DAT machines in most peoples homes do you?. Every recording studio in the world however uses them. So, copying music is not new. Cassette decks did that in the 70's, reel-to-reel tape machines did it in the 50's. The only thing that has really changed is the ability to easily distribute copied I.P. such as music. Distributing free or pirated casettes by mailing them all over the place would be a pain the butt, so nobody did it. It's very easy however to email an MP3 to someone, so everyone does it. By the way, I am both a musician and a programmer. I have an album coming up for release and yes I do worry about how many people will be playing my CD without me seeing a single penny from it. Dude, if artists can't generate income from their crafts, there won't be many good recordings coming around. Recording an album is a VERY time consuming and expensive proposition. Not many musicians will be willing to do it for free or at a loss. So if everyone expects, demands and is eventually provided with totally free MP3 music sharing, how on earth can the people who MADE the music manage to keep doing it? If you wrote a computer game, taking hundreds of thousands of dollars and months of your time, would you be OK with people just playing it for 'free' while you worry about how to pay the banks back? There has to be a solution for this, but the end result can only be that people must pay.