So... musicians need to live like this is ancient Greece, while our "fans" and everybody else gets to live in the 21st Century ? Including using modern technology to copy the recordings we made using modern technology ?
Why should music go backwards because of technological or social change ? Doesn't it sound to you like something might not be right in that scenario ?
If my biggest competitor for a dollar was the local fishmonger or olive oil or spice importer, or a guy making obscene pottery by hand, I guess I'd feel OK about those odds. But here in 2011, musicians compete against other musicians plus corporate resources on a worldwide scale.
The importance of what you're saying depends largely on whether it's a "how it is today" viewpoint, or a "how it should be today and tomorrow" viewpoint. If it's the former, I have little to argue. As for the latter, why would any musician want that ?
I could understand deciding for yourself that you want to live like a wandering troubadour, spreading happiness and syphilis from day to day, eating whatever is available and staying wherever you can, but it's not something that most people would accept being forced upon them, particularly knowing that others are making more money than us from our work.
It's not right to make music in the present tense but have to get paid like it's 3,000 years ago.
If everybody got paid like it was 3,000 years ago, a lot of us wouldn't get paid, because the ancient Greeks had human slavery; if you were a citizen you more than likely had at least one slave, and of course if you were a slave you were not a citizen.
Musicians barely make a living gigging and merchandising. As the actual song becomes "worthless" or "free", the investment of the consumer is then "worthless". So, you aren't invested in seeing it like you were just a few years ago. Everytime I shelled out $8 for an album it was not insignificant. Minimum wage back then was $1.15 an hour. So that was a whole day's work for an album. You bet I played it till it was sooo scratched up I had to buy another.
And since in those days you only had radio to give you the artist, you only got one or two songs. You wanted to see them live because you would get more material AND you would see different things then you heard on radio. Springsteens live show was and still is astronomically different then what is on the vinyl, so you bought the album. Dug the songs. Wanted to see him live. Then, when you saw him live you got much more material, and you got a show. Going to see and artist was the only way to immerse yourself in the artist, and you would pay anything within sick reason to see them.
Today, with one simple click you can have the entire catalog and a crap load of illegal live recordings. All, while mostly illegal, for free. So tell me then, if Cold Play came to the local theater or college by you, would you pay, say $100 per ticket to see them? (That is, in my calculation, the equivalent of a $25 ticket in the '70s. Three days of work to pay for a ticket to see your favorites. Heck, today, with minimum at $7 per, thats only two days work.)
Everyone has to give something of value to get someone to pay you for it. But why should someone, like Girl Talk dude, take the value someone worked hard for and get to profit completely from it. The argument, my argument, is not that Girl Talk shouldn't be able to do what he does. My argument is that he should have to share that profit with the people who put in the work. While both created something of value, the orginal artist, no matter how unrecognizable on the recording, is just as valuable as a contributor as was Girl Talk. Equal contributions, equal sharing.
You know, I am really beginning to resent this attitude of "get with the times." This argument is not about "the times." If it is, then this thread alone proves that by and large "the times" is morally corrupt, ethically bankrupt and that I guess we should get rid of all laws. I guess its now okay for me to break into your house and take your guitar, as long as I go out and make beautiful music with it. Or I can steal your car, as long as I can drive it well.
Yes, times and technology move on. Industries come and go. But you really can't equate the two here. The horse and buggy definitely was overtaken by the auto. The train was overtaken by the plane. Film was overtaken by flash and hard drives. But each was competing on a similar playing field and in a similar product line.
Digital technology did basically kill the vinyl album and the cassette tape. The media music is transported on. The non-fair part is that as the media changed, it opened the music up, unintentionally, to actions that were, even in the days of the bards, not desired or intentioned. The "technology" of music hasn't really changed. You still need an idea. Then strum it out. Then refine it, craft it and record it. Then produce it, and finally, release it. The way you do that has changed, but its still the same.
If you went to work and one day your boss came to you and said he was reducing your salary because he found one person who would work for less, or hell, food, even though in America that is illegal, what would you do? You'd probably quit your job and cry how unfair it was. You might even stop doing what you did forever. The ability to steal music is akin, in my mind, to the same thing. The thought that "I can download this for free (I'm talking about illegal downloads and sharing) so the artist should just put on more shows and sell merch" is misguided. Nothing in our society works without law and following the law. Not your job, not your home, not your life.
Having travelled the world extensively, and spent way too much times in the middle east, you would, I'm sure, be surprised to learn that a majority of the people who live there are not natives, they are serfs and slaves. The law is the ruling, rich princes and lords. You "work" for them. Meaning you are a slave and can be abused, and after enough time has passed they will give you your passport back and maybe even pay you enough to get one meal a week. There are no court systems, no real life based on law and constitution.
My point? If you want to steal music, you essentially are saying that you don't care about the law, and therefore you are saying you don't need any rights to protect you. Yep, may as well be that I own you. You don't care. Technology has allowed me to own you. You have decided which laws to follow and which ones you can ignore. Guess I'm free to do the same. Wait, you wouldn't like that, would you.
It would be one thing if the complaint was that these things are toooooo expensive. But that isn't the argument. I have never heard someone complain that $0.99 per song is expensive or not doable. Just, why pay at all when I can use illegal P2P and get it for free.
I'm done with the soapbox on this one. Technology only works and serves us when it is within a set of boundaries called laws. Once you decide that technology is above law, rule and rights....
