So the poor people in Brazil are going to overthrow western civilization by making their own affordable medicine? This thread is lame.
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Continuing the copyright discussion...
- Thread starter TRichardsbass
- Start date
So the poor people in Brazil are going to overthrow western civilization by making their own affordable medicine? This thread is lame.
- Jun 3, 2009
- 3,330
- 398
- Disclosures
- Bassgearu, Music Industry Consulting and Sales. Tech 21, NBE Corp, Sonosphere.
Jason, yes, forced to sell tickets. AAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!
I think though, that you could take the argument that if songs are public domain once you create them, then the prettiest guy or girl who you can find to sing them then gets to profit from it for the mere fact that they are not butt ugly like us. So, I write a song. Everything, except for my voice is the same. Paris Hilton hears me play the song. She goes and sings it. Since there is no way I can compete with her, she gets rich, I get squat. Yet, without my song, she would not have anything to start with to make that money.
While Red Hat does make money, not all that much. That is the other side of open source. I am sure that Mr. Linux himself, Linus, would love to be filthy rich from his operating system. He, however, chose to give it away. But then again, it could be because he chooses to live in a country where it is much more socialist then here, and many of your basic needs are taken care of by the government.
I figured you were a federali. Although I'd love to see your CRAZY credentials....
Yes, what Google says and does are different, and in the case I am referencing they definitely are using a technology that they decided to use first and try to get the license later, only to find out their competitors bought it specifically to screw Google. And now Google has come out crying.
Do copyright protections hinder creativitiy? I don't believe so. Do I believe in protecting a great way to earn a decent living in today's society? You bet.
Yes, the fact that you can record a decent demo with a simple ZOOM H2 has made the costs of creating music nil. However, that doesn't mean that it should then cost nil. It already is darn near that, at $0.99 a song. If you say music should be what the market bears, then just about every single digital anything should be free. More and more people "share", so free it is. So, take away any profit or jobs in the digital sector of anything in the US and what are you left with? Ridiculously high unemployment, the complete destruction of wages, and of course no way to recover in any decent amount of time. As it was stated in the movie RiP!, Americans have chosen, by and large, to get rid of actual manufacturing and labor jobs in favor of an intellectual property type commodity. We all know that the guy who cuts my lawn doesn't make nearly what I do. We have chosen, like most of the world, to invest in a standard of living that rewards creativity and thought, not labor.
I don't think, by and large, culture itself needs any full time anything. However, clearly, art was able to move forward because there were artists who did do nothing but that, even going back eons.
What it all comes down to today is that our standard of living, our general ease of life (and yes, the US may have one of the easiest existences on the planet) exists solely because of that concept known as the "rule of law." If you follow the law/rules, you can do anything, be anything, succeed in any amount you wish here. Once countries, cultures and economies that are supposed to live to those rules decide to no longer do that you destroy a delicate balance that cannot exist in a vacuum.
Brazil's need for large access to drugs to treat aids comes from a number of things, none the least of which is that they have chosen not to invest in large pharma, so they must then live with what the rest of the world will give them. In addition, if you choose to have an open society like they try to have, then when you wind up with large problems like HIV and AIDS, you have to live with your choice to not do anything to stifle what spreads it. In this universe you cannot have it both ways. In this case Brazil cannot regulate itself and keep its people happy without the drugs. Yet, they chose not to invest themselves. They were hoping for the international handout. It didn't come. Not from the US, not from Germany, no where. So then they decided to no longer honor long standing agreements.
Why then, should any guitar manufacturer care if any Brazilian wood protected internationally is obtained here? Why should we then protect them? It is okay, or it seems so based on other posts here, for Brazil to take the action it did under the guise of humanitarian aid. So, since in the US we need jobs, taking Brazilian rainforest wood to create jobs here is humanitarian too.
This is why I started this thread. To discuss all this. People seem to feel that because music is no longer delivered on a disc or tape that it therefore is not a product worthy of protection, nor is it worth anything. The question I have is, then, what if all music was sent back to being put on vinyl only, and the technology to record it in any other way was purchased by the recording industry and never released? Would that not really PO the masses? I personally would love to see it, or, as in Re-mixing, I'm hoping someone comes up with a way to digitally encode a file that will not allow it to be shared without a permission or purchase.
I think though, that you could take the argument that if songs are public domain once you create them, then the prettiest guy or girl who you can find to sing them then gets to profit from it for the mere fact that they are not butt ugly like us. So, I write a song. Everything, except for my voice is the same. Paris Hilton hears me play the song. She goes and sings it. Since there is no way I can compete with her, she gets rich, I get squat. Yet, without my song, she would not have anything to start with to make that money.
While Red Hat does make money, not all that much. That is the other side of open source. I am sure that Mr. Linux himself, Linus, would love to be filthy rich from his operating system. He, however, chose to give it away. But then again, it could be because he chooses to live in a country where it is much more socialist then here, and many of your basic needs are taken care of by the government.
I figured you were a federali. Although I'd love to see your CRAZY credentials....
Yes, what Google says and does are different, and in the case I am referencing they definitely are using a technology that they decided to use first and try to get the license later, only to find out their competitors bought it specifically to screw Google. And now Google has come out crying.
Do copyright protections hinder creativitiy? I don't believe so. Do I believe in protecting a great way to earn a decent living in today's society? You bet.
Yes, the fact that you can record a decent demo with a simple ZOOM H2 has made the costs of creating music nil. However, that doesn't mean that it should then cost nil. It already is darn near that, at $0.99 a song. If you say music should be what the market bears, then just about every single digital anything should be free. More and more people "share", so free it is. So, take away any profit or jobs in the digital sector of anything in the US and what are you left with? Ridiculously high unemployment, the complete destruction of wages, and of course no way to recover in any decent amount of time. As it was stated in the movie RiP!, Americans have chosen, by and large, to get rid of actual manufacturing and labor jobs in favor of an intellectual property type commodity. We all know that the guy who cuts my lawn doesn't make nearly what I do. We have chosen, like most of the world, to invest in a standard of living that rewards creativity and thought, not labor.
I don't think, by and large, culture itself needs any full time anything. However, clearly, art was able to move forward because there were artists who did do nothing but that, even going back eons.
What it all comes down to today is that our standard of living, our general ease of life (and yes, the US may have one of the easiest existences on the planet) exists solely because of that concept known as the "rule of law." If you follow the law/rules, you can do anything, be anything, succeed in any amount you wish here. Once countries, cultures and economies that are supposed to live to those rules decide to no longer do that you destroy a delicate balance that cannot exist in a vacuum.
Brazil's need for large access to drugs to treat aids comes from a number of things, none the least of which is that they have chosen not to invest in large pharma, so they must then live with what the rest of the world will give them. In addition, if you choose to have an open society like they try to have, then when you wind up with large problems like HIV and AIDS, you have to live with your choice to not do anything to stifle what spreads it. In this universe you cannot have it both ways. In this case Brazil cannot regulate itself and keep its people happy without the drugs. Yet, they chose not to invest themselves. They were hoping for the international handout. It didn't come. Not from the US, not from Germany, no where. So then they decided to no longer honor long standing agreements.
Why then, should any guitar manufacturer care if any Brazilian wood protected internationally is obtained here? Why should we then protect them? It is okay, or it seems so based on other posts here, for Brazil to take the action it did under the guise of humanitarian aid. So, since in the US we need jobs, taking Brazilian rainforest wood to create jobs here is humanitarian too.
This is why I started this thread. To discuss all this. People seem to feel that because music is no longer delivered on a disc or tape that it therefore is not a product worthy of protection, nor is it worth anything. The question I have is, then, what if all music was sent back to being put on vinyl only, and the technology to record it in any other way was purchased by the recording industry and never released? Would that not really PO the masses? I personally would love to see it, or, as in Re-mixing, I'm hoping someone comes up with a way to digitally encode a file that will not allow it to be shared without a permission or purchase.
I don't think that's much of a factor to actual professionals, because most people don't listen to recorded music made by people like that.
The supply far outstrips the the demand, which is mostly why we can't make money with that non commercial music; nobody I know that isn't a musician or sleeping with a musician listens to anything like that.
I totally disagree with the premise. There are recordings from 1950 that sound fantastic.
Lack of low end is not an objective measure of recording quality; that music as played in the studio didn't have a lot of bottom either. It would have been bizarrely inappropriate for the results to have modern levels of low end, and if somehow down anyway, impossible for the consumer to play back properly at that time.
I think there is some validity in your point, however I also think it's relevant that most people think the quality of music has declined in the last few decades.
That el cheapo home recording is not an interchangeable commodity with a true pro recording in a real studio; it doesn't sound the same and it doesn't sell the same. In fact, it probably doesn't sell at all, with very, very few exceptions relative to the huge numbers of such recordings that are being made each year.
But now you're changing the premise - instead of losing profits for your recording you are losing profits for your songwriting. And as soon as Paris Hilton makes a million bucks, then there are real damages for you (and your attorney) to win in a lawsuit. And there you will be, with your earlier version of the recording, and a judge will award you a big fat pile of money. But realize the distinction - Paris Hilton ripped off your songwriting, instead of millions of people ripping off your recording by downloading it for free.
(Or a slightly nuanced version of this scenario - someone samples your recording. If they never make substantial money with their version, what are you gonna do? Sue them for ramen noodles? Be my guest. As soon as the sampler makes a million bucks with your sample, you and your attorney can and will sue the bling right off his fingers and neck.)
We can swerve this discussion in any direction you like, but I'm focused on people who profit from recordings. Those days are ancient history, IMO. Even Lady Gaga is a multimedia/celebrity enterprise, making only a portion of her revenue from sales of recorded music. The real money is in leveraging your fame into clothing, liquor, ticket sales, MTV Takeover shows, reality TV deals, advertising endorsements, Youtube views, twitter followers, etc.
Yeah, but I AM talking about what the market will bear! (Virtually) nobody cares about the "quality" of the music, the musicians, the singing, or the recording! Just look at the sound-vomit that sells TV commercials and world tour tickets! Listen to anything from Kid Rock! He opened the NFL kickoff last week with the dumbest song I've ever heard. South Park cannot possibly satirize him - Kid Rock is self-satire!
And that's what the market wants! And it wants it all for virtually free! You could not possibly get a record company to produce, for a 4 piece rock band, a 30 track double album and force everyone to pay $20 for it - no stealing, no downloading, no copying. That's essentially what The Beatles did with The White Album, and IMHO it will never. happen. again. Virtually nobody wants that, and virtually nobody will pay for it.
The RIAA, you, me, Jesus, and John Rambo can moan about enforcing copyrights for recorded music as loudly as we like, but at the end of the day, the cat is out of the bag. The "industry" can produce recordings that meet the "quality" demands of the masses for a tiny percentage of what they used to cost. The market will no longer bear paying even $15 for an album, physical or digital.
So I go full circle - history will look at the years of 1950-1990 as an aberration, when it was briefly possible to get rich selling musical recordings. Never before, and never since.
You already have that, at least in the US. Registering it is how you protect your rights, and prove that it is yours. But you can assert copyright the moment you've inked the lyrics, recorded the song, whatever. It just makes it harder to defend if you can't prove your authorship. And no, mailing a copy to yourself in an unopened envelope is not a substitute for copyright.
What you describe is how art and music perpetuated for centuries before intellectual property laws. Shakespeare did not author the story of most of his plays, certainly not the most successful of them.
Also, Walt Disney corporation wouldn't be the multi-billion dollar media powerhouse they are today if Walt Disney the person hadn't liberally borrowed from the public domain back in the early days of the industrial copyright industry. Snow White, Cinderella, and even the Little Mermaid are all public domain works. I find it highly ironic that the main driver behind increasingly draconian copyright laws is the company that made a mint out of the public domain.
I have multiple listings in the Library of Congress. But the purpose of copyright is not to make you rich, despite what you may imagine. It is to encourage you to produce works that may be added to the public domain.
For some reason, it seems like people have forgotten the second half of that equation. I would like to see copyright law reformed to prohibit corporations from owning copyrights. Individuals are creative. Corporations are not. Incentivizing Walt Disney to hoard ever longer periods of copyright protection for their works has NOT in any measurable way improved the quality of their offerings. Rather the reverse -- with the exception of Pixar's movies I can't think of a single thing Disney has shat out in the last three decades that was worth the toilet paper it was wiped from. And Pixar was always an independent unit of Disney.
The problem America is facing is a century of commoditized entertainment is falling into a black hole from which much of it may never emerge. When one of these zombie media companies like Disney finally folds because their main line of business fails due to complete and total lack of creative talent in the entire company, all of their huge vaults of carefully preserved copyrighted material will vanish too. Who knows where they'll end up?
There is a happy medium between a free-for-all, and a copyright fascist police state. We are nowhere near it.
Comparing generic drugs (made from, as you say, "stolen" formulas) and music sampling is ludicrous. Medicine acquisition and sickness treatment might be a matter of life and death.
Plus, only drugs with expired patents have their generic counterparts produced in Brazil. (source Wikipedia:
Medicamento genérico )
Plus, I am quite sure there are generic drugs for sale in countries like the US and France.
Yes, there is poverty and crime. Your point? Sweden has close to zero poverty and crime, and is the home of piratebay, for instance.
And what's wrong with Oil? US has several oil companies. Norway is a big oil producer.
I am quite sure you know squat about our culture.
Logical fallacies and hamfisted speculation, OH MY!
Specious reasoning and inductive arguments, OH NO!
Oh crap, better copy-write that.
In all serious, this is all sour grapes. A few musicians can't deal with the fact that the short half a century window were music was extremely profitable (monetarily) for the individual is now dead and soon to be buried.
The point about not making money off music in the centurary's proceeding the 20th is at least partially true.
In the olden days; music and art, in general, were subsidised by either royalty or the wealthy. Ex: Vivaldi's Operas/pieces commissioned by Ospedale della Pietà, etc.
I personally think as society we should move back to that model.
"L'art pour l'art."
Specious reasoning and inductive arguments, OH NO!
Oh crap, better copy-write that.
In all serious, this is all sour grapes. A few musicians can't deal with the fact that the short half a century window were music was extremely profitable (monetarily) for the individual is now dead and soon to be buried.
The point about not making money off music in the centurary's proceeding the 20th is at least partially true.
In the olden days; music and art, in general, were subsidised by either royalty or the wealthy. Ex: Vivaldi's Operas/pieces commissioned by Ospedale della Pietà, etc.
I personally think as society we should move back to that model.
"L'art pour l'art."
As long as someone gives me credit when they sample a song of mine I could care less because that's free marketing for me to an audience that might not of heard my melody/beat before. Someone might say, "Gee, that sounds awesome. I want to see what the original song actually sounds like. Hey, these guys are pretty good! I'll have to see them live the next time they're in town."
You have to look at it from all angles.
You have to look at it from all angles.
I pretty much agree as far as the present day market is concerned. But it's a huge leap to go from that, to "this is how it will be for all time". You haven't made an argument that can bridge that gap. I realize it looks that way now in our local area (not the entire world), but things always change, especially in areas affected by technology.
There are in fact many millions of albums sold at that price or more each year at present, and many people who do see it as a matter of their ethics to buy the music they want to listen to and support its ongoing existence. (Which is not to say that there are not many more who don't see it that way.)
That said, with the market largely spoiled because it's hard to compete with free, let's say it's a generational thing that you just can't get comparable #s of people to pay for recordings for, say, 20 or 30 years.
What happens ? Does music continue to be made just the same as always despite the revenue stream drying up ? Of course not. High quality recording, like high quality musicianship, becomes more and more scarce; it is tied to the remains of the old revenue stream. To get really good at something complex, you have to do it all the time at a high level, and as a hobbyist, your time and resources are always more limited than for a pro getting paid for their time.
Does the demand for music go away ? I doubt it.
If you share that doubt, then what's left ? We're talking about the future audience a decade or two from now either deciding that the newest, more electronic and cheaply/hobbyist produced music is all they'll ever want, or, that audience deciding they want better sounding or better played music.
And this is not a today question, but I would point out that there is little evidence of widespread satisfaction with the kind of music that is being made by hobbyists. Home recorded albums that sell are scarce. There have been a few, and all of those that I've ever heard of had considerable pro work done on them anyway, or were done in lavish home studios of established artists that were still tied to the old revenue stream.
And then there's the technology. As of today, it's generally considered impractical to enforce anti piracy laws. However, the laws are there, and what is possible from a technology point of view changes rapidly; just look at 30 years ago compared to today, and imagine more change than that in the next 30, because that's how it's been going for about 100 years.
Effective (if not perfect) anti piracy methods would be a game changer. I think they are inevitable, and they will call the self entitled consumers' bluff. It's one thing to say that you won't buy any music (when you don't have to in order to enjoy it), and quite another to live in a world where you are denying yourself a pleasure. Most people are not into denying themselves.
But that's only one angle.
Recorded music is a distinct art form from live music. Some people work in recorded music exclusively, or prefer it, or have real limits on how often or where they can play live.
I am not interested in being taken advantage of in order to later be taken advantage of by a larger number of people.
There are all kinds of values about the purpose and meaning of music. Forums like this have a real problem in the level of assumptions about these things, and in the devaluing of different opinions.
I totally accept that someone else could feel that any attention is good attention. That's a perfectly fine choice, and there are ways to go about making your music freely available in that way if you so choose.
But that is not at all how I feel about it. I would rather not be heard at all, than be heard in compromised form. And make no mistake - this relates both to the nature of the appreciation of the music by the audience, and to the ethics and basic respect afforded to people that create art. It's not a one way thing just about benefits coming back to me, though that would be a good enough ethical justification.
Why ? What is the up side of that model ? You can't grant exclusive credit to patrons for the existence of the work. Many musicians also had income from popular live performances; and after all, they did the work itself.
Some of the downsides:
1) societal elite gets more cultural leverage, making everyone else subject to their (often bad) taste
2) using that leverage, the wealthy get a large measure of control of the cultural message, gutting the revolutionary and critical potential of art, except that which can be done for very cheap in the free time of people with other careers
3) musicians are forever a second class at best under the upper crust
Remember, in the era you are talking about, many great artists died as paupers, or had to spend much of their time doing crap on commission, plus schmoozing their patrons, to pay the bills.
If there is widespread consumption of music, the compensation can be widespread too. This is more democratic, participatory, fair, and difficult to manipulate or censor.
"Get" ugly? It started pretty ugly to me.
Yeah, I would agree with that. The OP's language choices and his conclusions do not set the debate up on the most solid foundation at the outset.
At least I tried to use a bit of humor while pointing out the absurdity of some of the opinions expressed in this thread. That's always a win right?
I lol'd on this one, thank you! I'd consider adding it as a sig, but I wouldn't want to have to pay you royalties per post.
Your points are all valid and I agree with quite a few.
I simply think that art should be for the sake of art. And by that; we as a society should spend freely on supporting our artists in a similar way. Put them up when they tour, feed them, tip them, go to their shows, even pay them if the latter can't be acomplished. Show them their sacrifice for the soul of our culture and race is worthwhile in a personal way.
Our current system mirrors your points quite well, I believe anyways. An industry with horrible tastes, check. View music and artists as a commodity that can be traded, speculated, leveraged, and sold, check. A cultural that has had it's collective brains and ears turned to mush from 100+ years of soul-sucking advertising, check. Insane ammount of money enlarged and improved music in many ways, but in many others it cheapened it's artistic integrity.
Again my opinion uncharacteristically hippie opinion on the issue, nothing more.
If that was a more widely held attitude, the copyright discussion would be less necessary. But when it comes to music in recorded form, there is a large appetite for it, and it strikes me as a very simple matter of payment tied to consumption, unless the musician has some other preferred way of putting their stuff out there.
I have a somewhat different outlook. In an uncensored free marketplace of ideas, I don't think it's the systems' responsibility to have tastes. Rather, I think the system needs to have as little built in bias and assumption as possible. The audience has their own tastes. The industry that a lot of people like to bash, has among other things financed many very risky and ambitious creative projects, in many cases at a loss, or with the returns only coming decades later.
One example I like to use is Miles Davis in the early 70s. His records were not selling well after Bitches Brew, except in Japan. And yet Columbia was footing the bills for absolutely top notch recording in NYC with whatever musicians Miles wanted, on a pretty regular basis for about 5 years during which time many incredible things were tracked.
Another type of example is the small label labor of love, of which there have been many, where, typically, one person's tastes and resources enable a few great things to be recorded that bigger labels passed on because they didn't look to be (and usually in fact were not) lucrative.
This marketplace has served every kind of taste there is, to such a massive extent that almost anybody has more great music they could listen to, then they possibly could in their remaining life. And I say that as a guy with notably selective and obscure tastes; if the well was going to run dry for anyone, it would be someone like myself, and yet I still know of many recordings I would like to have and other whole styles I would like to explore.
I'm not really seeing the down side of recorded music as a sellable commodity. What's wrong with that ? I can think of few more noble products. After the basic essentials, music is a pretty cool thing to spend money on, IMO. I enjoy it, in ways that are unique to recordings (rather than live where you hear it once) and it helps more music be created.
What is the connection between the cultural effects of advertising, and music ? Very little if any advertising that I see is for music, outside of music-specific magazines, and they're rarely annoying as ads. Some of them are pretty cool.
As for artistic integrity, I can't blame the market for that. It's up to musicians to have and keep it. Music tells the truth about people, that's part of why it's powerful. The truth isn't always pretty, but there are always other people to listen to if you become disappointed.
As valid a basis as any I would say.
The way I see it, musicians need to get back to the life of a troubador.
With everyone wanting to be "stars", be it American Idolatry, or TV Reality show-offs and the Internet, the idea that a band can take the world by storm ala the Beatles, et al are over.
With the ability to record and sell directly from the comfort of one's own living room and with such fierce competition from the entire planet, there simply lacks any real authenticity or originality any longer. Even original acts are now doing remakes (ahem...covers) and foregoing the trouble of trying to create anything new under the sun. The music business has become so much business, and so little music, that it's scarcely relevant.
As an artist, I no longer sign my paintings and simply put an Om symbol on them and let them go for a price. I make a living from the next painting sale, or as a musician, from the next gig. I no longer deal with the insanity or superficiality of trying to "make it big". I no longer feel the need to live up to unrealistic expectations, save for what my band can do for an audience on any given night.
Music has become more spiritual for me, where it infuses me with an energy I can both give and receive in a live setting. I get more from performing live without the worry about the "business" aspect of it. I'll leave that to those in search of stardom.
Copyright, shmoppyright. I don't even care anymore.
With everyone wanting to be "stars", be it American Idolatry, or TV Reality show-offs and the Internet, the idea that a band can take the world by storm ala the Beatles, et al are over.
With the ability to record and sell directly from the comfort of one's own living room and with such fierce competition from the entire planet, there simply lacks any real authenticity or originality any longer. Even original acts are now doing remakes (ahem...covers) and foregoing the trouble of trying to create anything new under the sun. The music business has become so much business, and so little music, that it's scarcely relevant.
As an artist, I no longer sign my paintings and simply put an Om symbol on them and let them go for a price. I make a living from the next painting sale, or as a musician, from the next gig. I no longer deal with the insanity or superficiality of trying to "make it big". I no longer feel the need to live up to unrealistic expectations, save for what my band can do for an audience on any given night.
Music has become more spiritual for me, where it infuses me with an energy I can both give and receive in a live setting. I get more from performing live without the worry about the "business" aspect of it. I'll leave that to those in search of stardom.
Copyright, shmoppyright. I don't even care anymore.
