Allison Outhit’s When Two Worlds Collude: Artists and Fans Hug It Out in Exclaim! magazine highlights how things could, and should be, between fans and artists.
Among other things, “While criminalizing unauthorized file sharing has created public hatred against the music business, it has also seriously damaged the artists in whose names those initiatives are supposedly launched,” she says, continuing >>>
Nice how that works out for the industry: keeping artists and fans at war with each other ensures they’ll never band together against a common foe.
That may be about to change. With the foundation of a2f2a, a site that encourages file-sharers and musicians to debate as peers, a conversation has been started that could see musicians and fans hugging it out at last.
a2f2a was started by Billy Bragg and myself. Allison interiewed us both for her piece and my end of it was done by email as sort of a Q&A. I re-ran her subsequent article in p2pnet and a2f2a and at the end of the a2f2a item, “By way of a kind of PS, Billy and I met for the first time [on Monday] in person, that is,” I said, adding:
“He’s touring Canada and as part of his trip, came to Vancouver Island, BC, where I live. We had a great talk and I came away believing he’s someone we can trust. Yes, I hit him with Three Strikes and although I don’t have anything I can put into print, I feel a whole lot happier and I can say things will be interesting over the next little while. And that’s in the positive rather than Confucian sense. 
‘They’ don’t get it. But we do. Definitely stay tuned.”
a2f2a is doing really well and although it’s somewhat lopsided at the moment, no worries because intelligent people on both sides of the fence are forcefully putting their perspectives to each other. And that’s groundbreaking. It’s never happened before.
Billy has been largely out of the picture because he’s been on the road, touring Canada. But he’ll be back home in the UK shortly and mixing it on a2f2a again.
Meanwhile, it’s no surprise fans are at this point making the most noise. They are, after all, the ones being villified by as thieves and criminals.
“Lucky for the industry, musicians tend to be a badly organized, somewhat apathetic bunch,” says Allison, adding, “The industry has taken advantage of that lack of self-representation to promote itself as the loyal guardian of musicians”, and “Until the industry started suing music fans for sharing music on the web, artists were seemingly content to let that representation live.”
Not any more and when I say Hang In, we’ll have artists joining in soon enough, I’m not sticking my neck out. It’s a guarantee.
Meanwhile, below is the email Q&A I had with Allison for her Exclaim! story.
Cheers!
Jon Newton
__________________
Allison: What is p2pnet all about?
Jon: It’s about a view from the other side of the fence — it’s for, and by, the people who keep Big Music, Hollywood and the rest of them alive, a minor detail the labels and studios (and everyone else, come to that, 
) continually forget.
Allison: The internet was pretty much founded 40 years ago to be a file-sharing tool. Why do you think legislators and rights-holders have been so slow to catch on to file-sharing as a key web 2.0 web-shaping phenomenon?
Jon: You can’t lump them together, unless you’re talking about rights-holders as the people wielding the whip and legislaters as the ones doing the jumping every time it’s cracked. Label lobbyists have a significant number of influential politicians in their pockets. Fot evidence, all you have to do is look at the Three Strikes and you’re Off The Net farce that’s playing out around the world. In the lamescream mainstream media, its being presented as a number of separate ‘initiatives’ in different countries. But it’s all one movie and record industry operation.
The rights-holders who, as far as the music industry is concerned, are Vivendi Universal (France), Sony (Japan), EMI (Britain), and Warner Music (US, but headed up by our very own Edgar Bronfman jr whose family itself initially made money by peddling product that was illegal on the other side of the border: booze) haven’t been slow in catching on. They haven’t even tried. The Net means competition and in their lexicon, that’s a dirty word. Their sole objective from Day One, was, and still is, to gain total control of how ‘product’ is distributed online, and by whom. They want it so they, and they alone, can use it as their exclusive product marketing, sales and handling vehicle. Everything else is secondary.
Allison: What are its goals?
Jon: Billy and I share one bottom line bottomline: Artists need to be paid, and fans want to pay them, and as we say on the a2f2a mission page [http://a2f2a.com/mission-statement/], we have three main goals »»»
1. Help each community better understand the other;
2. Help find a practical and workable system which offers artists fair remuneration in exchange for access to material by fans; and
3. Help set the agenda for discussions about the role P2P can play within the online digital record industry.
Allison: Describe the circumstances under which a2f2a was founded.
Jon: “I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together.” That’s from The Beatles’ 1967 song I Am The Walrus and for me, they sum up what the net’s all about. Peers to peers. People2people. P2P. And through it, there’s now a chance for two critical masses, those who make songs and those who enjoy them, to start a massive online chain reaction uniting musicians with fans and fans with musicians, to everyone’s mutual benefit.
Music is meant to be passed around and enjoyed, not owned exclusively by a small band of corporate pirates epitomised by the Big 4. That isn’t to say it should be free as in free beer, but it should at least be affordable and within easy reach of everyone. And yet, it isn’t — not corporate ‘product,’ anyway. Singly and together, in one way or another, the Big 4 control the music industry.
They say sharing is exactly the same as stealing, and they’re using his specious and indefensible claim as the visible element in their efforts to gain total control of the Internet. I Am the Walrus is more than 40 years old and by any reasonable standard, it should by now have entered the public domain for free use by anyone. But if you or I dare to share it online, and if any of the Big Music ‘trade’ organisation such as the the CRIA in Canada, the RIAA in America, or the BPI in Britain, are alerted and somehow find out where we live, we could wind up on the wrong end of a Big 4 anti-file sharing subpoena.
On October 2 I ran ‘Billy Bragg solves the file sharing problem [http://www.p2pnet.net/story/29292],’ based on his September 30 editorial in The Guardian called A better way to sink internet pirates. The next day I followed up with Billy Bragg to p2pnet [http://www.p2pnet.net/story/29279] and as I’ve said on both p2pnet and a2f2a, something happened I don’t believe has happened before since the file sharing controversy was launched by the labels in 2003.
My original post was less than complimentary to Billy Bragg. But he began talking to p2pnet readers in a series of posts addressing individual points raised in Readers’ Writes, as I call comments. At first, a lot of readers believed this was just someone pretending to be a high-profile artist. However, the tone and tenor suggested to me they were real and I asked Billy to get in touch so we could talk — he as the member of one constituency, musicians, and me as a member of another, music fans. He responded, we traded emails and phone calls and it became pretty evident we saw eye to eye on the lot of issues, particularly that artists need to be paid and fans wanted to pay them.
In direct contrast, the music industry has spent a major fortune portraying people who share music with each other as criminals and thieves whose last wish is to pay anyone anything.
Allison: When it comes to the future of the music industry, do you think artists should be sticking with record labels and traditional music industry structures, or should they be looking for ways to rebuild the industry more in their favour?
Jon: In the unlikely event the labels ever wake up, there’s no reason why they shouldn’t be part of the new music in digital 21st digital century. But clearly, they don’t want to be ‘part’ of anything. They want it all.
The old bases of cash-cow ‘consumers’ are dying fast and in 2009, we have a brand new, and rapidly expanding, pool of intelligent and articulate customers who’ve been permanently poisoned against the corporate music industry and it’s ‘product’. There are also hundreds of millions of kids who’d happily pay 10 or 20 cents for songs they like. My daughter, Emma, 13, and her friends (10 – 18) enjoy all kinds of music online, old and new, with YouTube and other video sites as their principal sources. Then they gossip with each other about what they like. Then they go to concerts. Then they buy CDs and T-shirts. I know because I have to pay for it. And they need to be separately considered, and addressed, ideally on websites, as a kind of customer unit in their own right(s).
Musicians have kids too. Some of their kids could be talking to some of our kids on purpose-built, carefully monitored sites. But as things are, they’re just targets with phony industry ‘educators’ with spurious messages trying to turn them into good little corporate consumers, compliant in all respects. (Dont get me going on that )
Forget the labels. The full range of corporate ‘product’ is already out there and readily available to anyone who wants it. That can’t be changed. The clock can’t be turned back. Sooner or later, what’s left of the majors will open their catalogues and drastically lower their wholesale prices. They won’t have any choice. Meanwhile, artists should do their own thing(s), and/or join independent self-help advocacy groups such as the Canadian Music Creators Coalition.
‘Trust’ should be the watchword. Musicians should trust people to be fair.
Allison: What do you think their file-sharing fans would like to see?
Jon: We need a selection of sites featuring music from indie musicians, and established artists such as Billy who own their own material and who can therefore do whatever they want with it. Sell individual downloads — singles, in other words — for 15 or 20 cents per, or perhaps by size as did AlloMP3. What’s better, 20 people at 20 cents, or 1 person at $1? And include MP3s as well as regular tracks on CDs so people can easily transfer them to their music players.
Allison: Taking the national pulse: in your opinion are Canadians likely to get behind economic and legal policies that favour legitimizing music file sharing? (through, for example, copyright reform, ISP levies) Or do you suspect we have all been infected with an unshakeable case of Hollywooditis?
Jon: Music file sharing is already legitimate. It’s never been otherwise. What’s in question is: are unauthorised uploads and downloads truly devastating the corporate music industry, as the Big 4 claim? I don’t believe it is. In fact, I think it’s a priceless form of viral advertising. Neither the labels nor the studios have ever come anywhere near proving files shared equal sales lost. When someone shares a tune with someone ese, it doesn’t mean the person on the receiving end would have otherwise have walked into a store and bought a CD, or paid for a rip-off $1 (or more) for a 10-cent ownload sold on a site offering corporate ‘product’.
I added:
“In my view, copyright reform means accepting the reality that music copyright is all-but dead. Instead, let’s talk about how people such as myself can have direct access to online music and those who make it. I realise a lot of people, particularly those with heavily vested interests, will violently oppose this perspective. They’re the middlemen, and they’re not only represented by the labels. They’re also the politicians, industry lobbyists, copyright lawyers and ‘consultants’ and all the other ‘professionals’ who depend absolutely on the status quo remaining the status quo. Let them keep what they’ve got, and while they’re busily cutting each other’s throats, we can bypass them and decide together what we want to do, how we want to do it, and with whom.”
November 27th, 2009 at 9:18 am
@jon, just something I noticed in your interview. One of the barriers put upon indie artists for selling super cheap downloads is bandwidth and the payment system (e.g. credit card and banking fees). So, while the cost of the ‘product’ (mp3 or video download) can be fairly cheap like 0-20cents, the banks tend to take a big chunk from the consumer and so do the telecoms (if it’s a pay by sms type thing). It’s something we’ve been working on at Kerchoonz. It’s also th the same problem with the ‘donation’ system. If an artist uses a donation button, there is still that dodgey transaction charge connected to it (e.g. paypal, etc.) So, we need to develop a payment system that helps bypass these kinds of charges. There are a couple of other things we are working on that I’d like to run past you though and see what you and Billy think.
November 27th, 2009 at 10:06 am
@ Indy:
“One of the barriers put upon indie artists for selling super cheap downloads is bandwidth and the payment system (e.g. credit card and banking fees).”
If they have a site, they’re already paying for bandwidth. Credit card and banking fees? They’ve been an integral part of doing business — any business — for decades (almost centuries
). Meanwhile, the labels, which have been swallowing the lion’s share, and that’s if they deign to pay the artist anything at all, will be left choking in the dust of progress.
I said , “We need a selection of sites featuring music from indie musicians, and established artists such as Billy who own their own material and who can therefore do whatever they want with it. Sell individual downloads — singles, in other words — for 15 or 20 cents per, or perhaps by size as did AlloMP3. What’s better, 20 people at 20 cents, or 1 person at $1? And include MP3s as well as regular tracks on CDs so people can easily transfer them to their music players.”
I also said, “The old bases of cash-cow ‘consumers’ are dying fast and in 2009, we have a brand new, and rapidly expanding, pool of intelligent and articulate customers who’ve been permanently poisoned against the corporate music industry and it’s ‘product’. There are also hundreds of millions of kids who’d happily pay 10 or 20 cents for songs they like.”
I’m sure this is the way things will be, and I don’t believe bank and CC charges will have much impact under this coming reality when artists own their own music and sell direct to fans.
Cheers!
November 27th, 2009 at 10:51 am
Hi jon,
I know what you mean, except that the bank charges are nearly as much as the price of the download if it’s 20cents. For example, if an artist uses paypal, the artist is charged the transaction fee.
November 27th, 2009 at 11:08 am
Don’t forget Indiana, for bandwidth there’s BitTorrent and MiniNova.
As to transactional costs, as I’ve said elsewhere, artists should give up selling copies and simply let people make their own, i.e. provide a torrent link. It’s not difficult. Why charge the fan for something they can make themselves for nothing, that mostly ends up going in transaction fees?
Sell something that really takes some serious effort and talent, i.e. a recording of a studio performance, or even a live webcasted performance?
Why the heck are artists trying to sell copies?
It’s like a rocket scientist flipping burgers. Their skill and talent is wasted considerably.
November 27th, 2009 at 11:37 am
Like with paypal, if you (the artist) take payments or donations, the fee is 3.4% + 20p per transaction. That means that an artist would need to charge more like 45p per track in order to make 20p. It’s because credit card companies and payment systems like paypal charge per transaction (which would be like per download). But, if artists bundle their work and charged something like £2 per album, they would only be charged that 3.4% + 20p once. It’s difficult to find a system that works for a single track download at a small price.
It’s the ‘artist’ that would have to pay that transaction fee… or, they have to bolt that onto the price if they would like to make 20p per track. So, we’re trying to work out a way to make these kind of micro-transactions work so that the artist can as for less. I’m wondering how allomp3 gets around it. It might be that they are acting like a bank and that they aren’t FSA regulated in Russia? Allomp3 takes a £1.33 monthly subscription fee with no fees per download or they have a lifetime membership for something like £30. You would need to ask artists if they receive anything from that though because it’s not a case where the artists have uploaded their music or have any type of direct payment system.
November 27th, 2009 at 12:33 pm
@ Indy:
1 (or more, if you’re smart) download for free (so potential fans can get a taste). Then 30 cents for a single (OK, you don’t make much, but you now have someone who’s actually paid, with all that implies), two quid for 10. And so on. That’d work.
Also, as Crosbie says, “Sell something that really takes some serious effort and talent, i.e. a recording of a studio performance, or even a live webcasted performance?”
Cheers!
November 27th, 2009 at 1:32 pm
@Indianna # 5:
Is it possible to learn from Lavalife? They have a “credits” system where you pay $20 and get x credits. Sorta like buying chips in poker.
This would reduce the number of transactions, because let’s face it, the banks and similar services have us under their nails with service charges. I intentionally skip over that part when I view my bank statements. I also prefer to pay in cash as that one transaction permits me many smaller transactions.
This is similar to Jon’s idea but he lost me with the “quid” and “p” thing, as I am not too familiar with the British coins. I was only there once.
November 27th, 2009 at 4:34 pm
Indiana:
Maybe have a look at what the Baen Library are doing, which involves a variety of approaches (and yes, I have spent some money there, as yet only US$15 or something like that, but I love science fiction and they have some authors I like a lot, as well as back-catalogue stuff I can’t easily get as physical books…)
Some other authors whose books are only available for download at similar prices to physical books, and in DRM-locked formats… Well, they won’t be getting any money from me for downloads, and for anyone who wants books are like MP3’s rather than films, so very fast and easy to download. Not that I would condone that, rather I’d like to change the law so that non-commercial sharing isn’t illegal, but the reality is that people will download instead in that circumstance.
One of the means Baen use, in combination with selected freely available stuff, and no DRM on anything, is staggered releases of a series, and also they let you purchase a chunk of credit with them at once, e.g. US$10 or US$20 (something like that, anyway), and then use that on their site in much smaller payments over a period of time, quickly if you download a lot from them, or more slowly if you are not taking as much. That way you don’t have to pay them much up-front, or a subscription, but they can offer micro-payments of any size quickly and easily, without additional transaction fees, and you can “top-up” as you go along, like a pay-go mobile phone, or Skype credit which works very similarly.
Ages ago I looked at eMusic, which is almost a viable concept, but no way would I pay a regular subscription at the level they wanted, especially not given their catalogue isn’t “everything ever produced”, and even if it was… I only want to draw on that credit when I use it, however cheap the per-download price is.
No-one like me who wants music they have irregularly or not at that rate every month is going to take that up, so unless eMusic do like Skype/Baen they lose me as a customer (as they did), and lose user base/revenue as a result, and I listen/download instead to independent music that’s freely available and non-DRMed so I can shift it between devices, or even share it if I want.
Using techniques like Baen are… You can still sell digital downloads at some price, even if they are freely shared by individuals and available on torrent sites. And Baen may well gain me as a future repeat customer, as e-book readers improve in technology, if they keep it easy, cheap, and nice to use like it is now, and even if I could download torrents of the books for free instead if I take the time to go looking for those.
November 27th, 2009 at 10:20 pm
@ Crosbie & John Barron and Jon… simply for the record, even if I were speaking about artists selling concert tickets, t-shirts or a Gibson guitar, those paypal (or credit card charges) still apply. Let’s say it’s some thing that the artist only pays 30p for, they still have to sell it at something around 60p in order to gain anything from it. It was a point that Jon brought up about driving the costs down. It’s precisely why at the beginning of our model we announced that we would make all downloads ‘free’ but share the advertising revenue with the artists. We are a lot different than some of the other ad-share revenue models because we were watching the market. At the moment, advertising simply won’t pay (why we haven’t launched properly yet.. not because we don’t have the financial backing, it’s because we are honest and don’t want to risk investment money on something that we know isn’t viable in the market yet.)
I get myself into trouble all the time for being too honest. I realize that, but, I don’t care (I do care, but, not that much… in the sense that I only care about things that I really believe in and their viability. I wish I wasn’t like that, but, I sleep easy at night and that’s what matters. It’s all about quality, not quantity. This approach has a lot to do with my fundamental philosophy. It explains my convictions, why I get annoyed by things in the world and also why I care enough to spend time here with you all. I believe that more than likely the people here also have their beliefs and convictions and that you are very active people. I have no problem with that. I enjoy that. In fact, I love that. So, I hope that you can all bare with me and realise that I don’t mind if you are controversial and if you think I appear to be annoyed, it’s not likely to be the case. I know this isn’t the perfect thread to explain that on, but, in reality, it’s how my mind works. I’ve been best friends with my most dire and worst enemies. It’s very weird that way, but, beautiful and encouraging.)
With @crosbie Yes, I believe I’ve grasped your concept about ‘copies’. However, the copy has to eventually make it out into the ‘public domain’. With independents (who are not privy to perhaps marketing spends) they are often putting their own ‘first copy out’… and even if Jon’s idea about selling the first copy at 20pence would work, the likes of banks and ‘paypal’ would drive that price up to around 45p. So, if you look at my no. 5 above, in reality (even bringing into mind the ‘digital’ age, and ’scarcity’, the banks drive the cost up by 100% or more for something priced at 20p… and remember, my comment was based upon Jon’s scenario of driving the price of digital content down to a level whereby people would feel interested in paying.
Point: If the objective of this site is about ‘cutting out the middleman’ maybe we could come up with a solution that perhaps bypasses the FSA (or the likes) and finds some kind of solution that makes direct payments ‘viable’ at any price? Just a thought.
But, back to Jon Barron’s comment, I agree, I also am not interested in any kind of subscription model because it pulls you into a monthly payment that you are maybe going to use for a while, but not necessarily (similar to subscriptions to a gym!) But, the reason why I mentioned allomp3 is because Jon and @dreddsnik mentioned their model as viable and interesting.
In my mind, it would be nice if at least something could work in the digital world for this outstanding group of artists that work hard, play hard and even get heard but have difficulties making ends meet even though people all over the world enjoy their music. In reality, they will perhaps never have the means to go and play physically to those people due to sheer economics. So, how can we help those artist who are being heard and appreciated in such a big physical world, cut out the middle man and somehow convince the government that they don’t need to crack down.
And beyond that, please remember that the world of the net doesn’t only rely on p2p, I know it’s important to all of you, but, it’s not the only technology or idea out there. How could maybe a combination of p2p and something else perhaps help the artists? I’m all cool about creative commons, I use it in writing under authorship (not music) as well. There must be a way to likewise also create a system that compensates artistic people but can somehow avoid bank charges and paypal charges. Put simply, if we’re really talking about ‘going direct’ without any middlemen, then, transaction charges would also need to be dealt with, right?
November 27th, 2009 at 10:27 pm
Grief, I write such long threads. put simply ( as per thread above) the sense of it is… if we’re plotting about turning the world upside down, it really must go ‘all the way’. like, 100% or nothing. Otherwise, it would be very mediocre.
November 30th, 2009 at 6:55 am
Indiana,
I’m not sure you have ‘grasped my concept about copies’. You are still talking in terms of selling a copy at 45p in order to make 20p.
I am talking about selling work, not copies.
For example, if some of my customers wanted me to spend ten days writing some software for them, I’d be looking at around £3,000 for that work. They can then make millions of their own copies for nothing for all I care – given I would have provided them with a GPL license (assurance that the copyright automatically applying to my work is neutralised).
If they want to sell copies of my work (that’s ‘my’ as in authored, not as in ’still under my control’), then they’re free to sell them at 45p to make 20p – if they reckon there’s still a market. I wouldn’t waste my time doing that. I’d simply provide a torrent link so people can make their own copies.
However, that’s just me. You can call me money-grabbing, but I’m not into working for nothing. Moreover, I’m certainly not into suspending other people’s liberty, I don’t think it’s ethical. NB I only realised copyright was unethical because I investigated its history (given it seemed at odds with information technology). So I reject Queen Anne’s grant of a monopoly over copies of my work (even though it might have some commercial value to an unscrupulous publisher). I’ll just sell my work thanks, and let people enjoy the liberty that nature has given them, without fear of FAST raiding their PCs, disconnecting them from the Internet and/or bankrupting them as an educational lesson.
Anyway, let’s get back to you and other artists who might just consider selling your work to your fans rather than copies of it (or a reproduction monopoly over copies to a record label).
I think we both know that selling one’s copyright to a label (whether 360 or less) isn’t what it’s been cracked up to be. You get an advance, followed by a musical career of indentured servitude and a one in a million lottery chance of ever recouping the advance (including subsequent costs) to see another penny ending up in your pocket rather than everyone else’s.
You’ve clearly demonstrated that selling copies is uneconomical and if record labels are finding it tricky to sell copies, it’s going to be even less viable for musicians (with far less in the way of resources than a label).
So tell me Indiana, how much would you charge a small 500 person venue to perform one song among a line-up of other musicians/singers? Assuming the venue covered all the others costs (stage, lighting, mixing, etc.).
I trust it’s more than 20p.
If you understand the business of selling your work (in providing a performance) to a live venue, why is it so difficult for me to help you understand the business of selling your work to your fans, or any online audience? In other words, why not miss out the owner of the venue, and simply sell your performance directly to the audience? How about making the venue your home studio, and the audience your fans sitting in their homes. You deliver them your performance as a recording, and they pay you your performance fee in exchange. No-one’s selling any copies here, and no copyright is involved.
This is what I mean by selling a recording instead of copies of it. A session musician sells their labour involved in performing for a studio recording. Usually to a label, but they might just as well sell it to the audience directly.
On your point about transaction charges, yes, I think it should be straight-forward to produce a system that leaves the artist with 97% or more of any revenue collected in artist/fan exchanges.
So, the musician wants say $5,000 for singing a song a capella, or possibly accompanied by acoustic guitar, in their home recording studio. It’s distributed free via BitTorrent/MiniNova. And 5,000 fans pay $1.03 each ($150 transaction costs). The musician gets paid. Their fans get the performance they wanted. The public keeps its liberty. Any record label is also at liberty to burn it on to vinyl or acetate – and they can pay the musician the same as usual (nothing), and sell copies for as much as they can get for them (a fair price given no monopoly). Now that’s what I call a free market, and an ethical incentive. The only people who have to find other work are copyright lawyers and online vendors of MP3 files.
December 1st, 2009 at 1:14 am
Hi all,
Regarding high transaction fees for micropayments, it is a problem. I have a couple ideas though.
A. Only make transactions once per week (or month). Over the course of the week, Jon’s downloads would add to the account total, and he’d be charged every Friday. Hopefully he would have purchased more than one track by then and the fee wouldn’t be as bad.
B. Only have a transaction after a certain threshold. If 1 or 2 downloads isn’t worth it, only charge after you get enough that it is, say 10 downloads. Yes, some people might freeload and never buy that 10th download, but you could consider that first 9 their free trial. Likewise, instead of 0.2/track, you could make it so that the first 9 were free and the 10th cost 2.
C. Make the first download cost more and subsequent downloads less. The first one would be 1.0 and the rest of the tracks in your cart would be 0.15. Or do a minimum transaction limit.
Basically, we’re trying to get the transaction total up, and there’s several ways to do it by changing charging structures other than a transaction for every small purchase. Lump up microtransactions to get majortransactions.
December 1st, 2009 at 2:53 pm
A look at major label “transparency”
http://www.toomuchjoy.com/?p=1397
December 1st, 2009 at 8:50 pm
Allof MP3
10.00 or more at a time.
Buy more as you use it up.
For some odd reason, people like that and are willing to pay.
Nothing will work if you don’t really want it to.
December 2nd, 2009 at 6:09 am
Bill, great link! Artists need to read that to see how labels are not the artist’s biggest fan, but their owner and master.
Good suggestions David, however, there’s something that Dreddsnik touches on that has some radical repercussions.
You can’t force your fans to pay you simply because they’re enjoying the music you’ve already delivered to them (published). The only thing you can do is make a deal with your fans interested in a good bargain.
This means that any future revenue mechanism will involve payment from fans who WANT to pay the artist. That means deprogramming yourself of the notion that you can CHARGE your fans. That is a delusion created by copyright, e.g. you can charge people for making copies (no!).
If all payment is coming from people who want to pay, then they don’t need to nickel and dime you with coins that cost 60% in processing fees. You simply let them pay you in digital IOUs. Because they want to pay you, they can then settle their accumulated IOUs when it suits them and when the transaction cost falls to something closer to 3% than 60%.
Artists who still believe their fans don’t want to pay them, and that the heavies must be sent round, will think I’m naive and delusional. However, I suggest it is the artist who has been brainwashed by the label to believe their fans are thieving scum (rather than their loyal and paying customers). It is actually the label that will do anything to avoid payment. See Bill’s link: http://www.toomuchjoy.com/?p=1397
I should add that when I say ‘fans want to pay’ I’m not talking about fans wanting to make charitable donations, I’m talking about fans wanting to make a good bargain and pay any dues arising.
You don’t get money for nothing. Money is work, and you get money in exchange for work. So, the artist makes a bargain with their fans to exchange work for money, the work of the artist, for the money of their fans (money the fans got through working).
But, the bargain has to be made. You can’t just do the work and then demand payment. I can’t wash your car and then demand $500 from you. All willing exchanges, all contracts, are agreements* between two parties. You need that agreement otherwise there’s no deal, no bargain, no exchange. And we’re left with gifts, freebies, and donations.
* Agreement is a priori voluntary. Involuntary ‘agreement’ is extortion.
December 2nd, 2009 at 10:11 am
” Good suggestions David, however, there’s something that Dreddsnik touches on that has some radical repercussions. ”
Thanks Crosbie, but no points like that will be addressed. They’re inconvenient, especially when it comes to successful working models like AllofMp3. It doesn’t fit the ideas some have firmly planted in their heads.
” Agreement is a priori voluntary. Involuntary ‘agreement’ is extortion. ”
As long as the ‘right’ people benefit from it, some feel it’s ok.
December 2nd, 2009 at 1:08 pm
@ Crosbie
“You don’t get money for nothing”
That means you don’t get chicks for free, either. So Dire Straits were lying. *sigh*
Cheers!
December 2nd, 2009 at 3:20 pm
@Jon
I always thought it was “checks for free”, but I’ll take the chicks.
December 2nd, 2009 at 6:31 pm
All the lyric searches come back ‘chicks for free’ ( what I always thought it was ), oops .. unauthorized lyrics pages .. I should go to jail
December 3rd, 2009 at 12:32 pm
@Dreddsnik
Oh, I wasn’t disagreeing with chicks for free as the lyrics, it’s certainly better than what I’d misheard it as.
December 3rd, 2009 at 9:36 pm
I looked it up because I wasn’t 100% sure either, even though the cover band I was in played that awful song for about 2 years
The bass player sang it. We had this weird little philosophy of giving everyone at least one song to front, and while Jon was ‘aces’ on the bass, he had less than no vocal chops. He got to sing that song and any songs by the ‘Cars’.
December 3rd, 2009 at 9:47 pm
In case anyone’s interested, My bandmate Jon passed away of a sudden heart attack in 2004. Here’s a link to his memorial site.
http://jon-waselewski.memory-of.com/About.aspx
There are some links to a few songs from our one and only CD. Not a ‘Great Work’ by any means, but it was our first try at putting something ‘real’ together. We never got the chance to try again. Without Jon, nothing ever seemed ‘right’ for any of us again. I was the last to give it up in ‘06.
December 4th, 2009 at 6:39 am
I’m really sorry to learn this, Dredd. But there’s more to life than death.
All the best, mate.
Cheers!
December 6th, 2009 at 11:50 am
@crosbie
A lot of the indie artists on Kerchoonz aren’t ‘published’, some of them are only ‘releasing’ their music by uploading it to the site for the first time, for example and some of what they are selling is physical (for example, like tickets, mugs, t-shirts, buttons, etc.)
But, my point was, no matter what they are offering, the transaction fees are quite high for things that even the artists themselves would like to offer for pennies. The only way around it is a ‘credit’ type system like Robert suggested. However, I would like to develop some type of ‘cash’ system for the internet that maybe only had an annual service fee for use rather than a per transaction fee (where people could perhaps transfer a bigger sum of money to their online account from their bank and then use the money or credit as ‘cash’ on the web. Not just on one site, but, perhaps on a group of sites even.) Has anyone seen or heard of a system that works that way. I’ve done a good deal of research, but, I’m thinking of writing a system myself if not.
December 6th, 2009 at 10:39 pm
” Has anyone seen or heard of a system that works that way. ”
AllofMP3’s system works quite well, selling in 10.00 increments.
Lots of people still paying them. It’s a great system that works well. A fantastic proof of concept.
Oh, right .. we don’t talk about them.
December 7th, 2009 at 7:46 am
Indiana, I thought we were discussing artists selling recordings for thousands of dollars rather than the users of Kerchoonz selling copies for pennies?
December 8th, 2009 at 8:16 pm
@Crosbie In the interview with Jon above, he mentions ‘cheap downloads’. So, in response, I brought up the issue about how the banks are essentially taking money for nothing. (and it is ‘chicks’ for free…) lol. So, the scenario that was originally being discussed was about how independent artists who are presenting their music (which often hasn’t been ‘officially’ published) may be selling copies of their work for the first time to their fans and most likely would wish to make it available cheaply. Kerchoonz at the moment actually attempts to do this with ‘free’. However, many artists are reluctant in this download versus streaming debate. For some reason, a lot of artists consider a download more valuable than an on demand listen (to avoid the ’stream’ word.)
@dresdnik On my allomp3, I don’t have the 10.00 increments. I’m wondering if their service differs in the UK than what you have. When I looked and I’ve just gone there again, it’s an ‘all you can eat’ based on a monthly subscription fee or a one time lifetime fee. Is the 10.00 increments after the monthly subscription fee? Here’s what it says when I access it:
Your membership is backed by a 7 day satisfaction guarantee.
Signup Now and join the millions of users that download files on the internet
Unlimited Downloads! This is a flat fee with no additional costs per download.
Save over 40% on our competition (compare their lifetime membership at $37.95!)
Lifetime Full & Unlimited Access for only 37.95 – Now Only £29.88!!! (best offer!)
2 Years Full & Unlimited Access for only £1.33/Month (Save!)
1 Year Full & Unlimited Access for only £1.66/Month
Get Blazing Fast Downloads + 1 Year Download Protection (Free Updates & New releases 0.99/month)
Get the Codec Pro Pack – View in DVD Quality the movies and videos you download – Only £8.88
Maybe their service varies dependent upon your IP location?
December 8th, 2009 at 8:22 pm
@dresdnik hmm. strange, the other thing is that when I go to ’subscribe’ to allomp3, it has a different (but similar) logo and calls itself mp3-freebie.com when you move from the main ‘home’ to the subscription part of the site. I’m thinking that they might offer different services by territory. Since they are based in Russia and are part of Berne (at list I think that Russia signed up to that convention), I wonder why (if they do) they offer a different service to a UK IP than they would for wherever you are based. But, the 10.00 increments is fine as an idea. It’s just that there are some people who might only want one track from any given site. So, it would be kinda cool to find a cash system type service to avoid those sorts of payment problems. Do you see how I mean?
December 9th, 2009 at 4:32 am
Indiana, did you miss my comment #11?
December 9th, 2009 at 8:51 am
yes, I saw comment 11, but, I don’t think that Jon was referring to artists selling their recordings for 20p, he is talking about reducing the price of copies (at least, that’s how I interpret the interview above.) Likewise, allomp3 is also basically selling ‘copies’ at either a subscription rate or like dresdnik pointed out a 10.00 credit (I guess that maybe their service varies from country to country) but, it’s still the same idea. I suppose it’s also an issue of reliability because torrents aren’t always reliable. So, that kind of service is worthwhile. As far as musicians selling their work to 500 fans, it’s acheivable and might pay for the initial recording. I’ve been to quite a few gigs where fans can buy a cd or dvd of that night’s performance after the show. (Big trucks with cd/dvd duplicators) The fans order their ‘copy’ in the middle of the show and then stand in line to get it at the end of the night. But, at the end of the concert, it’s still a ‘copy’ that they receive and it’s mutually exclusive of the live show usually.
December 9th, 2009 at 8:54 am
correction: mutually exclusive of the price they paid for the live show (they pay extra for the cd/dvd). But, in those cases, I haven’t seen the band actually selling the recording or publishing copyright to those fans yet.
December 9th, 2009 at 9:15 am
@30/31, that’s actually a great idea!
I have a concert on Friday to attend (yes Matthew Good) and if he were to do that I’d so be in line. $10 is a good price!
I’d almost have the ability to do that myself. $600 for the Apogee Duet and $100 for a firewire CD/DVD burner and $100 for a few hundred CD’s. I could take output from the mixing console, which would include mic inputs from the audience, sing-a-longs are awesome sometimes. But I don’t have the Duet or external CD/DVD burner, but that’s all you’d need (well with the Mac anyhow).
No trucks required.
December 9th, 2009 at 9:45 am
Indiana, so instead of the fans making pre-orders for copies of a CD duplicated on site, why not sell them the recording? Then they can make their own copies when they get home?
In fact they don’t even need to attend the concert. They can purchase the recording from the artist online. And they can still make their own copies.
So really, an artist can say goodbye to the 18th century business model of selling their recordings to a record label for them to sell copies, and instead sell their recordings directly to their fans instead (for possibly even more money). Fans can make their own copies for nothing (on CD or memory stick). That way there’s no messing about charging them 50p to get 20p.
December 15th, 2009 at 5:38 pm
@Crosbie Fitch You could do that as well, however, regardless of which way it’s done, I think the fans would probably like to leave the show with ‘a copy’ either way. Being able to get the full file on DVD might be more of a souvenir for them in in any case (when it comes to this kind of gig-related thing). But, yeah, sounds like @Robert may have a new business idea for himself. He just needs the multiple disc copier/burner and the Duet.;) But, a band could always sell the copy of the recording to their fans online with a CC license that says the fan has the right to make copies and distribute it, etc.
December 16th, 2009 at 12:12 pm
Indiana, but of course, if the recording has been paid for then the copies can be freely made by anyone, whether for free from their friends, downloading via wifi, or from a stallholder with a CD burner and printer, or if neither of those appeal, waiting until they get home and downloading a copy there.
This is why copyright (and any other new economic privilege the misguided will come up with) is entirely unnecessary. When you sell your recordings, and let any Tom, Dick or Harry make and sell copies without threat of prosecution, then everyone is happy. The artist has 100% of the money from selling their recording, Tom the stallholder has 100% of the money from selling copies of it, and the fans have the recording and their liberty restored to share it. There’s no need to involve lawyers, collection societies, and contracts with publishing corporations.
Of course a band could try to sell copies with CC licenses, but as I’ve been trying to explain to Billy and many others, the band is skilled at making music and better geared up for making and selling recordings of it. Publishers and companies like iTunes are geared up for making and selling copies, and the last thing they’d do is provide them with CC licenses.
A band (and each artist in it) has to decide whether they’re in the business of making and selling music, or copies.
You don’t see record labels giving copies away and having a go at making and selling music now do you?
So why on earth are people still advocating that a musician’s best hope for making a living in the future is to give away their music whilst making and selling copies of it?
As I’ve pointed out earlier, if someone asked me to write some software that took me a couple of weeks to produce, I’d sell them the software for nothing less than £3,000. I certainly wouldn’t give it to them (for nothing), on condition they bought a copy from me at 50p (from which I’d get 20p), given a hunch that I’d make more money making and selling copies to millions of others at 50p a pop (even with the magic power of copyright). If anyone finds me doing that I’ve been substituted by a Stepford coder.
So, when the music industry appears populated by Stepford musicians I’m reminded of the scene in This is Spinal Tap:
I’m like the interviewer saying “But why not just make ‘10′ louder?”, though I say “But why not sell your recordings instead of copies?”
And where Spinal Tap says “But, these go up to ‘11′”, the musician I’m talking to says “But I can sell millions of copies to my fans.”
There are times when argument is simply impotent and one needs a big, motherfucking clue stick.
December 16th, 2009 at 1:00 pm
@Crosbie Fitch
your quote “This is why copyright (and any other new economic privilege the misguided will come up with) is entirely unnecessary.”
(Also why we are trying to find solutions that would potentially render copyright as it applies to the ‘digital’ world obsolete. e.g.: public licenses, ISP licenses, and new forms of ‘rights’) But, copyright, to some extent, doesn’t simply apply to ‘copies’, it also has to do with the right that a creator has to release his/her works first to the public. It gives the author of the work the exclusive right to exploit his/her material before anyone else can/should (or, also the right not to release his/her works at all) There is a problem where some authors works are ‘leaked’ without their permission, etc.
Bear in mind as well, that under current law, you aren’t ‘allowed’ to copy although you are ‘able’ to copy unless the author gives you that right by license either directly via CC. (e.g. creative commons, etc.) Whether or not the author sells their recordings to a set of people or not (which would effectively be a ‘license’ of sorts) still implies that they would first issue a ‘copy’ to each of those ‘buyers’ of their recordings.
I completely understand what you are saying and of course every author/composer could essentially do what you are suggesting. However, chances are that you are unlikely to convince the entire music industry to do so and there is a situation where ‘copyright’ is part of all the deals that have been done for the past century. So, another line of thinking would be more along the lines of what Bennett outlined in his letter to the ministers which Jon published here: http://a2f2a.com/2009/12/11/%E2%80%98the-music-industry-is-in-free-fall%E2%80%99/ which creates an alternative to ‘copyright’ and replaces it with a ‘right of digital transmission’. With this type of model, it means that the creators are compensation and the public would be able to ‘copy’. Thus, rendering ‘copyright’ on the internet obsolete.
December 16th, 2009 at 1:28 pm
@Crosbie Fitch P.S.: The other thing that needs to be brought to your attention is the application of ‘commercial use’ for music which falls outside of the ‘fan to artist’ scenario whereby one would ’sell their rights’ to the fan. In the case where a website were to use the authors works to generate income (e.g. traffic, advertising revenue, etc.) the need for a public license for websites becomes more apparant and essentially, selling your rights to your fans would mean that the ‘fans’ would have the rights to sell the works onto anyone else for ‘commercial use’… maybe this better explains what I’m implying by the need for this kind of licensing system?
December 16th, 2009 at 3:58 pm
sell their rights = sell their recordings (in above 37, for clarity). I think that the main deterrent for an artist selling his/her recordings to a group of fans is that by this act of ’selling the recordings’ the author loses his ownership (because the fans, in essence, would own the ‘masters’ via purchase). This would mean that the fans (as a whole) would have the right to a)sell the work on for commercial use b) sell ‘copies’ c) share copies..which in this case would be the ‘point’ you are making. The artist effectively loses his/her copyright by nature of selling it onto the fans. The fans could only exercise their new ownership as a ‘group’ which means that there could eventually be a disagreement concerning the commercial use of that work. This is why perhaps allowing fans to purchase ‘copies’ rather than the ‘recordings’ and subsequently allowing them to ’share’ via a creative commons license would be more sensible under the current ‘rules’. (I’m sorry mods that I’ve explained this in three spots, but, I just thought it should be pointed out what ’selling your recordings’ actually would imply)….
December 16th, 2009 at 4:33 pm
” (Also why we are trying to find solutions that would potentially render copyright as it applies to the ‘digital’ world obsolete. e.g.: public licenses, ISP licenses, and new forms of ‘rights’) ”
The continued clear abuses of these solutions, coupled with the simple fact that the majority of artists don’t get squat from these systems should be answer enough. Isn’t there enough proof of this out there already ?.
I don’t think new forms of rights is an awful idea, but the current systems that you have mentioned have already proven to be easily corrupted and benefit no one but corporate rights holders, and not artists, except for maybe a few ‘featured’ ones ( big huge wink ).
December 16th, 2009 at 4:43 pm
@Indiana:
One thing I will insist on correcting is that what you’ve just cited, is a NATURAL right. “Copyright” has nothing to do with that one. “Copyright” only applies to “distribution of copies”.
This is why Crosbie makes the distinction between “the copies” and “the work”. Copyright controls one of them, the other was always in the hands of the creator that hasn’t sold it away to someone else to extort further control over.
December 16th, 2009 at 5:19 pm
Crosbie’s argument works for me. It’s like a shot in the arm when I read it. It is radical and yet so damned obvious it makes you realise just how convoluted old Copyright was.
I’m not oblivious to its problems though, one being that it would require a huge shift in attitude for it to become the norm for financing recordings. And anyone with close connections to the record biz will not be shifting any time soon. It will be fresh players who are able to run with the new ball.
Until then, Crosbie, smell the glove and get used to that “Tap” sensation. Although I’m guessing you’ll be no stranger to it already.
December 16th, 2009 at 5:28 pm
@DA, sure, but, I think that this ‘natural’ right is enforced usually via ‘copyright’ law because the act of someone infringing upon that ‘natural’ right would generally be considered ‘copying’ (right?) But, in any case, there is this slight deterrent that I mentioned above about selling your ‘works’ to a group of fans which one of you would need to address. The ‘group of fans’ would become a single ‘entity’ who ‘own’ the works (effectively, the author of those works would no longer be the owner of the ‘master’ recording. The ‘group of fans’ as an ‘entity’ would indeed ‘own the works’ which means they would have the right to sell them (either for commercial purposes) or ‘copy’ them obviously in the sense that Crosbie Fitch is implying. Do you see what I mean?
December 16th, 2009 at 5:44 pm
Indiana, your last two comments are simply a repetition of old paradigm thinking, a non-comprehending re-iteration of “These go to ‘11′”.
Copyright is an 18th century privilege created for printers (and thus record labels) that suspends the individual’s natural right to copy and improve the works of art they’ve been given or purchased – in order that printers can sell copies of a particular work without competition (having a monopoly).
If you realise that the monopoly is not only unethical, but also now no longer viable, indeed an obvious anachronism, then the creators of a particular work may as well sell their work directly, instead of to producers and of vendors of copies. If the latter are no longer involved then they don’t need any monopolies – and thus individuals the world over should look forward to the restoration of their cultural liberty.
These are the two perspectives – old and new:
1) Enabling labels and collection societies to stay in business.
2) Enabling artists to sell their art directly to their fans.
All the “these go to ‘11′” artists still think they should give their art into the loving care of labels and collection societies in exchange for the larger of an advance or 1% of whatever can be obtained through exploiting the privileges of copyright (or replacement ‘commercial exploitation’ privilege).
Why not give up the cultural police state and set your fans free? Sell them your art, and let them share and build upon it in turn – without royalty.
NB Note that I never advocate artists or anyone selling their rights (rights are inalienable and cannot be sold). Instead I advocate that artists neutralise their privileges in order to restore their audience’s rights that have been unethically suspended by them.
Without the privilege of copyright there is no such thing as a license – you don’t sell back to people their liberty that is no longer suspended by your privilege. You simply sell people your recording, and they are then naturally at liberty to make copies.
In the case of software, I sell it to those interested in buying it. The notion of copies as anything special then disintegrates because there is no 18th century privilege pretending that every copy is precious. File share it, broadcast it, print it onto T-shirts and sell ‘em for a fortune. I don’t care, because I’ve been paid. If musicians sold their music performances or recordings to their fans then they too could stop caring about anyone making or selling copies – they’ve been paid.
Yes, but, you’ll say, with copyright or an Internet tax “These go to ‘11′”…
But, why not simply sell your recordings and restore everyone’s liberty?
“These go to ‘11′”
December 16th, 2009 at 6:43 pm
@DA
Although it doesn’t seem as though ‘copyright’ would have ‘nothing to do with that ‘natural’ right’… it actually does have everything to do with it since the only way to infringe upon that ‘copyright’ would be to ‘copy’ (if you see what I mean, as in the case of a leak prior to the author’s right of first release… obviously only under the current ‘rules’.) But, I see your point clearly and we both know and more than likely agree that this isn’t one of the more urgent details.
One of the things that comes to mind is this notion of ’selling your rights’ and/or ’selling your works’ directly to fans and the implications of doing such a thing under the current ‘rules’. I think there are ways around it. It all depends upon the ‘terminology’ as you’ve pointed out previously in these threads. For example, if you call it ’selling your works’ directly to your ‘fans’, you get that problem of ‘who owns’ the right to sell that work commercially. In the case of what Crosbie Fitch has been proposing, I’ll say “yes, I think it’s a really cool idea”. But, the act of selling your work to a group of fans also implies that they are the ‘owners’ which ultimately puts the artist back into that ‘label’ scenario and in some ways, even worse, because theoretically that ‘group of fans’ each own a ‘part’ of the ‘master recordings’… hmmm.. we’re looking at a pretty big ‘board meeting’ when it comes to a choice about who they can sell those masters to. “one board membemr might say something like well, if IBM wants this song for their advert, why not approach apple iphone? Or, why should we go with Nike when they have a history of unethical exploitation of children in a sweat shop environment.”
(as per our hypothetical situation above in this thread) Basically, you would have a scenario where 500 fans ‘buy’ the master recordings. By doing so, these ‘fans’ have bought the right to decide where and ‘how’ that ‘master’ should be expoited. None of them individually would have that right solely. It automatically becomes a ‘collective’ right.
So, We could all argue that this could be good because it would be in the ‘fan-owner’s’ interest to seek out the commercial exploitation of their newly ‘owned’ master. So, indeed, having 500 people working proactively to sell this piece of work could arguably be just as good as having a major record label doing the same thing. And perhaps that group would also have the artists interest at heart, which is also a good thing. The only thing is, the artist who sold their master invariably has no rights. So, the artist would need to do a ‘deal’ with his ‘fan group of master owners’ to potentially get a ‘cut’. Hmmm.. Begins to sound familiar to the historical ‘record deal’.
So, now, we see a potential deterrent to this model. What can we do to solve it? Probably create a license or do a direct deal with those fans which only enables them to invest in order to ’share’ or ‘copy’…. which, ultimately sounds awfully close to what the createive commons license does for ‘copies’. (Artist retains their rights and fans can distribute and copy as long as they give attribution.)
But, maybe there is something more to this that I’m not seeing. I’m clearly open to it. I think it’s a really cool idea to sell recordings directly to fans. But, given this situation, how do we bypass this potential hurdle?
December 16th, 2009 at 7:07 pm
@Crosbie Fitch can you address this no. 44 issue as well. I put @DA on it, but, maybe you’ll see how it would come full circle when one sells ‘recordings’ directly to ‘fans’. How would this issue be addressed and in what form? That’s not something to do with a draconian law about ‘copyright’, it rather has to do with the issue of ‘ownership’.
December 16th, 2009 at 7:29 pm
@Indiana:
The point we’re all trying to make here is that “selling your rights” and “selling your work” are NOT the same thing. One represents the “right to distribute copies”, and only applies to a copyright regime, while the other reflects the natural right you’ve always had – to simply sell your work.
Nobody’s proposing to give the fans “commercial” privileges or controls! Selling your work doesn’t entail giving anyone “rights” to do anything that would override anyone else’s natural rights, which Crosbie has repeatly said, cannot be sold, as they are inalienable.
Under Crosbie’s take, such a privilege would not be possible.
This is one of the key reasons I insisted on correcting the language here – it makes a huge difference when it’s properly understood, and fixes a couple of false notions people have developed from years of copyright conditioning.
December 16th, 2009 at 7:34 pm
@Dreddsnik… you’ve hit the nail on the head in your no. 39. This is exactly what needs to be addressed and circumvented. Those ‘ananlog’ abuses simply should and can NOT be allowed to prevail in this ‘digital’ and somewhat ‘accurate’ world! That’s why I think (and you think… and everybody here thinks, this forum is worth our time). There is a way to seriously make everything on-line ‘transparent’. That’s what we’ve all got to work towards. I think these arguments are super productive. But, as Billy says, after a while, we will need to form some sort of consensus and devise a ‘plot’. It’s great that Bennett has shared his proposal, it gives us an opportunity to ask questions to someone who has the ‘legal’ means of working this whole debate into something magical (hopefully). It’s well worth the time. I’d like to see artists being prolific without always needing to watch their backs. I’d also like to see fans of art cultivating and getting their hands dirty and having fun supporting the ideas and creativity that hopefully help enrich their lives. It’s gonna be amazing once we argue out all the quirks isn’t it!!!
xxx
December 16th, 2009 at 8:24 pm
@DA hang on a minute, are you implying that you are thinking ‘analog’(in an anlalogy kind of way?) (just kidding) as per your number 46…:) seriously, just kidding though;) x
December 16th, 2009 at 8:35 pm
@DA Ok, my 48 was just being fun… we would need to redefine then! only Because selling your ‘works’ implies that buy and sell relationship that is inherent to a ‘deal’ being done. (and I do understand the poinr you’re making, but, it’s got to be applicable to a good deal of arguments that have been surrounding this subject. According to what a good few have proposed here in their arguments on this forum, the idea of ’selling your works’ is equivalent to ’selling your rights’ (implied by the definition of that ’sale’ word and also implied by the ‘Bjorn’ website that is entited specificallly as ’sell your rights’, just as an example and follow through to the various points that have been presented)… it’s been argued in the sense of selling music as ‘used’ versus ‘new’..(even though it’s digitally impossible) Likewise, It’s been argued in the sense of being able to ‘return’ a ‘used’ mp3.(also, simply impossible, an mp3 is an mp3 no matter how many times it’s copied, right?) It’s been argued about returning used ‘CD’s’ to a shop, in the case that the music didn’t ’suit’. Ownership has been implied all along the way!
This will sound silly, but, ” it’s been argued in all senses of this argument!!! ”
(lol, and I see what you’re saying, so, it’s all cool):) But, at the end of the day, it all boils down to this ‘use of terminology’ (and you caught me out on that one, didn’t you? xx)
So, we’ve got to get to the bottom of this, don’t we? It’s like this: the idea of selling a master isn’t much different than selling a car (in Crosbie Fitch’s scenario). So, we’re working with the idea of selling something ‘once’. (aren’t we?) Isn’t the idea of ’selling your works’ for the sake of allowing other people to ‘copy’ and ‘distribute’ or ’share’, exactly the same as selling the ‘copies’ and giving those people the ‘right to copy’ via a ‘creative commons license? I’m not sure if I’m right on this one at all, I’m just ‘thinking out loud’. But, in the case of ‘copies’. A copy is a copy is a copy to infinity and beyond. So, the idea of ’selling’ a ‘work’ is simply ‘terminology’. If not, it implies the ‘master’ and then again it’s ‘resale’. Does that make sense (I’m again sleep deprived…lol…hee heeee… it’s 1:34 a.m.!!)
December 16th, 2009 at 10:53 pm
” @Dreddsnik… you’ve hit the nail on the head in your no. 39. This is exactly what needs to be addressed and circumvented. ”
Good.
Maybe you could stop pushing so hard for an ISP tax, levy .. etc .. because as I see it, that is simply a continuation of a very broken and corrupt system. Don’t fall for it. We SEEM to agree, and then not .. It’s a bit confusing, but after being a musician for so many years before settling down I sometimes reside in another dimension,and thus can be easily confused and/or confusing. Be patient with me.
December 17th, 2009 at 6:31 am
In case anyone was confused, the ‘last two comments’ I was referring to of Indiana’s in my comment 43 were 36 & 37.
Indiana, RIGHTS (natural rights) cannot be sold.
Privileges (hangovers from the 18th century) CAN be sold (except in some peculiar jurisdictions that disallow it in a misguided attempt to further insinuate they are natural rights). Privileges can be sold precisely because they are legal artifices – bestowed on favoured parties as rewards, gifts, or incentives (an unethical practice typical of the 18th century and earlier).
Privileges are termed ‘legal rights’ because they appear very similar in law to the legislation that protects individuals’ natural rights. However, privileges are created by kings and corrupt states. Rights are imbued in people by nature, and to be protected by democratic governments.
Predictably, privileges are termed ‘legal rights’, or simply ‘rights’ for short, by those who are quite happy for them to be considered as equivalent, or rather superior to RIGHTS. After all, privileges suspend natural rights so they must therefore be superior (especially if you would unethically elevate corporations above the individual).
Anyway, ’selling recordings’ therefore has two completely different meanings depending upon which side of the paradigm shift you are, whether you’ve taken the blue, copyright pill, or the red, copyleft pill.
1) If you believe in copyright’s supernatural power to prevent file-sharing, then to sell a recording means to sell the privilege of preventing anyone broadcasting or making copies of it.
2) If you realise that copyright should have been abolished in 1900 before it became too entrenched, definitely by 2000 when the information age rendered it a ridiculous anachronism, then to sell a recording means to exchange the recording for money.
In the first case the (public’s) right to make copies (unethically suspended by Queen Anne in 1710) has been granted as a privilege attached to the recording (the initial holder being the artist). This privilege has then been sold by the artist to a record label (in exchange for an advance on royalties).
In the second case no rights are suspended (any suspension is undone or neutralised) and so no privileges exist to be transferred or licensed. The creator of the recording simply gets an equitable amount of money for it and those fans who’ve thus paid that equitable amount for it get the recording. That is the END of the sale. There are no privileges to exploit. There are no committees to debate anything further. The artist has their money. The fans have their recording. It’s just like a concert. 50,000 fans pay $10 in exchange for the artist’s performance. The artist performs and gets paid. END OF STORY!
Yes, that means that anyone who has purchased the recording can make 5 trillion copies and sell each one at $50. But then anyone who buys a copy (or who is given one) can do the same (see how long that price of $50 remains without a monopoly to prevent competition). There are no longer any privileges that prohibit such copying.
If I sell my software for £3,000, why would I wish to prohibit anyone copying it onto CD, putting it in a pretty box and selling it for £10? I’VE BEEN PAID IN FULL. Why the heck am I going to get upset that someone else is selling copies of software that I wrote?
If your fans pay you for your recording, why the heck are you still going to be upset that a record label is selling CD copies of it, or a TV channel is broadcasting it without paying you any royalties?
Sell your performances and recordings thereof. You’re a musician, not a publisher or broadcaster. Know your true customer, and for heaven’s sake set them free.
December 17th, 2009 at 10:16 am
” I’VE BEEN PAID IN FULL. Why the heck am I going to get upset that someone else is selling copies of software that I wrote? ”
That’s the part that is scaring the reading musicians, i would guess.
They bought into the systems claims that they could get a continuous stream of income after doing only one job ( creating the initial recording in a studio ), when the true purpose of their contract was to keep a continuous stream of revenue for the third party that convinced them to sign in the first place.
In nearly every other job or trade on the planet, you do a job, get paid once, move along and find more work. The entertainment industry is the only one in which people feel it’s their ‘right’ to get paid in perpetuity for doing a job.
The ones that are stuck in the system, I can understand why they might worry. They might not have gotten a whole lot for doing the initial recording. The ones I don’t understand are the ones like Sam, who don’t get royalties for their work ( creating lighting and set design for videos ), and stand up for the corrupt system.
I forgot.
Some of them are also the problem.
Some of those people ( studio engineers, studios, light men, set designers ) have sweet deals with record and movie companies. In the case of the artist, the label pays the studio an amount, and then charges a HIGHER amount to the artist to keep them in debt. Same for guys like SAM. Because they keep their mouths shut they continue to get work ( you see, they get paid once for the job, and have to do another job to get more money, like everyone else ).
A WHOLE LOT of people depend on a corrupt system. That’s why it will be hard to close down
December 17th, 2009 at 4:29 pm
@Indiana
Please tell me I’m imagining it, and you didn’t just do that!
There’s nothing “analog” or “digital” in my comment. It was a simple attempt to state a truth that many have either forgotten or never fully understood in the first place.
No analogies, no opinions, and no “creative thinking” techiques were at play.
There are so many misconceptions about very important facts and principles that affect the very fabric of the ideas we’re throwing around. The principle of “privilege” vs. “right” is a classic example. The realities need to be re-injected into subjects like these.
December 18th, 2009 at 8:10 am
@Dreddsnik “I”VE BEEN PAID IN FULL”. Well, in that case, so have all the artists who did deals with major labels that got their ‘advance’ payments and later complained that the labels made SOOO much money off of them. Do you see what I mean? Many of you have argued that the labels rip off musicians and that they have done everything to cheat those artists through giving them advances which include cash upfront, publicity, plugging, advertisement, distribution, tour support, etc. etc. In this case scenario, the ‘fans’ would become the ‘record label’. It’s the same situation only reversed because now it would be fans owning the masters… which means they all would have to agree on how to proceed. (theoretically, if you have a group of people who own the same thing, this is very similar to shares in a company.)
The truth is, when a musician is working, touring, marketing, making public appearances in order to promote their music (album), they aren’t just doing a job “ONCE”, they are constantly promoting their album (product) for at least a few years. The making of the album generally takes a year depending upon how anal or precious the artist is about their music… then, they tour it for at least a year (or two). Once they stop promoting that particular album, they generally don’t get any ‘royalty’ that lasts forever. But, this is not much different than ANY product on the market. No matter what kind of product it is, there is a constant promotional work that goes on towards generating sales. In the same sense, even if an artist sells his recordings to his fans, he not only gives up his master recordings and rights, he also has to do all that promotion beforehand in order for his fans to know or want to buy the recordings in the first place. Why, if he wants to get rid of the middleman, would he then create a new middleman who can gain the same type of ‘rights’ as the old record labels did?
December 18th, 2009 at 8:40 am
@Crosbie Fitch It’s nice for everyone to talk about what they think “should have” happened back in 1900, but, the truth of the matter is we live in a world where there aren’t really any ‘natural rights’. In fact, the only ‘rights’ or ‘priviledges’ that we have are pretty muched outlined via the laws of the lands where we live. Unless you can build a Tartus and go back with Dr. Who into year 1900, the fact remains that “copyright still exists”. And beyond that, there are a long list of works who exist under that regime. You cannot change the past and it is very difficult to upturn precedence overnight in the legal world. It’s just not going to happen. You can argue about this forever and it still does not change the facts. Likewise, just because we have the technology to build F1 cars and some people can drive them, it doesn’t change the fact that there is a law about breaking the speed limit. We don’t have any ‘natural’ rights. You are born and nobody gives you the ‘right’ to live in that case. Naturally, a mother could reject or starve her child (if you want to go back to the ‘natural’ rights scenario.) It’s just B.S. this legion of people on the web who complain about Kings, Queens, ‘the priviledged’ and the laws that have been formed around it. We don’t actually even have ‘Freedom of Speech’ as a ‘right’. All these things have been ‘made up’ by ‘law’ (the same laws that apply to things like copyright, licenses, intellectual property law, etc. etc. etc.) So, all this nonsense about how ALL of our laws have evolved from those age old laws is simply ridiculous. WTF? many of our laws today date back to Moses and the 10 commandments, otherwise, we could all go around with guns and murder each other without consequence! (wink, sigh, I know you realise that what you are saying isn’t a black & white scenario, but, it does come across in a way that you think that it is.)
When you sell a ‘master’ to any person or group of people (or label), you ARE, under the current law, selling them the rights to copy, sell, etc. Why would an artist want or need to do that if they already have the rights to sell their own copies? And why wouldn’t the artist simply sell those copies to their fans and if they want to, simply give those fans the right to copy for non-commercial purposes (if they want to?) and if they don’t want to, why should a fan not respect that right or wish of the artist either way. If the fan is truly a fan, it wouldn’t matter because he would buy his copy anyway.
December 18th, 2009 at 8:59 am
the converse would be perhaps rather than worrying about ’selling’ music at all would be something like Bennett’s proposal. But, you all seem worried about artists getting paid residually for work that they only did once even if it’s only fractions of pennies per listen or download or whatever and even if it’s a commercial exploitation like radio, a website, or use in a TV program.
December 20th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
Indiana, it is you who keep on going on about selling ‘rights’ despite the fact that they clearly don’t work (you can’t stop someone making a copy of your published work). I’m the one trying to persuade you that these things are ineffective anachronisms, ridiculous 18th century privileges, and not at all as real as natural rights (which you cannot sell).
Anyway, let’s get back to the matter at hand: an artist selling their music to those who want to buy it, their fans.
You seem to be worried about the idea of selling your music because you keep changing the subject and avoid answering the questions I put to you on the matter, e.g. “How much would you want to be paid for singing a song in a studio?”
Let’s haggle over that ‘paid in full’ amount.
Presumably it’s somewhere between one dollar and a trillion?
Or perhaps you find the idea of being paid to perform by your fans too repulsive to consider? Perhaps it’s not about the money? Perhaps you need that separation of audience from commerce that only record labels and collections societies have traditionally offered? Then again, perhaps you simply can’t abide the idea that your fans could be free to make copies without paying you anything – even though you’ve already been paid in full?
Not unless you specify that you are transferring the copyright (a privilege, not a right).
They’d do it if a purchaser offered them a lot of money, traditionally a record label.
However, if you were selling the recording to your fans, then you’d neutralise the copyright attached to the recording. Neither you nor your fans want to sue anyone for making copies, and nor do either of you wish to be sued. Throw the ring into Mount Doom.
You seem to be missing the elephant in the room. Nothing stops anyone making copies. All you have is a shotgun you can shoot random fish in a barrel with. You are a musician not a record label. stop thinking you’re in the business of making and selling copies. You are a MUSICIAN, not a record label. Let the record label sell copies (hint – the market for copies has ended).
Sell your music. Sell performances. Sell recordings thereof, but please, give up the idea that you’re going to get rich making and selling copies. I can make copies of your music already, and I’m not even thinking that I might make a few bucks by doing so. Really, there’s no money in making copies. Stick to music. That’s the talent that’s hard to come by.
And where the heck did you get the idea that if someone respected you they wouldn’t copy your music? Wrong way round. If someone respected you, you’d hope they would give copies of your work to their friends as that demonstrated their respect for you.
A fan may well pay you for your music. However, a fan pays the manufacturer of the copy for the copy, although in the case of digital copies it’s generally not worth paying for the copy because it’s so cheap to make. Hence most fans will be given a by another fan, or simply a member of your audience. Those in the business of making and selling copies are obviously in trouble because of this free exchange of copies (file-sharing), however, that doesn’t mean musicians are in trouble, because musicians can still sell their MUSIC. Unless that is, they only know how to sell their music to record labels, and have no conception of selling their music directly to their fans.
December 21st, 2009 at 2:43 pm
@Crosbie Fitch “Anyway, let’s get back to the matter at hand: an artist selling their music to those who want to buy it, their fans.”
um..that’s what they always did when they sold copies!
But, why do you want to focus on selling anything (whether it be recordings or copies) when there is a potential solution whereby copyright could be eliminated completely for the purpose of the internet and replaced with a new type of Digital Right (e.g.: public license for exploitation of music for example, as also described by Bennett) This eliminates the need to sell any recording or copy. Everyone would be able to obtain music ‘freely’ and there would no longer be ‘infringement’.
December 21st, 2009 at 2:53 pm
@Crosbie Fitch “You seem to be missing the elephant in the room. Nothing stops anyone making copies. All you have is a shotgun you can shoot random fish in a barrel with. You are a musician not a record label. stop thinking you’re in the business of making and selling copies. You are a MUSICIAN, not a record label. Let the record label sell copies (hint – the market for copies has ended).”
Hang on a minute, YOU are the one talking about ’selling recordings’. At Kerchoonz, musicians give their music away for FREE, but, they receive a cut from the advertising generated. It’s a completely different scenario than what you have perceived. Nonetheless, artists will still be able to sell their ‘copies’ if they want to. (whether you consider that market to be ‘dead’ or not, millions of copies are still sold each week). The flip-side to what you’re proclaiming is the fact that now we are facing censorship (recent Australian legislation), 3-strikes, and ACTA and there is still the insecurity involved with using Bittorrent (dodgey files.) So, there is still a market for free services who offer the files reliably, which sometimes entails selling copies.
Obviously, artists can decide to sell their ‘recordings’, either way, it really is the same things as a ‘copy’.
December 21st, 2009 at 7:20 pm
Indiana, many artists have sold their recordings, but they have 999 times out of a thousand sold them to a record label rather than to anyone else, and hardly ever directly to their fans.
Yes, I am the one talking about selling recordings. You are the one suggesting musicians should give their music away for free.
Why are you trying to persuade me that recordings are the same as a copy? They are completely different. A copy is something a computer can do in a fraction of a second. A recording takes talented artists and studio engineers considerable skill and effort. There is no market for copies, but there is a market for recordings of talented artists.
December 21st, 2009 at 8:38 pm
Once again, a discussion reaches an impasse because the SPECIFIC language being used is not understood by all participants.
Rather than beat a dead horse again, maybe the blackboard should just be rubbed clean, then started off with the necessary definitions to the terminology required, to be referred to by everyone before using these terms, and by everyone reading these terms before an intended reply.
This is frustrating to even just watch, and it points out the very reason I was so adamant about:
1) getting consensus on the “selective” language used (those terms that have “arbitrary” definitions, depending on who’s using them – there are actually far less of these than some people seem to think);
2) getting consensus on the “specific” terms used (those that have ironclad definitions and simply should NOT be “redefined” by the speaker – most of the terms being used here should actually fall into this category);
3) getting consensus from everyone that they will simply NOT confuse the above two, and that this is paramount to having a proper discussion on subjects like this.
December 21st, 2009 at 9:49 pm
@DA and Crosbie Fitch
Ok, I’ve been presented as type “artist” on this forum. So, since we have had this presentation about ’selling your rights’ from the website called ’sell your rights’ (@bjorn) the structure of that site is based upon this idea of ‘rights’ (by nature of the brand, logo, name, etc.) I think that the principle is really cool. (I think I’ve said this before. But, unfortunately, we have a history of recordings and we also have some laws that are out there. So, it seems rather difficult to stave off those lobbys who are trying to quarter and hang the internet, at least, at the moment.) Please, try to understand that I’m not willing or even hoping to disable your cause or even dream of being defiant towards it. But, in this small corner of the world that I live in, I just can only see a few windows where we could actually make a change and ‘convince’. Please believe me if I say I understand your point of view. But, likewise, please trust that the individuals who are in authority at the moment are not likely to understand (nor will they have any willingness to understand) unless we put a strategy together that a) shows them why in terms of ‘money’. and b) shows them why in terms of ‘power’ or ‘control’. So, maybe if we’re going to do that, we should maybe move to a video, email or audio discussion. Lest this forum become one of the ‘banned’, the ‘ill-gotten’, the “lepers’. The ‘vision’ is one thing, the ‘means’ are another. Until this point that I keep driving home to you … is indeed ‘fully’ understood, there will be no revolution, no vision, no ‘freedom’, no nothing. Persistence only beats Resistence under certain circumstances. You have to calculate and you need to be realistic and strategic. It’s not by simply stating your ultimate future that you’ll bring it into fruition, right? (If so, you’d all have won the lottery by now and you’d be playing tennis in Barbados.) But, that’s not to say that there’s no truth in ‘where there’s a will, there’s a way”. It’s a sequence of events that needs to be created. If we are going to play the game, you’ll need to be on the chess board just like they are. Planning every move.
December 22nd, 2009 at 4:06 am
Indiana, I don’t recommend you obtain your understanding of rights and privileges from marketing slogans, or web ventures’ company or domain names.
The task at hand is developing an argument with YOU. Let’s leave others to worry about their understanding. If YOU can understand (eventually) then you can help explain to others who were once like you.
When you make the paradigm shift then you have that moment to quickly note those key insights that helped you finally grok the difference between selling a copy and selling a recording, between maintaining the suspension of the public’s right to copy, and restoring the public’s cultural liberty.
YOU CAN do it, but you’ve got to want to do it.
December 22nd, 2009 at 4:11 am
DA, I’m all for a glossary.
December 22nd, 2009 at 2:51 pm
@63 I have to ‘Want’ to do what? I didn’t create copyright law.
“the suspension of the public’s right to copy, and restoring the public’s cultural liberty.”
That’s like saying “I would like to drive my car really really fast and break the suspension of the public’s right to drive the car as fast as the speedometer displays”.
December 22nd, 2009 at 5:01 pm
Indiana, driving at a dangerously high speed jeopardises people’s lives. The law is thus right to protect individuals’ natural right to life.
However, not all law protects rights. In the 18th century laws were made that suspended individuals’ rights.
December 24th, 2009 at 1:07 pm
@Crosbie Fitch The law protects all kinds of rights and the law has also prohibited a lot of ‘natural’ rights (public nudity, conducting sexual acts in public, taking various drugs whilst allowing other drugs, and a host of other laws that stipuate.) The law has not taken a way any natural ‘right to copy’ when the law was meant to protect the livelihood of creative people.
December 24th, 2009 at 1:07 pm
’stipulate’
December 24th, 2009 at 5:12 pm
@Indiana:
Here’s one classic example of that “selective understanding” I’ve been ranting about.
The “law” you’re referring to that was “meant to protect… creative people” is copyright, which is not a law. It’s a “privilege” and it WAS introduced to take away the natural right to copy (for a temporary period of time). That was its purpose.
In order to award this privilege, “unnatural laws” were created to enforce it. In the “wisdom” of those who passed such laws, the word “rights” was used to refer to the “new” rights granted by copyright, thus creating confusion with the already existing rights of NATURAL law.
Since the whole idea was to suspend the public’s right to copy, and that’s exactly what was accomplished (until recently), it would make no sense to suggest in any way that a natural right wasn’t taken away.
Arguing such a point is a demonstration of a failure to understand the very point you’re arguing.
December 26th, 2009 at 8:01 pm
There is no ‘natural right’ to do anything. There are only laws and regulations that either protect or prevent. Society and the laws that have been created and enforced has absolutely nothing ‘natural’about it. ‘Natural law’ has only to do with biology, chemistry and physics. There is no ‘natural law’ implied by any ‘right’ or ‘privelege’ to copy except what is inherent in procreation. Otherwise, all other law exists on paper via ’society’. There is no ‘right to copy’. Such a thing simply doesn’t exist. The inalienable rights (or ‘natural rights) of ‘life, liberty and pursuit of happiness (for example) have nothing to do with ‘civil rights’. They are opposites. The act of ‘Copying’ isn’t some kind of definitive ‘moral’ right. It’s absurd to even think of ‘copying’ in the same sense as something like the inalienable right to personality, for example.
December 27th, 2009 at 5:24 am
Indiana, how can you demand that copyright (plainly incompatible with the natural laws of information) is absolute and undeniable, and yet the ‘all born equal’ individuals’ natural rights (life, privacy, truth, liberty) are figments of the imagination?
For you to elevate an 18th century privilege as more important (and real) than the individual’s inalienable, natural right to liberty puts you on the same pedestal as Queen Anne.
Liberty includes the ability to learn from, copy, and improve upon the works of others, whether they be baskets, ploughs, pictures, songs, or stories.
The inalienable right to liberty thus includes the inalienable right to copy. Individuals cannot surrender it. It takes something as powerful as the crown or state to suspend it.
If you suspend the right to copy, to reserve it as a transferable privilege for the benefit of the printing press, then you have effectively alienated the right to copy from the people – from their right to liberty. When people cannot sing each other’s songs or tell each other’s stories then the people have lost their cultural liberty.
Indiana, while you remain in love with the glamour of copyright you will believe such corporate privileges as absolutes, and those rights of the individual such as liberty as non-essential ‘nice to haves’.
So it is YOU who have got it round the wrong way. It is you who are being absurd in your attempts to say that a commercial privilege is absolute, and that natural rights are non-existent.
December 27th, 2009 at 3:09 pm
(and)
Indy!… Go to the front of the class and face the blackboard… NOW!!
You’ve just denied the very essence of why laws were conceived in the first place. Now, go write this on the blackboard repeatedly until it sinks in!…
1. Natural rights ALWAYS exist.
2. Laws were introduced to protect natural rights when they were found to be violated. The primary form of these laws were immortalized as a “Constitution” in many countries.
3. Privileges were introduced when it appeared constructive to temporarily suspend some natural rights.
4. Privileges contain UNNATURAL “rights” that should not be confused with INALIENABLE rights. “Unnatural” laws were introduced to enforce the unnatural “rights” of privilege.
5. Inalienable rights cannot be sold.
6. Natural rights are not only inalienable, but the very building blocks of law. They trump all else in that respect.
7. I promise to look up and review the word “inalienable”, and the significance of its definition to this discussion in the future.
December 27th, 2009 at 5:21 pm
Copying simply isn’t considered a ‘natural law’.
A natural law would be a right to personality or even artistic expression. In your no. 2, ‘copyright’ (for example) was introduced to protect artistic and creative works. Copying is not considered an inalienable right. However, in the past, by allowing creators to copyright their works, it was a form of protection against the exploitation of others. (For example, so that printers could not copy books that were authored by their creators and then by permission were printed and then distributed via a specific publisher.)
Inalienable rights would be similar in definition to ‘natural rights’ (I’m assuming as per your post that we’re talking about the same thing). Nonetheless, “Natural or inalienable rights” only exist in theory and by their introduction in history as they were discussed and penned via various declarations and religious laws. But, in reality, even those ‘inalienable rights’ aren’t particularly ‘real’ and many times in history even those ‘inalienable rights’ have been surpressed and/or disposed of under various forms of government as we all know.
I would’nt consider new laws derived due to the formation of society as ‘unnatural’ though, simply because we’ve developed as a society and recognize that there have always been and always will be people who take advantage of others.
These more theoretical inalienable (natural) rights specifically can only be exercised to the extent that they do not infringe or impair the rights of others. (For example, just because one has the right to ‘freedom of speech’ does not mean that one can use that right to libel or infringe upon the liberties of others. Once that happens, it is no longer considered ‘freedom of speech’. Some people like to call it censorhip if a newspaper is told not to print something that is untrue or libelous. Other’s would call it libel or defamation of character and believe that a ’stop press’ order is appropriate.) I wouldn’t consider a law that is introduced to ‘protect’ the individual as ‘unnatural’ and clearly, it has never been assumed or maintained that copying the works of others as being a natural or inalienable right. However, in the future, it could be possible to introduce a sort of ‘digital’ right if there could also be introduced some form of compensation for the creators.
I know that there has been a big discussion here about ’selling your recordings’ for example, however, this is something that only a singer/songwriter (like myself) would be able to do. An artist who is only a singer, for example, would have to pay the songwriter in advance before he/she could sell her recordings otherwise, the songwriter would be working for ‘free’. Which wouldn’t be a fair scenario. So, a singer like Aretha Franklin, Whitney Houston, or even Susan Boyle (or any other diva who generally covers other peoples songs) would perhaps never be heard if they had to pay songwriters in advance in order to use their material.
December 27th, 2009 at 7:46 pm
Indiana, here’s what Richard Stallman had to say on the matter in 2000:
David Crossland a few months ago in 2009:
December 28th, 2009 at 12:17 am
@Indiana:
Everything you’re expressing in #73 is, quite simply, FALSE!
To be honest, your understanding of this subject is truly impeded, and I can only assume you will continue to argue with the very black and white of it, no matter how much time and care I put into laying it out for you.
I’ll write this one off as another one of your refusals to accept the absolute terms laid out by an absolute subject. It’s beyond me what you hope to accomplish by doing that, but as I’ve said before, I don’t intend to keep wasting my time trying to find out.
December 28th, 2009 at 6:17 pm
@DA perhaps clarify exactly how my no. 73 is ‘False’ in black and white terms. Everything about law has been created based upon previous ‘law’. There is absolutely nothing absolute in what has been presented. Copyright is by no means a ‘government monopoly’. Just because Stallman made a claim and labels it a ‘natural right to copy’ doesn’t make it so and a ‘natural right to copy’ wouldn’t also give a ‘natural right to distribute copies to the entire world’. That’s simply nonsensical.
December 28th, 2009 at 9:32 pm
@Indiana:
You have very effectively demonstrated that you don’t understand what natural rights are, and why such things ARE absolute. If you did understand, you wouldn’t be arguing with it – that’s how absolute it is.
Statements such as this…
…reinforce the fact you don’t get it.
Stallman’s not making any claims. He is just doing the same thing that Crosbie and I are doing here – stating something that is a fact, and trying to put it into terms that illustrate that, in hopes that more will see where the misconceptions are.
Without copyright, distributing copies to the entire world would INDEED be perfectly legal, as per Natural Law. It is copyright that supresses those kind of natural rights, in order for the “rights” holder to have a TEMPORARY MONOPOLY on copy distribution, and therefore, a monopoly on the profits from their sale.
The mechanics at play here are not that difficult to grasp.
Under Natural Law, it’s the WORK people pay for. A tailor makes a pair of pants, takes his money for it, and doesn’t care less if you take them home and “reverse engineer” them with the intention of making your own to sell. Hell, he might even sell you a pattern so you don’t need to figure it out.
Under copyright, a tailor makes a pair of pants, takes his money for it, and then he can, if applicable by the license…
1. Tell you where to wear them, who can see you in them, what you’re allowed to put in the pockets, and what kinds of belts void the guarantee, if you use them.
2. Forbid you to make your own, whether for profit or personal use.
3. Expect a royalty or license fee everytime you wear them.
4. Charge licensing and collect cuts of profit from the reproduction and sales of those wishing to do so.
5. etc.
In other words, the tailor would be milking profits from the act of copying. It’s the COPIES he’s getting paid for.
Why do you think this privilege is called “copy+right”?
The right to copy has been artificially transferred from the people to the creator (or distributor). Now, where do you think the right existed to begin with, in order to suspend it like that?!
I won’t be dissecting #73 into a critique of the black and white contained in it. It’s just too riddled with statements that don’t apply, for similar reasons as the one I did pick on.
I’ve given you a considerable amount of black and white on this already, and have tried a variety of ways to illustrate how it’s absolute. I didn’t create this stuff, nor did Crosbie or Stallman.
You either get it, or you don’t. I don’t know what else to say about it.
December 29th, 2009 at 6:53 am
@Indy:
IMO, DA’s summation just about sums it up. Give it a bit of time and it’ll be academic anyway. a2f2a — artist-to-fan-to-artist — will be where most of the action is.
Cheers!
December 29th, 2009 at 3:31 pm
@DA Your arguments come across as fairly naive. You’re demonstrating a lack of understanding about a) how law and policy is made and the way that it can be influenced and b) a complete lack of understanding of how IP and copyright have been introduced and c) the reason royalties exist, how mechanicals & publishing works, etc.
Since you are comparing a tailor’s works (which are physical) with an intangible IP oriented product (e.g music, film, software, games, etc.) which is ‘intangible’ and more ’service’ oriented, it seems to me as if you’re living in some kind of parallel universe. You’re trying to create your own utopic scenario in a world where the laws DO exist. In my opinion, claiming that you once had a ‘right to copy’ which was ’suspended’ 200 years ago simply won’t get through the gates or even onto the playing field. As nice as the theory may seem, it is extremely unrealistic to believe that this type of argument will captivate the minds of anyone at the level of government ever. Simply because the laws are based upon precendence. Until some form of ‘license’ is created for use of IP within the framework of the digital world, there will be this constant threat.
Even so, since most ‘tailors’ or clothing designers actually do sell copies of their original pieces (which are manufactured and often mass-marketed, the ‘tailor’ or ‘designer’ does get a cut per copy.) Only the ‘made-to-measure’ tailor would sell a ‘one of’. And we know the uproar in France if anyone dare buy a Chinese copy of a Chanel bag (or any other French designer article) and take it through customs, again, those bags, shoes, etc. are copies of the original design. If you are caught with a fake, you get fined and potentially a ‘go to jail’ card.
With regards to the ‘personal use’ scenario, haven’t copies for private use been deemed’legal’ anyway? It’s only when the copies are mass-distributed that there has become an issue of infringement via the courts recently.
But, even then, as I mentioned above, a new form of licensing for digital use could be a way to get around these infringement issues (unless it’s already too late and 3-strikes is pronounce across the globe.)
Think about it, if you plan to negotiate with law makers by telling them to abolish copyright and give everyone back this ‘natural right’ that you claim once existed… um.. what do you think they’ll do? Maybe ask you how long it’s been since you broke out of the asylum? It’s simply not going to happen! Using that kind of argument or presentation is not strategic and implies no consideration for prior law. It’s simply a theoretical dream from a parallel universe and when you come back from there, please bring me back the odd socks that the gremlins snatch.
In my opinion, the only way to bring forward a new ’system’ would be to gradually phase out the old system strategically. If you are realistic, you’ll understand why it will be impossible to persuade the law that abolishing copyright all together and simply saying something like “give us our natural rights” back is not strategic and is likely to get more of these ‘3-strikes’ and other extreme legislations through the gates. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but, that simply IS reality.
December 29th, 2009 at 3:33 pm
@Jon Newton — “The gem cannot be polished without friction- Chinese Proverb”
December 29th, 2009 at 9:32 pm
“Exhibit A”:
“Exhibit B”:
“Exhibit C”:
@a2f2a:
The overwhelming evidence speaks for itself. I rest my case.
“Where ignorance is bliss, ’tis folly to be wise.” – Thomas Gray
December 30th, 2009 at 5:12 am
Indiana, perhaps you should stop discussing things in terms of rights, then? Especially given you define them from a totalitarian perspective as ‘what the state decides they should be, as it defines them in law’, which is diametrically opposite to the libertarian perspective that the law is crafted to protect the people’s natural rights.
So, we can ignore the rights & privileges and focus on the commercial realities:
1) It is not possible to prevent people manufacturing and distributing their own copies.
2) The market for copies has ended.
3) The market for art remains as strong as ever.
This is why I suggest that artists should sell their art directly to their fans instead of to publishers, and certainly not to attempt selling copies themselves.
I have suggested several times to you that musicians should sell their recordings to their fans instead of record labels (just as I’d sell my software rather than copies), but each time I do, you ignore that suggestion and start wittering on about selling rights, copies, or having a tax or compulsory license.
I’m still trying to understand why you’re so scared to even think about the idea of selling your recordings to your fans, why you won’t even consider putting a price on one, e.g. somewhere between one dollar and a trillion.
Let’s ignore the elusive ‘rights’ and deal entirely in terms of physical objects, e.g. a recording of you singing, and a shed load of cash. Why won’t you consider such a simple exchange?
December 30th, 2009 at 8:07 am
@Crosbie because I believe that if we have an opportunity not to sell at all, it is much more liberating for art. If we have a situation where artists can be compensating without this commercial notion of ’selling’, perhaps we won’t have all these cookie-cutter acts who abide by the 3′20″ rules for radio play and other nonsense. If you don’t have to sell your art, it means that artists can become more artistically daring.
December 30th, 2009 at 8:07 am
‘compensated’
December 30th, 2009 at 12:09 pm
Indiana, I’m now wondering if perhaps we need to create a new website for those peculiar artists interested in selling their art directly to their fans?
This site can be for those sensible artists seeking, as you put it, an opportunity not to sell at all.
December 30th, 2009 at 5:59 pm
@Crosbie are you being serious or sarcastic? I hope you understand how I mean. I think if there is a way to avoid ’selling’ recordings or copies and simply introduce a way of making music free (but, yet still compensate the creators… not in the ‘huge’ ways that record sales may have done in the past, but, some form of compensation and have more artists out playing live as much as possible, in my opinion this would help the fan-to-artist relationship. It won’t need to always be this advert of ‘buy the album on itunes’ or whatever, it would be more of a collaborative ‘have a listen’ or maybe even something like asking fans ‘any ideas for lyrics on this section of the song’ with the fans. I’m not saying that artists who want to sell their recordings to their fans are ‘peculiar’. As I said above in the thread, it’s a fine idea as long as they own the recordings that they are selling (and have permission from any co-writers or whatever.) But, if the idea is for music to be ‘free’ and liberated, it would be cool to find a way to do that without making musicians work on their recordings for free, but, also not making it an ‘artist -to- customer relationship anymore.
December 31st, 2009 at 5:01 am
Sorry, Indiana, but it’s pretty tricky enabling fans to buy the musician’s music without this constituting a customer/vendor relationship – unless of course, you take the fans’ money out of their wallets by force instead, i.e. via taxation or compulsory ISP license fee.
It seems you are so dead set on the latter that you can’t even conceive of the former.
Universe 1) In a free market you have 1,000 fans who’d buy a recording from you for $10,000. You could sell it to them – if you can put up with the vendor/customer relationship.
Universe 2) There is a collection society or equivalent that will disburse a $10 per month ISP levy according to the proliferation of your recording over the next umpteen years. At best this is simply a lottery style scheme with 50% overhead costs, where a very few people get 10x-100x their stake each month (10x$10-50%=$50), most get 1x back (1x$10-50%=$5), compared to others that get none back because they don’t generate any unique works that proliferate.
It is economically ridiculous to have a central bureaucracy charging every member of the population $5/month for the job of disbursing the other $5 back to them. Unfortunately, it is highly appealing to those of limited economic acuity given the prospect of a one in a billion chance of getting back more than you would earn in a free market.
So, why not accept the $10,000 sale, and then spend half of it on lottery tickets if you’re so set on becoming a multi-millionaire? That way, you don’t burden the rest of the population with a tax.
December 31st, 2009 at 4:30 pm
I’m thinking more about website and service licenses, not ‘ISP levies’ and even in the case of an ISP levy or license it would be considered in the cases where ISPs are co-jointly working as a music ’service’ . I don’t see where the 50% overheads would come into play for collection societies anymore. There wouldn’t be a justificaion for those kinds of overheads. From my experience, websites deemed ‘legal’ already need to calculate their contributions whether they have done deals with labels and/or with individuals and it’s not a situation of 50% overheads. They report and would be subject to audit just as they are now.
All businesses are similar to a ‘lottery’ even with the best due dilligence and the best laid marketing plots. In the past, 75% of the money that changed hands between the consumer down to the artist vanished via distribution and label overheads anyway. Here, with digital, we have a way of actually seeing the transactions virtually in almost real time. It only takes play counters and a universal database and reporting system within every region and/or territory to report to a few independent monitoring agencies. No need for big overheads (other than a few people administering, bank charges, and the willingness of bands and artists to provide data for the administration.)
Selling any commodity is indeed a risk. But, with music and artistic expression, it seems like, as you have put it, the ‘market’ isn’t scarce and there are millions of records. It would make more sense to me to let musician’s be heard and remove the customer/vendor relationship. Fans would be active in helping with the marketing aspect via ’sharing’ which in turn would help the musician earn a wage when their music is heard. There would be no need to sell recordings directly to fans or to labels in this scenario. Fans would however, perhaps purchase tickets. There may be ‘labels’, but, they would be more involved in promoting live shows (that shift is already taking place). Sure, artists could sell their recordings, but, I don’t see what purpose it would serve for a fan to have a master copy when music can be proliferated and distributed freely anyway.
December 31st, 2009 at 5:07 pm
@Crosbie Are you asking me (in particular) to do a ‘test’ and see about selling my master recordings to my fan base? If that’s the case, let me have a chat with the band and think about giving it a go, it would be fun to give it a try. I’m wondering how it would go though. Would we give samples of the tunes and ask people to invest or take a cut in the master first? Or do you just say “hey guys, we’ve done a new record and we’re selling them to the first group of people who invest and we’ll release when we reach our break-even point on the recordings plus our overheads for the next tour? If you put the album online, anyone can copy it anyway. What does the fan actually get out of it other than being the first to hear and share?
January 1st, 2010 at 7:38 am
Indiana, it doesn’t matter what you call it, it’s a tax – a compulsory fee collected from someone it’s easy to collect it from, with threat of prosecution. Let’s not pretend it’s not compulsory, e.g. because people can always abstain from communicating, from exchanging ideas, sharing and building upon mankind’s art and knowledge.
As I’ve said before there are three primary revenue models:
1) Reproduction monopoly (invidious 18th century anachronism, wet paper bag, etc.)
2) Taxation (an invalid equation: ‘work + 50% overheads = popularity/communication tax’)
3) Free market (sale of intellectual work to those interested in its production)
It’s amusing that you acknowledge the overheads* of copyright as 75% (which through creative accounting is usually pushed closer to 99% for signed artists), and yet by some leap of faith you hope for less than my generous 50% as the overhead of enforcing, measuring, collecting, and disbursing a tax.
Insanity is repeating the mistake demonstrated by history and hoping for a different result.
Of course a tax is appealing, given it seems like a much easier way of making money (taking it through force and then dishing it out). However, that’s generally ‘easy money’ for the administrators. The artists still have to work like buggery to beat those who control the communications channels effectively gaming the system, i.e. the broadcasting and publishing corporations.
If you want artists to have more money the best thing to do is to stop finding ways of funnelling the 99% of it to administrators and publishers, i.e. stop proposing to replace their now ineffective privilege of copyright with an equivalent tax.
Try a free market, where artists and their fans exchange art and money directly. It’s working for the free software industry (software engineers and the users of the software interested in its development).
Yes, the downside of a free market compared to taxation is the fact that you have to deal with your customers and give them what they value for their money. A tax on the other hand is nice in that you can produce cookie cutter crap and get paid far more due to its popularity than an esoteric album that takes you years of hard work to compose and produce, and yet has such a small audience that the popularity is unmeasurable and so obtains no tax dividend. With a free market you are able to be paid commensurately, e.g. a million may pay a penny for a simple ringtone, but a thousand may pay a hundred dollars each for an esoteric masterpiece.
See Retailers fear Simon Cowell and Harry Potter overkill.
[I'll answer 89 later.]
_______________________
* not even including the cultural cost.
January 3rd, 2010 at 3:22 pm
@Crosbie, I haven’t mentioned a tax, only mentioned a license paid by websites that use music. The reason I can see the margins is mainly because I’ve spent the past few years working on a project that is meant to do exactly what I’m preaching here.:)
January 3rd, 2010 at 3:42 pm
@ Crosbie
The overheads under the ‘old’ distribution model (e.g. putting cds into retail) was made up of recording costs, manufacturing, distribution, shelving fees, promo fees (if you did a TV advert, for example and you had your units on the shelves at ASDA or Sainsbury’s, they would expect a tag on the advert “available at ASDA” etc.) In order for an independent to get shelved at any major retailer, a minimum marketing budget was required, on top of that you paid pluggers for radio and any other PR, publicists, etc. etc. Whether on a major label, independent, or D.I.Y., you had a good way to go before break-even kicked in. Under ‘new’ model, you have no manufacturing. So, an artist can go straight from recording costs out to the ‘market’ place. So, the reduction of overheads for the artists are very significant. In both cases, most artists need to rely on some form of ‘collection’ agency simply due to time. Otherwise, they would need to engage someone to collect on their behalf. This is why many songwriters and artists have joined societies to collect for them on their behalf. In your above statement, you are comparing two very different mechanisms. What happened during the old sales machine is fairly different to what happens when it comes to royalty collections. And in the new-ish potential scenario, those overheads should become minimal if a proper system is put into action.
January 4th, 2010 at 6:58 am
Indiana (re 91), you may well not have mentioned the word ‘tax’, but you have nevertheless mentioned a tax. You can call it a ‘license to use music’ or you can call it a tax on an activity that should remain as tax free as speaking. It is still a tax, but obviously, taxes with respect to music don’t have as much apparent legitimacy as license fees.
The crux of the matter is that calling it a license fee implies that singing another’s song SHOULD be illegal, and thus SHOULD require permission or payment (of a license fee). A tax on the other hand is simply an expedient means of collecting funds for national infrastructure, which then raises the question as to why the heck songs should be considered as infrastructure.
At least ‘tax’ is a more honest term in that it’s saying “Instead of seeing them struggle in a free market like everyone else, we thought we’d do songwriters a favour and tax everyone for singing songs, and then disburse the tax back to all songwriters according to how popular their songs are”, i.e. it’s not saying that singing another’s songs is a priori illegal, it’s just saying “If you sing, you must pay. If you write songs, we will pay you according to how widely they’re sung”.
So, there is sod all difference between a license fee and a tax. The same money is collected and disbursed to the same people. The only difference is whether you believe the underlying activity should be illegal in the first place, e.g. singing another’s song without their permission.
As you know, I do not believe singing another’s songs without permission should be considered a fundamentally illegal activity, given it violates no individual’s natural rights, therefore any fee to be collected from those who do so is properly termed a tax – not a license fee.
And to tax singing as a means of paying songwriters would be a colossal folly, to top the 18th century folly of copyright, i.e. making it illegal to sing another’s songs without permission.
January 4th, 2010 at 7:23 am
Indiana (re 92), of course the overheads in a music tax are going to be completely different to the overheads in a reproduction monopoly. My point was that you should expect similarly talented ‘creative accountants’ to bulk up the costs of enforcing, measuring, collecting, and disbursing a music tax to rapidly approach 99% of the monies collected vs that reaching the individual artist.
In other words you can look forward to the same AMOUNT of overhead, not necessarily the same overheads.
If the only way artists can get paid is to go through the same gargantuan central bureaucracy then they can look forward to paying for quite a few marble floors and mahogany staircases before they see a single penny end up in their pocket. It doesn’t matter that the process SHOULD be efficient. When there is a single administration, it will be incentivised to bulk itself up with inefficiencies and mutually profitable overheads via other participants in the tax collection chain.
The only way musicians will earn more via tax than a free market is if they give up making music and get a job in the national music tax administration facility.
January 4th, 2010 at 9:58 am
Indiana (re 89), I wasn’t asking you to do a test, I was simply asking you to at least consider the possibility of selling your recordings directly to your fans rather than to a record label, or worse, rather than trying to make and sell your own copies.
Very few musicians have sold their recordings directly to their fans. There aren’t many facilities to do so either. You could certainly do a test, but given a lack of facilities and the unfamiliarity you and your fan base will have in purchasing or commissioning your recordings, the results of the test should not be considered conclusive.
I was only hoping to at least persuade you to acknowledge this revenue mechanism and business model. However, you now appear to want to jump straight in the deep end with a test. This is a bit like me trying to persuade you to consider the possibility that human beings can swim, and you refusing to consider the possibility as anything except delusional until one day you say “Ok, I’m game. Which cliff should I jump from?”. We appear to have missed out a big chunk of intervening discussion concerning the actual technique of swimming let alone diving and making sure there’s water to dive into.
There are two obvious ways of selling a recording:
1) You have already produced a recording, but not yet released/published it. You are interested in your fans’ best offer in case it may be better than that of a record label.
2) You are interested in producing a recording, and invite record labels and your fans to tender their offers of commission.
A less obvious way is as follows:
3) You regularly produce and release recordings to your fans by way of ‘priming the pump’. You invite your fans to commission the release of subsequent recordings. The initial releases are promotional loss-leaders to build the fan base to a size where their subsequent commissions match and possibly exceed the costs of production.
In all cases 1-3, the purchaser of the recording effectively ends up with the right to make copies. If you sell a recording to a label, they get any copyright (the privilege that suspends everyone else’s liberty to reproduce it). If you sell a recording to your fan base, any copyright is neutralised (your fans’ and everyone else’s liberty to reproduce it is restored). Indeed, when selling recordings to your fans, copyright becomes a redundant nuisance to be disposed of, rather than a privilege to be sold to those unscrupulous labels who’d exploit it in their sale of copies.
At least when an artist sells a recording to their fans, they retain all their (natural) rights. When an artist sells a recording to a label the artist loses their liberty to make copies. When an artist sells a recording to their fans they retain their liberty to make copies (a consequence of neutralising rather than transferring copyright).
The recording (as deliverable) comprises the digital master and all components thereof as would typically be expected by a record label. If sold to one’s fans, then at the point of exchange this must be supplied or made available to the purchaser (one’s fans), e.g. as FLAC files via BitTorrent. Anyone (including the recording producer) can then sell material copies (media and delivery costs) in instances where such delivery of the recording is preferred, e.g. on DVD-ROM.
In the other direction, the sale price that the artist agrees is equitable in exchange for the recording (say $10,000) is provided from each fan (say $10 from each of 1,000) and delivered to the artist (or the company representing all those involved in the production of the recording). Typically, each fan will pay the same amount, but some schemes may involve variations.
There are umpteen other issues (quality assurance, etc.), but we can cover those another time.
In answer to your other questions, this is not an investment in the artist, but the sale of a recording. The fans get the recording they want. The artist gets the money they want. Moreover, everyone gets their liberty restored.
In terms of facilities with which to test it, one could attempt to shoehorn eBay’s Dutch auction to sell 1,000 ’shares’ in a recording if you reckon you’d easily sell out and the minimum bid price was around $10 (if you hoped for at least $10k). This also has to pass eBay’s scrutiny as the sort of auction it’s happy to see (doubtful).
Alternatively you could try Kickstarter. See Pros and Cons of the Kickstarter Model.
Predictably, the more artists that start selling their recordings to their fans, the more facilities will be developed, and the more familiar fans will be with this means of encouraging their favourite artists to produce recordings for them.
However, it is important to note that ‘more facilities’ means ‘less overhead’. The more facilities there are to enable artists to sell their recordings to their fans, the more competition there is to provide artists with such services at ever lower prices. Contrast that with a single taxation and disbursement administration that has every incentive to ratchet up its costs and overheads.
Privileged cartels and government backed central services are the entities to establish ONLY if you want less rather than more of your fans’ money.
So, cut out the middleman! Or at least ensure that there’s a highly competitive environment such that any middlemen have to be extremely fit, lean and cost conscious if they expect you to use them in selling your recordings to your fans. If you create a tax instead, you’re creating one humongous Jabba the Hutt and very little prospect of seeing much more than a tiny trickle of treasure leak from its greedy clutches.
January 4th, 2010 at 4:58 pm
The problem that every artist/songwriter faces is that it is virtually impossible to collect for yourself. If it weren’t for societies like SACEM & PRS/MCPS, I would have more than likely never been paid. For example, I had no clue that my tracks were used for television last year. Most artists see these societies as a ‘union’ and they also help go after monies that you, the artist, know you are owed. They collect for your public performances and make sure that the organisers (who often don’t fill in the PRS forms) are paying those royalties when your songs are played, covered, or even when you perform them yourself live. I’m not so sure about the mohogany staircases. One thing I do know is that the offices in London are big with quite a lot of employees pushing pencils, but, that’s the way it was. The world of radio, TV, live performace was all about filling in a piece of paper which was sent to the societies (which required people opening the letters, collecting the data, and distributing the cheques. So, a lot of room for error.) With a digital system, there is much less room for error. Obviously, people can conveniently forget to report, but, online, that’s not quite as easy to trick.
Your response to 89. You are presenting a business model that, under my understanding, you must know the in’s and out’s about. So, rather than saying that I don’t believe humans can swim, I’m saying, right, you seem to know the mechanics of swimming, so, I’m happy to get into the water and take your instruction. I never once disregarded the possibility of it being a ‘model’, however, I do doubt the effectiveness in a world where there is so little difference between a master recording and a copy (other than on paper and within a certain set of ‘rules’. The same rules that you have deemed ‘unnatural’.) So, all I’m asking is that if you consider selling recordings directly to fans as a new mechanism, why not explain the mechanism and how it would be implemented?
x
January 4th, 2010 at 5:04 pm
@Crosbie … For the record, I’m an independent. So, I don’t sell my recordings to labels (and haven’t done for ages.)
Songwriting is different, however, there, you give other people the option to release your compositions and generally expect a royalty, or you can do a ‘buy-out’. As a songwriter, you have little or nothing to do with the recordings.
January 5th, 2010 at 4:19 am
Indiana (re 97) I’m not trying to imply by my examples that I am describing you or the business you’re in. There are many arts covered by copyright (or not) and I have to pick specific examples, as otherwise things get very unwieldy very rapidly.
(re 96), if you take it as read that you are entitled to be paid each time your work is played, broadcast, or copied, then of course a tax is much simpler than a collection society. However, I posit that there is no such entitlement, nor should there be.
I suggest that you sell your work to your fans once and for all, whether a live or studio performance, broadcast or recording – and never get paid for that work ever again. It’s just like any other craftsman selling their material work.
Think of a ‘recording’ as like the writing of a novel or the production of a movie. The recording is the work, the result is the master. Traditionally, the work, the recording has not been sold to the audience, but copies thereof. The copies cost next to nothing, but their price has been artificially inflated by a state granted monopoly (copyright) that prevents anyone making their own copies.
So, I’m saying to the musician, “Sell your music (performance or recording), not copies”, to the author, “Sell your novel, not copies”, and to the movie-maker, “Sell your movie, not copies”.
I’m saying “Sell what’s valuable! Do not waste your time trying to sell that which people can make themselves for nothing.”
You can say it’s crazy to sell what’s valuable, to sell the actual work, that people must be able to sell copies at artificially high prices as they have done for the last few centuries. However, I suggest it’s those who insist on selling copyright ‘protected’ copies who are crazy.
A tax certainly appears to solve the problem, but it’s a terribly inefficient and ethically unsound solution.