I had an email from an a2f2a member asking if a2f2a is dead.
I had another asking if Billy is still involved and if he isn’t, do I plan to continue with the site.
To the second question, as far as I know, Billy hasn’t packed it in (see below). But if he has decided he’s had enough, I’d want to keep on truckin’.
Below is my reply to the first email >>>
a2f2a.com in the doldrums, for sure, but that doesn’t mean dead.
Right now I’m busy trying to feed my family and keep p2pnet online. And I know Billy has been busy with this – http://www.nobonus4rbs.co.uk/start.html.
So nothing has changed, not from my perspective anyway.
“If I hadn’t been hit with losing my income, I’d have been on it, probably castigating the FAC, among other things”, I said in the email. “And once I get myself sorted, I’ll try and rev it up again — unless, of course, people who’ve been on it think it tried and failed.”
So what do you think? Is it dead? Or only sleeping?
Cheers!
February 15th, 2010 at 7:53 pm
Jon,
I fear that what has happened is that we’ve lost our appetite for this debate after seeing you almost go under. Your farewell post on February 1st kinda took the wind out of the sails of those who have argued that musicians should let go of their traditional sources of income – record labels, retail, copyright – and let their fans support them.
For those who have been shouting at artists telling them to jump into the safety net held by the people who love their stuff, the sight of you plummeting to earth was pretty sobering.
The fact that you have managed to carry doesn’t offer much comfort to those who have been arguing that the only way to make a living is to give everything away. We’ve all now seen the stark reality of that particular business model
The sight of your own community failing to come to the aid of one of its greatest champions has so severely undermined the libertarian argument that I doubt there is much left to be said. I surely can’t envisage anyone stepping forward to say that perhaps we artists might have had a point when trying to hold on to some traditional sources of income.
If there is a lesson to be learned from the dialogue that we have had over the past months, it is that no matter how much we might want to see a new business model created, unless we ourselves are willing to play our part in its creation, then nothing will change.
Sorry to have to say this, Jon, because you have been through the grinder over this issue and are still paying the price, but I fear that this is the reason why there has been nothing but tumbleweed blowing through this site for the past couple of weeks.
February 16th, 2010 at 3:31 am
So Billy, if people won’t voluntarily donate their money to charity cases they should be forced to do so via an Internet tax?
Business has never been based on charitable or compulsory ‘giving’. It’s always been based on exchange, voluntary exchange in a free market.
I am playing my part in the resurrection of that business model (one that pre-dates copyright). You could also play a part in that, or you can persist in pleading for a tax handout.
This site has ground to a halt because a decision has to be made.
Is it to be about the status quo (supporting ACTA, etc.), lobbying for an Internet tax, or rolling its sleeves up and actually helping artists and fans do business together today?
The argument has ended. You and Jon have got to decide in which of those three directions a2f2a is going.
Any further argument is simply displacement activity to avoid confronting that decision.
February 16th, 2010 at 5:07 am
Hi Jon, Hi Billy,
My name is Oliver dawson. I wrote to Jon the other day, but got no answer… I think there were a couple of interesting topics there…
February 16th, 2010 at 6:19 am
Crosbie,
That is a prime example of displacement activity, attempting to change the focus of this thread by dictating to us the terms of the argument, but it’s not going to work.
Did you not see what just happened here? Jon tried out your business model, asking the p2p community for support, and it didn’t work.
Have you anything to say about that?
February 16th, 2010 at 6:38 am
@ Crosbie & Billy
Don’t think the similarities escaped me. However, I’ve decided that after having taken for so long, it’s time for me to give back so I’m finding my own funding.
Things are being said on p2pnet that badly need to be said, and issues aired that badly need to be aired.
I could have sold the site altogether, or taken on a 49%/51% partner, with me on the short end. But Cliff is my host and he’s promised to keep p2pnet online even if I stop contributing. So the content will still be there. And who knows — maybe if and when I can’t do any more financially, someone else with better resources than mine will take over?
From my perspective, the missing component in a2f2a has been the artists themselves. On p2pnet, readers contribute significantly. But that participation didn’t happen overnight.
I’m still willing to keep on truckin’ because I believe over time, a2f2a.com can be what we want it to be – a channel for fans and artists together and a power in the land.
And I’m not the giving up type.
Cheers!
[PS - Fuc the FAC
)
February 16th, 2010 at 6:44 am
@ Oliver: I didn’t see your email or I would’ve replied. I always do, even if it takes a day or two.
Cheers!
February 16th, 2010 at 7:07 am
This is absolutely correct. And even more salient is this:
The “argument” ended in 2001, but it’s taken nearly ten years for the old guard to even realize that something was happening. At this point, today’s success stories are already transitioning to newer models. The question is, are we going to help them with these changes, offering advice and sharing experiences artist to fan to artist? Or are we going to moan about “pirates” because a few ancient artists can’t keep getting checks in the mail?
Nobody is advocating the kind of “give it away and pray” non-model that Jon tried here. What we are talking about are business transactions, the exchange of money for work. Without a working system of commission for new blog posts, Jon needs to find other things to sell. Perhaps his experience as both a musician and p2p advocate would make his time valuable enough to a forward-thinking musician that they would pay for his advice.
Frankly, this is why I’ve lost interest in a2f2a. I’m tired of wasting my time explaining the same things over and over to Billy and Indiana when it’s clear they’re not here to learn, but to advocate a specific view of things. I’d rather expend my energy with the people asking what’s next, not with those attempting to turn their refusal to accept reality into a merry-go-round “debate.”
February 16th, 2010 at 7:34 am
Billy, very few people have tried my ‘MfA+LfP’ business model. I suggested Jon try it out via KickStarter, but it turns out that it’s only available to US citizens.
I’m still working on implementing this business model with 1p2U (and the ContingencyMarket online exchange facility), however these are not yet fully operational. These things are still in alpha testing, i.e. ironing out the bugs in the system that only appear during testing. Jon and a few others are kindly helping me test it. However, until that’s finished and I risk real money changing hands, Jon has not ‘tried out my business model’.
I have never suggested Jon or anyone else pursue let alone rely upon donations. There’s nothing necessarily wrong with accepting donations, but I wouldn’t call it a business model.
That said, many entrepreneurs do indeed think that donation facilities are ‘the solution’. We have Kachingle and Flattr as two recent examples, and TipJar and FairTunes as a couple that came on the scene a little less recently.
So Billy, I’ve been researching this area for a little while and have seen FairTunes rise and fall (this Interview with Matt Goyer could have been written yesterday). So I’m not going to be so silly as to pursue the same thing but with a snappier name in a prettier colour now am I?
I’m working on a business model, not a donation facility.
February 16th, 2010 at 7:50 am
@ SteelWorlf:
Give it away and pray? That’s not at all what I was thinking, or have ever thought. I was able to keep p2pnet online from ads and sponsorship, but those sources have dried up. I now have a $5 per month subsciption button. We’ll see what that does.
But “Give it away and pray?” Not even nearly.
Cheers!
February 16th, 2010 at 8:18 am
Yes, it’s not accurate to suggest Jon had tried “Give it away and pray”. That proposition is usually used pejoratively by IP maximalists against artists publishing copies of their art either free of charge or with a copyleft license.
Of course, giving away copies (copyleft as they should always be) is fine as a promotional strategy, but it’s not sufficient to constitute a business model (even if one’s prayers for donations are answered). At some point you need customers who, having consequently discovered you, want you to produce more great work and will commission you to that end, i.e. will exchange their money for your art.
February 16th, 2010 at 10:28 am
I’ll add my email here….
Hi Jon.
My name is Oliver and I work in the music business in italy.
I’m writing for two reasons.
1 – I work for an Italian record company as A&R. We are very small and we mostly do digital downloads on the usual stores. We are now producing a young hip-hop band called Huga Flame and as their fans are very young and don’t have access to a credit card we are working on two systems to get young fans to pay of their mobile phone credit:
- http://www.goldpay.it/ (i’m sorry this is in italian. Basically you call a number and you receive an sms with a pw that allows you to access a premium part of your website. You receive about 39% of what the costumer pays).
- http://www.onebip.com/consumer/uk/
We are gonna launch the website on the 15th of March. It will be my priviledge to keep you updated on how this new system works and give you some data, if you are interested.
2 – My main job is at a very important italian music television, where I work as music programmer. We are cforrently very frustaed.
The big record compagnies won’t allow us to play the latest music videos and they force us to follow their terrible video dates. This means that all of Italy can see the latest videos on youtube or vimeo and out television is always late on showing the new releases. Plus, very often, they won’t allow us to play videos of artists that they don’t want to promote in Italy… like Lil Wayne. In 5 years they ahve never officially sent us a Lil Wayne video. In the clubs everyone loves Lil Wayne, but we are not allowed to have the video because they have other priorities (i.e they think the radio won’t play it so it’s a waste of time). We are very very frustrated by this situation. Is there a way out? Will they ever realize that by doing this they damage us and their artist and ultimately themselves?
Thanks
Olly
February 16th, 2010 at 1:52 pm
I’m not suggesting that Jon was trying to give it away and pray. He was clearly looking for people to sign up and support him in his work.
Crosbie says “At some point you need customers who, having consequently discovered you, want you to produce more great work and will commission you to that end, i.e. will exchange their money for your art.”
So here’s the question – why were the users of p2pnet, who greatly value Jon’s work, unwilling to become his customers?
February 16th, 2010 at 2:28 pm
@ Billy:
For years people have been getting p2pnet by just logging on. Now, all of a sudden, I’m asking them to pay.
It’s a personal site and people don’t pay for personal sites. But I’ve now changed the game on p2pnet. So we’ll see how it goes over the next few weeks and in the meanwhile, my wife, Liz, and I are working on a couple of ideas for offline projects to bring in some readies.
I’m also seriously thinking about doing some busking when the summer comes. That’d be appropriate, don’t you think?
And when you win the pools, Billy, you can bung me a pound or two.
Cheers!
February 16th, 2010 at 3:21 pm
I personally think the consensus poll where only 20% of respondents thought that the draconian and unworkable Three Strikes was a bad idea also put people off contributing.
February 16th, 2010 at 4:59 pm
Billy, as I indicated, my system that allows Jon to sell his news production (to what would become his customers) is not yet fully operational.
At the moment there is no facility for people to commission bloggers for their work. All we have at the moment are donation facilities. Whilst donors are no doubt welcome, they aren’t customers.
Just as Jon should get subscribers/customers who will pay him to produce his news, so songwriters should get musicians and singers who will pay them to write songs they can perform. Naturally, none of this requires copyright. It just requires a facility to enable those who produce intellectual work to exchange it for the money of the people who want it. That’s exchange – not donation.
February 16th, 2010 at 6:17 pm
The users of p2p.net clearly want the intellectual work that Jon produces, yet none of them were willing to exchange money in order to continue to receive it. The method of exchange that you have been trumpeting for the past months failed to work, not because there was no facility to enable p2p.net users to support him, but because of their reluctance to put their hands in their pockets.
February 16th, 2010 at 6:35 pm
@ Billy:
“yet none of them were willing to exchange money in order to continue to receive it”
Not so. People donated, but not enough for me to survive on that alone.
By way of a bit of an update, two people have taken out subscriptions. The first two, but not the last. And it all counts.
Cheers!
February 16th, 2010 at 7:12 pm
My point exactly, Jon.
Your experience in the past month has been a stark illustration of the fact that it is very difficult for an individual creator to survive on the support of fans alone.
It is important that we recognise this because it sheds light on some questions that have baffled the p2p community, for instance:
Why do artists continue to sign record company contracts when they know they are being screwed? See above.
Why do artists need publishing income in the digital age? See above.
Why are artists willing to believe what the record industry tells them about downloading? See above.
February 16th, 2010 at 7:23 pm
@jon how is your subscription service set up? Do you send extra or exclusive news to your readers, or are you planning to move the whole thing towards subscription access only?
February 16th, 2010 at 7:25 pm
Come on Billy, bring a2f2a out of the doldrums. Is it to be a site that promotes an Internet tax to forcibly take money from people’s pockets, or is it to espouse free market principles?
Make that decision and then all the birds of that feather will flock here together.
February 16th, 2010 at 7:50 pm
@djbonky
Welcome to the discussion, Olly.
@MD1500
More than half of the respondents to the poll were artists. This isn’t a fair cross section of the Internet as a whole. Also, there were numerous comments wondering what Three Strikes and the ACTA even were. One of the directions that this community could go could be just educating artists about the atrocities that are committed in their name.
@Billy
I donated. Not all the readers of p2pnet support Jon or want him to succeed. Some of us do, but most, I imagine, are in a position much like myself and not able to donate as much as we would like, or enough to support him.
February 16th, 2010 at 8:08 pm
@ Indy:
“how is your subscription service set up? Do you send extra or exclusive news to your readers, or are you planning to move the whole thing towards subscription access only?”
It isn’t a service. It’s a way to give people who want to pay for what’s available, a means to do that — to become patrons. But they don’t, and won’t, have to subscribe. What I am thinking of, though, is a system under which anyone who donates $30 or more gets a p2pnet t-shirt or a mug with the p2pnet beetle ( http://www.p2pnet.net/story/34209 ) on it/them. The exact donation level will depend on what it costs to produce the shirts and mugs. I’m literally waiting to get a quote back on how much that’d cost. Also, Crosbie suggested a named-sponsor scheme.
I’ve been rushing around like a blue-arsed fly trying to find a way to keep going and I think I’ve now solved my immediate financial worries, which means I can keep on with p2pnet and, to a lesser degree, a2f2a.
In the background I have what is to me is an exciting project which’d make p2pnet itself a value-added. But it’s the sort of thing which needs two or three people who are interested in opening up online news (and other content) delivery working on it. I have to find them before I can go any further.
So as I keep on saying, stay tuned.
Cheers!
February 16th, 2010 at 8:13 pm
@jon cool. sounds like a good enough plot. (I was just wondering anyway). So, if I understand right, for the moment, the subscription button on p2p.net is similar to a donation or patron button, but, you are looking into offering some extras. I’m guessing that if you have subscribers (patrons) offering a monthly, then, you wouldn’t have problems working with some on-demand type t-shirt/ mug providers like cafe press or something. I’m wondering if it wouldn’t be worth doing the same thing on a2f2a?
February 16th, 2010 at 8:24 pm
@ Billy:
We want artists and fans to have a place where they can jointly try to work out solutions to their commom problems. But that can’t happen if the two components aren’t more or less equally represented, which isn’t the case at the moment.
But it will be.
The members of the FAC should meanwhile fire the current board and start over.
Then there’d be a responsible, and credible, body we could team up with and develop an action plan that’s acceptable to everyone. That would be a huge step forward. I think we have already have most of the components, and some pretty smart musicians and fans who could probably put them together.
Cheers!
February 16th, 2010 at 8:28 pm
@ Indy:
Not cafe press. The only way it’d work in terms of bringing in some dollars is if I do it myself.
Cheers!
February 16th, 2010 at 8:46 pm
@Crosbie Do you really think that a2f2a is a place that is meant to decide some form of ultimatum as per #20? A free market system can continue regardless of any protection or intervention. In the market of non-digital or ‘tangible’ goods, there are still systems put into place to protect the interests of creators via patents and IP. I’m not convinced that this is bad or even some form of ‘necessary evil’. It is a good thing to value the ingenuity and drive of creative people who bring new and innovative product &/or services to the marketplace. I don’t believe that creativity should be stifled. Until we live in a world that is so ‘pure’ as to think that creativity doesn’t deserve some form of protection?
I understand your point of view, I just don’t see why anyone would be so against protecting the very people who are generally most vulnerable? Creative people aren’t usually the ones who have big cash behind them. Those people are usually the ’sharks’. One of the fundamental reasons why law (whether you want to call it ‘unnatural’ or not) protects creativity is to nourish itself. Edison was an inventor and relied on the patent system. He failed miserably on thousands of occassions, but, the protection of patent allowed him to finally thrive and also make it into history books due to his undying commitment to IP = e.g. ideas and productivity. There needs to be a balance within it and perhaps a new framework to work within. But, seeing the nature of people (not just corporates, but, also individuals) Are we to rely on goodwill and free market in it’s purist form as if there were no bad intention? There must be a point of some type of give and take.
When you say to Billy ” Is it to be a site that promotes an Internet tax to forcibly take money from people’s pockets, or is it to espouse free market principles?” If we give that ‘ultimatum’, are we not also preaching the opposite? Allowing people to take creative works from the creators for free is the same type of situation where money is ‘forcibly being taken from the creator’s pockets’ by default? In today’s world (outside of anything that we may believe to have taken place a couple hundred years ago), if the goals of a2f2a is indeed to help facilitate the need and desire to ‘make things work’ wouldn’t it be in order to discuss reasonable solution based upon free-market principles and also some types of opt-in situations.
In my ideal world, we would earn our dues and earn our ‘right of passage’. There are no free lunches and there would be fair exchange for the use of any commodity : anywhere, anyplace, anytime. How is it possible to even imply that someone would be forcibly inclined to pay a tax for something he would not use? I don’t believe that the idea has ever been introduced. However, in that case, in the world of supply and demand, you would be complaining about the price of eggs. You have been forced to buy those eggs you wanted for a price that you weren’t allowed to determine. Nothing’s stopping you from raising chickens yourself though. The same applies to the arts. Nothing stops you from recording a song or making your own film.
February 16th, 2010 at 8:56 pm
@jon , perhaps. But, I’m thinking like with a printer who would do ‘on demand’ jobs for you for a wee while so you don’t have the bulk costs up front.
February 16th, 2010 at 8:59 pm
oooooh. or Jon, you could do some awesome screen prints… hang on, I’ll need to find the link again. I saw this six months ago and I did it myself with the kiddies. argh. Your daughter would really love this. will find it within 24 hours for sure! It’s like a DIY for screen prints that’s really cool.
February 16th, 2010 at 9:29 pm
@ Indy: “I’m thinking like with a printer who would do ‘on demand’ jobs ”
Already in hand – http://www.p2pnet.net/story/25803
Cheers!
February 17th, 2010 at 4:22 am
Indiana [26], a decision needs to be made otherwise a2f2a won’t obtain any traction.
We’ve had the debate (whether copyright protects publishers or artists, and whether in failing, a tax is needed).
a2f2a now decides which of those three paths it’ll take (copyright, tax, free market).
Those who would join it along that path will flock to it, those who would travel down ether of the others will depart.
February 17th, 2010 at 7:17 am
Crosbie,
I know why you want to talk about anything else but what has happened to Jon, because it undermines your whole argument, but I have to ask you again:
Do you understand now why artists sign to record labels even though they know they’re going to be screwed? Because they don’t want to end up in the situation that Jon finds himself in – having to choose between supporting his family or carrying on with p2p.net.
Do you recognise that?
February 17th, 2010 at 8:50 am
Billy, I’ve already explained in earlier comments.
You want to avoid the difficult decision you obviously have to make, and so as a distraction and displacement activity would have me repeat myself.
So here we go again…
As I said:
Why don’t you read that 10 year old article in my comment #8 above? DONATION FACILITIES are NOT business models. “Give it away and pray” is not a business model. You don’t have to tell me “See. It doesn’t work. Told you! Nyah!”. Moreover, it’s actually insulting to Jon to portray p2pnet as operating on a ‘give it away and pray’ basis of funding, let alone that Jon thinks that’s a business model (viable or not).
For you to point out that donations don’t constitute a business model is to AGREE WITH ME.
Similarly, for you to point out that getting 1% of a publisher’s revenue through sale of copyright protected copies isn’t much better, is also something I agree with.
However, you pointing out the obvious fact that charity is neither a business nor viable (except for particularly good causes), doesn’t constitute an amazingly elegant proof that taxation is the better answer to all artists’ prayers.
A viable BUSINESS MODEL is the solution to having a viable business, not a tax. A tax is defeat and surrender.
Artists and fans agreeing to exchange the art the fans want for the money the artist wants is a business model.
Giving art away is PROMOTION.
Giving money away is CHARITY.
Being FORCED to give money away, so that a collection society can dish it out to artists in proportion to how much art they give away is TAXATION.
Exchanging money for art (without compulsion) is BUSINESS.
Derogating the people’s cultural liberty to grant the monopoly of copyright is an INJUSTICE.
Now what argument of mine was it you felt had been undermined?
Do you really think I’ve been arguing that artists can survive as charitable causes?
After all the debate on a2f2a, are you still unclear as to the differences between monopoly and a free market, promotion, charity, business, and taxation?
February 17th, 2010 at 10:52 am
So let me get this right, Crosbie: you don’t think that you have anything to learn from what happened to Jon?
February 17th, 2010 at 11:21 am
Hi everyone.
I’d just like to introduce myself first. My name is Jacqui and I am singer bass player in London based Independent artists Devilish Presley. We have only ever been (or wanted to be) on one label, our own. We have released 4 albums, gigged across the UK & Europe and supported The Damned on a major UK tour.
I admit I have been lurking here for a while and I have to say to Jon that this is an excellent idea and site. I will also contribute to your subscription service or via paypal because I have found great value here.
To us it seems clear that there is now only one choice, we need to see the end of record labels and that old system asap – we have decided that from 2010 on we will be using the CwF+RtB formula and see how that goes. So far our fans have been quite amazing in their support and all of them are sick to death of being branded “thieves” by the powers that be.
It is quite plain why musicians still cling to the “old model” and that is because every independent act can only ever get so far without falling foul of the illegal control of the “means of promotion” that the Big4 have. For years they have stamped out competition and this is why they hate the internet and all that goes with it. That is what forces artists to still sign up and get shafted, the fact that growth is forbidden! “Not coming through the right channels old boy”.
Of course a lot of musicians are also very lazy and want to “concentrate on my music man” which is just so much BS (and this isn’t aimed at anyone here btw).
We are living through THE most exciting time for music ever, forget the sixties forget punk, today and tommorow are a far better place to be. Well, they will be if the corporate types and their deluded mouthpieces like Lily Allen don’t get their way and clamp down on the internet like they did TV/Press & Radio.
We have great respect for Billy Bragg as an artist, but we just can’t agree with him on this issue. Jon may not yet have found a way to “keep on truckin’” but finding that solution is what every creative person needs to be doing, not clinging on to an outdated, corrupt and frankly soon to be deceased system.
Jacqui.
http://www.devilishpresley.com
February 17th, 2010 at 11:59 am
Billy, everyone cannot help but learn from everything they are aware of.
Unfortunately, it’s still possible for you to ignore my words (#32) and thus choose to remain unaware of how I have fully addressed your question (in #31). You cannot learn through such ignorance, nor add weight to your arguments.
Given the choice of a begging bowl or signing up to indentured penury with the prospect of a lottery win, most artists will UNSURPRISINGLY opt for the latter.
I agree a begging bowl is not a business model (although street performers can find it helps). I agree that signing to a label is but a momentary flush, except for those rare occasions when a lottery win results.
However, a tax is also neither a business model, nor a lucrative source of funding.
Suggesting that if an artist doesn’t sign with a label it’s either a tax or the gutter they should look to is a great choice to lay before your would be converts. It’s going to be slam dunk “Oh, well, since you put it like that Billy, yes, a tax is obviously the answer. I don’t fancy the gutter.”.
Why are you so scared that artists might consider ‘directly exchanging their labour with the money of their fans’ was a business model worth exploring?
Why do you want to remove that option from the choice artists are presented with, if not to make a tax the only available option?
February 17th, 2010 at 1:30 pm
@ Jacqui:
Thanks a lot. Your encouragement means a lot.
“We are living through THE most exciting time for music ever, forget the sixties forget punk, today and tommorow are a far better place to be.”
Dunno about forget the sixties and punk
But otherwise, I couldn’t agree more. And we’re only at the beginning.
Cheers!
February 17th, 2010 at 2:15 pm
Crosbie, I’m not scared that artists might consider directly exchanging their labour with the money of their fans. I’m just wondering if you have any comment on what happened to Jon when he tried to do just that?
February 17th, 2010 at 2:42 pm
Billy, I suggested Jon tried such an exchange via Kickstarter, but unfortunately that facility is only available to US citizens.
So, Jon hasn’t actually been able to try it.
February 17th, 2010 at 3:47 pm
But he has been able to try CwF+RtB. Who could be more connected with his fans, the p2p community? And he gave them a reason to buy – who else has been such a stalwart champion of their views?
Why did the magic equation fail? Because Kickstarter is only available to US citizens?
February 17th, 2010 at 5:33 pm
Billy, I’m just discussing the business model of exchanging money for art.
You’ll have to talk to Mike Masnick about ‘CwF+RtB’, however as far as I understand it I don’t think Jon has yet tried it, or at least p2pnet is only just beginning to dabble with it. So it’s very early days. Do you expect it to be lucrative after just a couple of weeks?
February 17th, 2010 at 6:28 pm
So you’re not interested in talking about how a creator like Jon can rely on users like yourself to supply his income?
February 17th, 2010 at 6:45 pm
What Jon has done so far is not CwF+RtB at all. What he is talking about doing, but not yet implemented, is more like that model. Offering tangible items like sweatshirts and mug or a sponsorship section are examples of Jon working to provide people with reasons to spend money. He’s only just starting to work out these ideas. Putting your content out there for free and asking for donations is not a reason to buy, and I think it’s pretty clear that is not Jon’s business model nor is it how he plans to proceed.
Additionally, there’s no magic. Developing a CwF+RtB model that works for your particular fanbase takes time, effort, and feedback. That’s why a site like a2f2a could be valuable – forward thinking artists like Jacqui sharing what has worked for them, throwing out new ideas, and getting feedback from other artists and fans.
Masnick has already compiled multiple lists of creators who are successfully leveraging CwF+RtB models, as well as excellent “reasons to buy” for people to be aware of. None of this stuff is new, Billy. It’s the way things have worked for thousands of years before a few powerful folks got the government to give them an unethical monopoly.
February 17th, 2010 at 6:47 pm
Billy, it is only indoctrination by copyright that gives rise to the idea that USERS of someone’s published work should pay for it.
If you’ve ever looked at the free software industry you’ll find that people don’t pay to USE the software, they pay for it to be developed, maintained, fixed, enhanced, supported.
So, no, I’m not interested in finding ways of getting those who USE Jon’s site or READ his articles to pay him, certainly not ways of forcing them to.
I’m interested in enabling those who want to PAY Jon to continue PRODUCING news articles to do so.
Money for work.
Not for using, not for reading, not for copying, but for producing.
The first three constitute work by members of the audience. Production constitutes work by the artist, paid for by the fans who want them to do it.
I have talked at length about this. It should be clear to you by now what I’m interested in talking about.
Why don’t you get back to that little trilemma you don’t like to talk about, of deciding what the heck a2f2a.com is going to be about? Copyright, tax, or a free market.
That is, I suggest, why a2f2a is near death. You have to pick a direction – soon! If you don’t, then those waiting for a2f2a to make its mind up will drift away never to return.
February 17th, 2010 at 7:26 pm
Crosbie, no one was forcing the users of p2p.net to pay up. Jon simply asked those who read his news articles if they would pay him to continue producing work and the answer was no.
I am surprised to hear you say that you are “not interested in finding ways of getting those who USE Jon’s site or READ his articles to pay him”, because he most certainly is.
How do you square that?
February 17th, 2010 at 7:32 pm
@ Jon.
You are welcome mate, yeah it is just the beginning!
@ Billy
I know you are well read, so don’t think for one moment I assume you haven’t seen these quotes before, they are just SO much more relevant now than ever.
“The major advances in civilization are processes that all but wreck the societies in which they occur.”
“It is the business of the future to be dangerous.”
Mcluhan quoting A. N. Whitehead in The Medium Is the Massage.
@ Crosbie
“Do you expect it to be lucrative after just a couple of weeks?”
Exactly, like Jon said this is only the beginning.
February 17th, 2010 at 8:25 pm
Billy, Jon invited donations from his readers. You are trying to suggest that that was a business model that was expected to succeed but that has failed.
How many times do I have to agree with you that charity is not a business model? It wasn’t tried as a business model and so couldn’t fail as one.
However, like a street musician’s hat, donations might just help keep Jon going in the interim.
I’ve covered this in earlier comments if you’d read them.
I’m not interested in donations or charity as a long term source of funding. Like you, I am very skeptical that artists can survive on charity, and I would never recommend any artist plan on doing so. I’m interested in business models, specifically the exchange of money for art (labour, intellectual work, news production, etc).
I’m not surprised Jon is interested in receiving donations from readers.
He might even be interested in a share of an Internet tax – if Canada ever enacted one.
However, you should talk to Jon about his plans to fund p2pnet, and whether he sees his future funding coming from exploiting copyright, taxation, or a free market.
When you do, you can introduce the issue of a2f2a’s future direction, i.e. whether it is to be pro-copyright, pro-tax, or pro-free-market.
February 17th, 2010 at 10:02 pm
@ Billy:
They didn’t say No. No positive negative action (if you see what I mean
) was involved.
At worst, you could say some ignored my plea. And some didn’t.
Cheers!
February 17th, 2010 at 10:37 pm
@Billy:
Try as I may, I can’t figure out where you’re coming from right now, or for that matter where you expected what to go.
Any half-wit can see there’s no comparatives to draw to what’s going on with p2pnet. Your persistence, in trying to get people to “admit”(?) Jon’s situation somehow demonstrates a failure of a free-market business model, is not only incomprehensible, but is a statement in itself, which I’ll get into further on.
Get it through your head, nobody has abandoned Jon or rejected the idea of paying for him to keep going. If you had bothered to look, you’ll see that some contributions were made, as well as some suggestions on how to further the effort. It’s not a king’s ransom, but it helps make a point you’ve completely missed. And, they did this over a rather short period of time.
Jon didn’t start p2pnet with any intention of making it a pay site. That’s where the SPONSORS came in, which were, subsequently, lost along the way, resulting in the present state.
Comparatively, Jon’s “fanbase” is not going to be able to compete with one of a “featured artist”, and people don’t typically come to blogsites looking for things requiring a credit card, anyway. YET, some of those who could afford to give…HAVE, when alerted to the site’s demise!
A (good) musician would undoubtedly have more fans to start with, and that fanbase is usually much more focused toward the “product” of a narrow array of artists, and would already have the expectation of making a possible purchase before even visiting their sites.
An artist has a necessary “uniqueness” that generates a large, devoted following. A blogger, whether intentional or not, generally becomes part of a larger “community” that is collectively striving to dig the public out of the mainstream media misinformation blackhole.
While some bloggers (like Jon) certainly do have “fans” (like me), the blogosphere is more like a “brotherhood”, working toward a shared goal, than an “idol worship”, in which the followers virtually exist to serve the interests of the followed.
I have to give lots of kudos to Jon for refusing to take the “easier” way out, which involves jumping on the malware/data mining bandwagon the vast majority of advertisers are pushing. If only more site owners would reject what the Great Marketing Machine is doing, and demand more honest and user-friendly forms of advertising, the Internet would automatically advance in usefulness.
The same thinking that has so many sites overrun with Flash and user tracking scripts – that perceived need to have “guaranteed income” – is demonstrated by artists who would have everyone on the Internet taxed, or have a fee for every play of every song. And, everytime artists launch that kind of proposal, all it does is give the government control freaks and the corporate world more propaganda to spin another excuse to attempt to “lock down the Internet”. All in the name of “music”.
Let’s just call a spade “a spade”. You didn’t come here to discuss a truly alternate way of doing business. You came in hoping the fans would support some form of “compensatory guarantees”, and you got pissed when the very people you needed behind such proposals summarily shot it down.
Now, it seems the only time we see you post is when you want to vent, or point a curious finger at stuff we’ve already made numerous, consistent, diligent points about, obviously in vain. And, I know it’s not because you don’t understand what’s being said.
A number of artists have come here announcing they have embraced the free market strategy and have not regretted it. Yet, you want us to comment on p2pnet?!
Look, you came in a little while back, campaigning for some kind of useful consensus. An overwhelming majority did say it was time to honour the site’s mission statement, and start discussing how to get rid of the middlemen (as suggested at the top of these pages). There was also a majority who stated they wouldn’t sanction anything that handcuffed the Internet.
That leads us back to Crosbie’s point. There has to be a decision made on what is truly supported, in order to be appearing to move forward. Most of us seem to be agreeing in principle about the need to do something outside the Status Quo, and that anything else will just enable the same people to continue causing problems.
Of course, we don’t really know what YOU agree on, or whether you’ll even be around, or what the FAC is hoping to accomplish, or how or when, or whether that group is even part of your life right now. (They obviously don’t want to be part of ours.)
As my grandmother used to say, “Shit, or get off the damned pot!” (“pot” = “toilet”, for those who’ve never heard the term.)
February 17th, 2010 at 11:24 pm
” Let’s just call a spade “a spade”. You didn’t come here to discuss a truly alternate way of doing business. You came in hoping the fans would support some form of “compensatory guarantees”, and you got pissed when the very people you needed behind such proposals summarily shot it down.”
No one has been able to put it so clearly. Perfect summation of BB’s
participation. The FAC .. FOAD.
February 18th, 2010 at 8:06 am
Sorry if my insistence on drawing some sort of conclusion about the reluctance of the p2p community to support Jon’s continued production annoys you.
Its just that for the past few months, you have been telling artists that they don’t need any of the traditional sources of income – record labels, retail or publishing – and that they could survive simply by relying upon the support of their fans.
Jon tried relying on the support of his fans – the very people who have been proposing this solution – and it didn’t work.
Do any of you have an explanation?
February 18th, 2010 at 9:00 am
@ Billy:
You’re still trying to compare apples with oranges. Please carefully re-read DA’s post.
Cheers!
February 18th, 2010 at 9:58 am
Billy, the only conclusion that can be reached is that you have an interest in pretending ignorance, in rejecting any explanation, in denying any possibility of a free market being viable, simply in order to maintain your prejudice that fans won’t pay artists of their own free will, and that the Internet must be taxed in order to force everyone to support artists (especially the retired ones).
Are you waiting for that right moment, for a verbal coup de grace, when you can terminate your involvement with a2f2a?
Will you then go back to FAC and say “My fellow featured artists, I’ve tried to get a bunch of outspoken file-sharers to lend their vocal support to a UK wide ISP tax if we come out against 3 strikes. Unfortunately, they’re all incorrigible tealeaves. So, forget it. We’ll lobby for a tax and get kick-backs for remaining in support of 3 strikes and anything else ACTA or the Digital Economy Bill comes up with”?
February 18th, 2010 at 10:29 am
@ Billy
“Do any of you have an explanation?”
The guys here have already given you several, just repeating your question until you get the answer you want isn’t going to work.
Can I ask you. Do you really distruste your own fans so much? Or do they have it in for you? I doubt it. I know I am not a “featured artist” (thank goodness sounds nasty) but I would appreciate a reply – this is a forum on the internet not a carefully controlled radio discussion where only the “few” are allowed to participate.
If you don’t answer me then I will take it that you are totally in favour of a UK wide ISP tax because you don’t even want to address musicians who are working to replace an unfair system – and replace it with a future that will give bands like mine a fair crack of the whip.
February 18th, 2010 at 10:54 am
@ Jon.
I know a lot of folks who want to buy T-shirts off of you. Can we have these slogans please: I would gladly help you drum up sales.
“We mean it Maaaandelson”
“Home taping is killing music – good riddance”
Both with a little P2P logo or something.
We’ll take 5 of each XL to start…so who else would buy one or suggest slogans to make a start helping Jon survive?
February 18th, 2010 at 11:11 am
“Are you waiting for that right moment, for a verbal coup de grace, when you can terminate your involvement with a2f2a? ”
That’s exactly what he is doing. He’s been waiting for a ‘gotcha’ moment since he first came in and called us thieves. We’re being used as an excuse, in the same way that lilly Allen was used as an excuse to suddenly rally behind three strikes, after pretending to be against it. No wonder a complete list of FAC members is nowhere to be found.
February 18th, 2010 at 11:29 am
@ Jacqui Vixen
You’re hired! Heh.
I’ll get right on it – excellent slogans. Expect something for the weekend. And stay tuned here, and on p2pnet.net
Also, see my email to you …
Cheers! And thanks again …
February 18th, 2010 at 11:53 am
@ Jon.
Cheers mate, glad to be on the team LOL!
I have replied to your email and will send you the “redraft” you requested – probably tommorow – gotta go and rehearse now
‘Cos all this CwF part doesn’t leave much time for music making at times!
February 18th, 2010 at 1:46 pm
Hi all. First and foremost, glad to see some new activity here.
@Jacqui Vixen
Welcome aboard. I’m very glad to see you here! One thing I always felt about a2f2a is there was a derth of artists posting. I always felt there was a diversity of opinions regarding copyright from artists that until now was just not seen here.
@Billy
I have one for you, I’m surprised no one has mentioned it yet, although I think Jon is aware of this factor, as I have heard no complaints at all from him over the amount he has received. I can sum it up in one short sentence. The economy sucks. You think Jon is the only business man who hasn’t raised enough money? I can’t speak for the U.K., but try walking down a street in the U.S. and NOT seeing out of business signs on buildings. My pay, not large to begin with, has been frozen for three years, and I consider myself lucky not to be unemployed. The company I work for just hired someone who was unemployed for eight months. People do what they can, when I thought p2pnet was going to go under and realized how few sites there are covering that venue I started my own. Even though p2pnet stayed active I liked the idea so much I still put my site online. I don’t have any spare money, so I felt it was a way to put my paltry web design skills to use to make a contribution. I’m sure I’m not the only one posting here who is not doing well financially, that doesn’t make us bad people.
February 18th, 2010 at 1:56 pm
@Crosbie
I definitely may have missed something, but from what I recall while Indiana Gregg came out in favour of a net tax, Billy never did. Billy, feel free to correct me if I’m wrong on that.
February 18th, 2010 at 2:45 pm
At Monkey:
First, I’m not a businessman. If I was, I’d starve, bad economy or good. heh.
Second, I’m very touched that anyone has contributed anything at all. Things are really bad and a lot of of people emailed me to say they would if they could, but they can’t.
In the meanwhile, I’m still working on ways to keep going AND keep the pot fiercely bubbling with the message that fans and artists can work together to help each other. We’re part of the same fabric and the net will allow us to mesh seemlessly, to the alarm and horror of the labels.
I really like Crosbie’s idea of musicians having patrons again — people who enjoy their music enough to pay for it. And without needing some venal corporate psychopath standing in the middle with his hand out.
Jacqui quotes my fellow Canadian Marshall Mcluhan quoting A. N. Whitehead in The Medium Is the Massage as saying, “It is the business of the future to be dangerous.”
The medium – the net – is the message and anyone who doesn’t get it is, to use that ancient Celtic word, phuked.
I’m really excited. I really am. The world of music is powering ahead online and off. And I’m part of it.
Couldn’t be better, or cooler.
Cheers!
February 18th, 2010 at 3:08 pm
@Jon,
By using the term businessman, I didn’t mean it as a pejorative, like some corporate dickhead trying to rip people off, but in the absolute broadest sense, someone attempting to earn money at an endeavour, in your case a self employed person. As the term does have too much negativity applied to it I won’t use it again.
February 18th, 2010 at 3:28 pm
@Monkey:
BB stopped posting steadily to this forum early in the game, so it’s easy for some to forget that he came in basically saying that “artists need to be paid…” meant some sort of *guarantees* were in order. (An argument of “entitlement”.)
Depending on the conversation, he was demanding everyone accept either…
1) that whenever the use of content could be interpreted as “financially beneficial” to someone else, a royalty should be due.
2) that we might need some form of “user license” on the use of the Internet (or certain individual sites), in order to escape the criminal stigma of filesharing.
While he was certainly louder with #1, he always pointed fingers at people who are unwilling to entertain #2. In fact, he got his back up equally over both arguments.
Now, he’s back to suggest that p2pnet’s story is an demonstration of the failure in our words, which mostly revolved around the free market concept, which he always referred to as the “begging bowl” or “goodwill jar” anyway.
You be the judge.
February 18th, 2010 at 4:03 pm
@ Money:
“By using the term businessman, I didn’t mean it as a pejorative …”
I know you didn’t. But I wanted to make it clear I’m not a businessman,
Cheers!
February 18th, 2010 at 4:19 pm
@DevilsAdvocate
I agree, I don’t think the fact that Jon didn’t raise enough money in a few weeks time means that any musician going the DIY route is bound to fail. Copyright isn’t always the great friend Billy thinks it is, it’s certainly not helping OK Go when their label yanks their promo video off you tube. If I had to pick the biggest problem out of all of this, it would be the whole third party rights-holder concept.
February 18th, 2010 at 5:21 pm
Jon, I should add for others’ benefit that it’s more micropatrons (fans) than patrons (in the 17th century aristocratic sense). Too many people simply dismiss (micro)patronage out of hand because they have preconceived notions of it involving either winning the favour of some bureaucratic arts council or via pitching to wealthy ex-bankers.
Micropatronage is the reclamation of an old word to distinguish between ‘funding artists through the retail of copyright protected copies’ and ‘funding artists through the sponsorship of their fans’. It’s ‘micro’ because there are thousands more patrons and they only need to be a thousandth as wealthy.
Monkey, yes, Billy has it within his power to say “Of course I realise that the future for artists is doing business directly with their fans in a free market! I just had to play devil’s advocate in order to provoke good arguments as to why an Internet tax is such a bad idea”. It is possible Billy doesn’t really favour an ISP tax. Until he decides, a2f2a is going to remain in a deathly limbo.
February 18th, 2010 at 6:38 pm
@ Crosbie:
I understand why you make the distinction, and for your purposes it may be necessary. For mine, it isn’t. A patron is someone who “supports with money, gifts, efforts, or endorsement an artist, writer, museum, cause, charity, institution … ” in any amount, large or small.
And “Until he decides, a2f2a is going to remain in a deathly limbo.”
Actually, No. Billy is a part of this, not all of it. It was in limbo. Now it isn’t.
Cheers!
February 18th, 2010 at 7:23 pm
Jon, you did say “Crosbie’s idea of musicians having patrons”, so I felt able to clarify my idea.
As for what term becomes most popular to describe fans paying musicians to produce music, we can also add ‘crowdfunding’ to the list, and no doubt other terms.
I’m glad to hear that a2f2a isn’t in limbo any more.
February 18th, 2010 at 7:32 pm
@Crosbie
“Let’s just call a spade “a spade”. You didn’t come here to discuss a truly alternate way of doing business. You came in hoping the fans would support some form of “compensatory guarantees”, and you got pissed when the very people you needed behind such proposals summarily shot it down.”
What’s the point of engaging Billy in debate then? There is none as far as I can tell. There’s some irony in Billy’s involvement in Mermaid Avenue. Woody Guthrie on copyright: “This song is Copyrighted in U.S., under Seal of Copyright # 154085, for a period of 28 years, and anybody caught singin’ it without our permission, will be mighty good friends of ourn, cause we don’t give a dern. Publish it. Write it. Sing it. Swing to it. Yodel it. We wrote it, that’s all we wanted to do.”
February 18th, 2010 at 7:48 pm
@ Monkey
“My pay, not large to begin with, has been frozen for three years, and I consider myself lucky not to be unemployed.” Exactly my circumstances. 76 people where I work are not so “lucky” – they have been laid off for over a year. My ability to continue to donate to p2pnet is as “guaranteed” as my next paycheck. That being said, I’ll send support to Jon for as long as I can.
February 18th, 2010 at 10:34 pm
@ Crosbnie:
No digs were intended, Crosbie.
Cheers!
February 19th, 2010 at 5:04 am
bill, you appear to have attributed DevilsAdvocate’s words to me.
However, I’ll respond anyway.
a2f2a is a joint venture between Jon and Billy.
I think there could be a future for a site that reviewed/explored/demonstrated/discussed all the practical and feasible ways in which artists and fans could form a more direct and lucrative arrangement than going via labels or any other intermediary that enjoys a large (~99%) cut of the action.
However, it seems that Billy’s not going to play ball and participate unless everyone first agrees that artists should get a cut of any money made in the distribution or use of their work, e.g. by users of the web who pay ISPs a lot of money for all the music that they listen to, download, and share.
So there’s a schism between:
1) artists and fans doing business directly
2) artists and fans not doing business because it’s all taken care of via an ISP tax and a collection society handling disbursal.
There was a recent suggestion of accepting Bennett Lincoff’s proposal (an Internet tax) as a basis for a2f2a – in which case the site is transformed into a nexus for those who would lobby for such a thing, blowing out of the water any point in those interested in ‘direct business’ sticking around.
So, the ebb and flow of debate either way has come to an equilibrium where a2f2a reached a standstill, limbo, an impasse.
I’d like a2f2a to escape that impasse. That’s why I’m still responding to Billy’s comments, still trying to point out to him that a decision needs to be made concerning which horse a2f2a is going to back: copyright, tax, or a free market.
However, as Jon says a2f2a isn’t in limbo any more, I infer that some change has occurred, a decision has been reached, and there is a state of agreement or détente that can be announced such that everyone knows where a2f2a stands, even if ‘undecided on the issue of an ISP tax, for the foreseeable future’.
February 19th, 2010 at 7:41 am
When I said a2f2a was no longer in limbo, I meant a2f2a was no longer in the doldrums.
I have an idea I hope might help to get things moving a little more quickly. I’ll try and do a post later today, or tomorrow.
(UPDATE: Soon, I should have said. Still thinking about it.
)
Cheers!
February 20th, 2010 at 6:16 pm
For an artist with a “donate” button and a reason to buy, check out this:
http://www.amandarheaume.com/blog/loons/index.php
Loones for Tunes, Amanda Rheaume is trying to tour across Canada and while planning she realized the expense is immense (done it, it’s not cheap to travel across this country, even when you camp most of it).
So Amanda is appealing to fans and potential new fans, the reason to buy is she wants to tour to your city or a major city near you. If you donate, you can see her. But she’s not asking for “pay what you can” she’s just asking for gas help.
“If everyone I knew tossed me ONE loonie I could probably get pretty far in gas!”
This engagement with fans brings her tour closer to a reality.
The main point, with her “just a loonie” approach, she makes it easy for people to contribute and feel like they are a part of the tour, making it happen as a community. She’s expanding her fan base this way as existing fans will undoubtedly encourage others to donate, after all it’s only a dollar. Those potential donators are gaining exposure to Amanda’s music, this expanding her fanbase further, all the while helping herself out financially.
February 21st, 2010 at 1:21 pm
@ Billy:
Those p2pnet people who aren’t prepared to pay for p2pnet reads have, since the start of the month, nonetheless put their hands in their pockets to the tune of $918.28 – http://www.p2pnet.net/story/36051
Cheers!
February 21st, 2010 at 3:51 pm
Summary:
Billy Bragg #1: “The sight of your own community failing to come to the aid of one of its greatest champions has so severely undermined the libertarian argument that I doubt there is much left to be said.”
Billy Bragg #4: “Did you not see what just happened here? Jon tried out your business model, asking the p2p community for support, and it didn’t work.”
Billy Bragg #12: “So here’s the question – why were the users of p2pnet, who greatly value Jon’s work, unwilling to become his customers?”
Billy Bragg #16: “The users of p2p.net clearly want the intellectual work that Jon produces, yet none of them were willing to exchange money in order to continue to receive it.”
Billy Bragg #18: “Your experience in the past month has been a stark illustration of the fact that it is very difficult for an individual creator to survive on the support of fans alone.”
Billy Bragg #31: “Because they don’t want to end up in the situation that Jon finds himself in – having to choose between supporting his family or carrying on with p2p.net.”
Billy Bragg #33: “So let me get this right, Crosbie: you don’t think that you have anything to learn from what happened to Jon?”
Billy Bragg #37: “Crosbie, I’m not scared that artists might consider directly exchanging their labour with the money of their fans. I’m just wondering if you have any comment on what happened to Jon when he tried to do just that?”
Billy Bragg #39: “Why did the magic equation fail?”
Billy Bragg #41: “So you’re not interested in talking about how a creator like Jon can rely on users like yourself to supply his income?”
Billy Bragg #44: “Jon simply asked those who read his news articles if they would pay him to continue producing work and the answer was no.”
Billy Bragg #50: “Jon tried relying on the support of his fans – the very people who have been proposing this solution – and it didn’t work.”
Jon Newton #74: “Those p2pnet people who aren’t prepared to pay for p2pnet reads have, since the start of the month, nonetheless put their hands in their pockets to the tune of $918.28″
Conclusion: Did you ever get the feeling Billy Bragg wanted Jon to fail? Despite Jon’s repeated corrections to the contrary, does Billy go back to FAC with the message that the p2p community will not support artists and use Jon’s “failure” as proof?
February 22nd, 2010 at 10:42 am
” Conclusion: Did you ever get the feeling Billy Bragg wanted Jon to fail? Despite Jon’s repeated corrections to the contrary, does Billy go back to FAC with the message that the p2p community will not support artists and use Jon’s “failure” as proof? ”
Absolutely.
One artist showed up with a success story.
I personally pointed out an author who self publishes and whose
ONLY advertisement is his website, his direct link to his fans, and
the fact that he is very happy with the results.
Other well known successes have been denigrated or ignored.
We’ve been “used” to promote a “Levy or else ” stance by the FAC with any opposition to this position being used to ‘prove’ that the P2P community are incorrigible thieves. If ANYONE can find a link to a full membership list of the FAC, I think we’d all love to see it.
February 22nd, 2010 at 11:37 am
This should be interesting if anyone has 10 quid to spare and is in the area:
ARTISTS RIGHTS AND DIGITAL FUTURES IN THE MUSIC INDUSTRY This regional event is for musicians, music businesses and music students. Come and find out about the work of the Featured Artists Coalition and discuss how the digital revolution impacts on the future of the music industry and your own career.
Speakers include: BILLY BRAGG and ED O’BRIEN (Radiohead), Clive Gardiner WE7 – http://www.we7.com
Other Artists and Music Industry specialists to be announced
When: Friday 26 March 2010 from 9.30am to 5.30pm
Where: Dartington Campus, Dartington Hall Estate, Totnes, Devon
Cost: £10 (to cover lunch and refreshments)
Cheers!
February 22nd, 2010 at 1:52 pm
“Come and find out about the work of the Featured Artists Coalition and discuss how the digital revolution impacts on the future of the music industry and your own career.”
In other words, the FAC is beginning whatever campaign they had intended to launch, directed at the usual local paying crowds. It will be interesting to see if they present their views as being representative of and supported by their fans.
One thing about such presentations is they’re always missing the presence of the online world, and this “absence” is always insanely pointed out as some negative “statement”. (As if they could have actually been there!)
February 22nd, 2010 at 2:00 pm
@Dreddsnik
Oh, I’ll LOUDLY second that one, and I know it’s a pipe dream, but I’d really love to see which artists on that list voted in favour of three strikes.
February 22nd, 2010 at 2:19 pm
@ Dredd and Monkey:
There’s a partial list in this post: http://www.p2pnet.net/story/33132
Cheers!
February 22nd, 2010 at 5:01 pm
You guys are crazy – demanding a list so you can hunt down all those who voted for three strikes.
What do you want me to do? Name names? ‘Are you now or were you ever a member of the FAC?’
Jon, I really thought we might be able to find some common ground between our two communities but this is turning into a witch-hunt.
February 22nd, 2010 at 5:09 pm
@ Billy:
Why do you always have to spin things so darkly? No one is demanding anything. And you’re the only one talking about witch hunts.
Personally, I’d like to poll FAC members to see exactly how many of them support the FAC’s three-strikes statement, and how many of them didn’t, and don’t.
That’s a what hunt, not a witch hunt. And isn’t that something you’d like to know?
Come to think of it, no one’s in a better position than you to make it happen.
By way of a PS, before I saw your comment here, I’d just posted on p2pnet – “For what it’s worth, I believe Billy Bragg really was hoping some kind of useable solution would come out of a2f2a.com.” This was in response to Robert’s question to Dredd, “You think FAC tried to play us on a2f2a?”
http://www.p2pnet.net/story/36178/comment-page-1#comment-999125
Cheers!
February 22nd, 2010 at 8:18 pm
Jon,
I’m the only one talking about witch-hunts because I’m the only one willing to question what is going on here.
Everybody else who didn’t buy into the argument by axiom that passes for debate around here has decided that the game is not worth the candle. That’s why you were asking only a week ago if the site was dead.
My mistake was to respond to your question, hoping for some recognition about how difficult it is just relying on fans.
Instead, all I succeed in doing is waking up the undead, thirsty for blood as they hadn’t fed for two weeks, who, without a moment’s reflection, went for my throat again.
First post – from Zombie Fitch – opening line: “So Billy, if people won’t voluntarily donate their money to charity cases they should be forced to do so via an Internet tax?”
WTF? Where did that come from? What is he talking about? I’ve no idea what this ‘internet tax’ you’re all so afraid of is.
The truth is, Jon, a2f2a is dead. Without artists willing to come and engage, then it’s a zombie site, with the same six people violently agreeing with each other, trying to keep their ardour up until the next unwitting victim walks down this dark alleyway in search of a reasoned debate.
February 22nd, 2010 at 8:34 pm
@Billy
If you researched McCarthyism, , and the original Salem trials, a Witch hunt”, involved accusations, often false, followed by some kind of harm to those accused, irrespective of actual guilt. Asking for a listing of FAC members, along with which ones voted for three strikes is NOT a witch hunt, no one wants to accuse random people as was done in Salem and by McCarthy. As for “harm”, I don’t think anyone here other than you wants to financially support artists who favor getting people net connection cut off, so yes, if I saw such a list I would purchase no tickets, CD’s, T Shirts from any artist who voted for three strikes. That’s the beginning and end of it, I have no wish to harass them. On the other side, I’d like just as much to know who DIDN’T vote for three strikes as they deserve support.
One more thing, you have what appears to be a large organization with a secret membership pushing a hostile (three strikes) agenda, why would people NOT want to know just who is involved with this?
February 22nd, 2010 at 9:26 pm
@Billy,
Yet another reason for wanting a full membership list is it would tell us just what the FAC really is. If you wonder why I express doubt as to what it claims to be, read the Sam I Am — a troll unmasked article published both here and on p2pnet.
From the article:
Sam I Am is a label shill, just what the fuck is he doing as an “Attendee and participant in the core focus group leading to the formation of the Featured Artists Coalition”? It made me, and I’m sure others wonder just who else with label connections is involved with the FAC? Because we told you straight up, right from the beginning, that while we were willing to work with artists we were NOT willing to work with the RIAA or any of their labels. That also includes any subsidiary front groups. Maybe Gregory A. Roach aka “Sam I Am”’s participation is just a fluke, perhaps no one else like him was involved in the creation of or is currently in the FAC. But without full disclosure of the FAC membership, how are we to know? I conclude by stating that the whole member secrecy issue surrounding the FAC reminds me not of a witch hunt but of ACTA, which is appropriate seeing that FAC seems to support the same agenda.
February 22nd, 2010 at 11:11 pm
” The truth is, Jon, a2f2a is dead. Without artists willing to come and engage,”
That’s odd, There are ( I think ) 2 new artist arrivals in this thread, some more in other threads. The only unwilling artists seem to be the ones that belong to the FAC. Are you suggesting that A2F2A is dead because the ‘important’ ‘Featured’ artists aren’t coming ? I notice that once again, you are the only one doing the name calling btw.
Something is just about dead though, and that’s the credibility of the FAC.
February 23rd, 2010 at 12:24 am
Nice!
Who uttered the bizarre statement that sparked this supposed “rebirth of the undead” you speak of?… YOU DID. And, who dangled that brain that led the “zombies” here in the first place?… YOU DID…
Who came through p2pnet professing to be in this ideal position to help getting artists and fans talking?… YOU DID.
Who is was the one promoting himself as a revolutionary, and claimed to be the voice of a large collection of featured artists?… YOU WERE.
Who is Jon’s co-founder of this site?… YOU ARE.
Who was the first one to go into “hide and fling shit mode” when people disagreed?… YOU WERE.
Who continues to make the least effort to understand is being said, while still making the most bizarre statements?… YOU.
Okay, we’re now zombies (whatever!). You didn’t give us the brains you said you had for us. You wouldn’t even let us see them. Because there aren’t any, are there?!
You came into this thinking you could do all the speaking for a totally invisible group, who, at best, were only placating you because of the possibility you might eventually be able to “prime” your fans to agree with [whatever agenda they actually have].
How bloody long did you think this would go on before the group started demanding to hear from the rest of the artists you said were available to you through the Coalition, particularly when you were somewhat absent from the forum yourself??
If I were to ask others like David Gilmour, Howard Jones or Annie Lennox what they thought about any of what’s been posted on these pages, I have to wonder what the answer would be. Would they even be aware of any of it, let alone have any opinions they would have us hear?
Similarly, I wonder how any of them feel, on an individual basis, toward things like 3 Strikes, ACTA, or their own experiences with the Labels.
But alas, we’ll never know, by the looks of it. Their LEADER doesn’t appear to have injected any interest in extending their voices our way. If he has, I find it very odd that NOT ONE voice from the FAC was heard.
And I, for one, have a hard time believing artists like David Gilmour and Annie Lennox would be that narrow, or so unwilling to engage their fans. Something’s not right here.
Who had the privilege of direct contact with such artists, yet didn’t feel enough positive incentive toward this project to try to turn this around?… ( ? )
Who puts on the tinfoil hat of conspiracy at the mere suggestion that we contact FAC artists ourselves?… ( ? )
Who must have had a different mission than the one posted here… ( ? )
I have to ask, how is it that someone who can launch such a noteworthy one-man protest against the RBS (Big Money) have such a problem understanding the similar mechanics behind the problems with Big Music?? (My guess is, there is simply an incentive to not understand the latter.)
February 23rd, 2010 at 4:14 am
Billy, I was assuming you’d remember that we’ve already discussed that a compulsory license fee paid by ISPs is effectively an Internet tax.
I’m reminded of the current dissembling by the government where it is promised that people will not be disconnected from the Internet for infringing copyright. Instead their ISP accounts will be temporarily suspended, i.e. the modem can establish the connection, but the bandwidth is zero.
Of course Billy, you’re not proposing a TAX either…
Anyway, as you plainly exhibit the signs of someone who has given up reasoned debate do you really think such antagonistic withdrawal does you any favours?
You can still join the cause of helping artists and fans to do business and step back into the limelight. Or you can remain with the better funded recording industry and retire into the twilight.
Red pill, blue pill?
February 23rd, 2010 at 10:29 am
i just have one thing to say to BillyB, you keep talking about jon’s community failing him, and how the same thing is going to happen to artists if they embrace that idea. If you really wanted to effect change, your music would be up there beside mine as a donation to Jon, and your name would be in a donor list somewhere, if i am wrong and you have helped Jon out, then i apologize, but if not, then i guess you really don’t support the grass roots and counter culture as much as you want the rest of the world to believe. The days of being able to get by with saying you are in the loop and against all sorts of things has gone.
February 23rd, 2010 at 10:55 am
If I may, i’d like to make a request, suggestion, whatever one might call it
Clark, Jaqui, Devious, and all of the other artists ( funny, there
are so many of you that showed up recently I have to apologize for
not remembering all of your names, though you apparently don’t exist )
since YOU are what this site is really about, please tell as many of
your peers about A2f2a, and get them to come here or e-mail Jon their
stories of success or failure so each of you can be FEATURED in an
article here. Show everyone, especially the FAC and the labels that
you absolutely DO exist, and what you like/dislike about the possbilities
the internet has offered you. Sell yourself here. Send your fans here.
FORCE your existence to be known, and encourage you peers and fans to
FIGHT for your right to run your bands, business, and lives the way
YOU want to on the ‘net, without restrictions or barriers.
This place is for YOU and YOUR fans.
February 23rd, 2010 at 10:56 am
@ Dreddsnik
**” The truth is, Jon, a2f2a is dead. Without artists willing to come and engage,”**
“That’s odd, There are ( I think ) 2 new artist arrivals in this thread, some more in other threads. The only unwilling artists seem to be the ones that belong to the FAC. Are you suggesting that A2F2A is dead because the ‘important’ ‘Featured’ artists aren’t coming ?”
Totally 100% on the target.
He is so much a part of the label system with its AAA backstage pass “keep the plebs out” mentality, or should that be keep the zombies out – at least his imagery has improved if nothing else – that he refuse to even acknowledge any lesser bands.
Here is one guy who saw the error of his ways:
http://www.akirathedon.com/2009/09/f-the-fac/
Quote:
“So, there you have it. With that pretentiously titled “Air Statement” The FAC have announced that they are taking the Metallica route. They have revealed themselves to be greedy, backward, vindictive crybabies” End Quote:
The photo is pretty scary coming from someone who has used the phrase “witch hunt” – it looks like some kind of 1930’s rally, or better still maybe if they were all brandishing flaming torches, they might have come to destroy Frankenstein & his monster.
Sorry Billy “this is one monster you can’t stop”……
February 23rd, 2010 at 11:08 am
@ Dredd:
“please tell as many of your peers about A2f2a, and get them to come here or e-mail Jon their stories of success or failure so each of you can be FEATURED in an article here.”
Excellent idea. Please contact me via p2p@shaw.ca
Cheers! And thanks …
February 23rd, 2010 at 11:12 am
@ Jackqui:
http://www.akirathedon.com/2009/09/f-the-fac/
Good one. I’ll do a post in that tomorrow (have to pack it in early today).
Cheers!
February 23rd, 2010 at 12:12 pm
@ Dreddsnik 90:
Ok mate sounds like a plan, will see what we can do.
February 24th, 2010 at 1:24 pm
I have been a little occupied lately with one thing or another, trying to find alternate sources of income, homeschooling, and even some gardening, but Jon, obviously, has mentioned the burgeoning debate about how his experiences over the last month and a half with p2pnet are somehow supposed to illustrate the need for copyright of artists’ works. However, equating Jon’s problems with those of a struggling musician is not a straightforward thing because the world of commercial music and that of the written word are, in some ways, fundamentally different.
Ultimately, I think all of us in the Western world view the written word as ‘free’, not financially, but politicallly.
Some of us are old enough to remember buying a daily newspaper but we also always knew we could get almost anything in the local public library for free. And, because with the ‘written word’ the important thing is the message, at any point in the history of printing, somebody could produce a cheap little pamphlet – if the information in it was interesting, the quality of the paper or the ink was hardly important.
In the world of music, the quality of the medium is as important as the quality of the message, so from the start, the early 1900’s, when technological advances allowed for the recording and reproduction of music to become viable on a large scale, the industry that grew around those activities has been dominated by specialists and the cost of entry has allowed monopolies to form.
Unfortunately, nobody thought to charge the public libraries with the task of acquiring music recordings on a large scale from the start. What a missed opportunity for building a public domain for music!
To get back to Jon’s situation, in print (including the Internet), small and large publishers have been able to make a living by catering to given markets. Jon was able to make a living at doing only p2pnet while there were businesses out there who benefitted from advertising on, or otherwise financially supporting, the site. The current financial crisis has changed that picture and Jon is now getting income from readers who value p2pnet enough to pay for the content. It is missing the point entirely to focus on the fact that those revenues are not sufficient to pay Jon’s rent. And let’s acknowledge those people who are demonstrating, to the tune of $918, that patronage does work.
Meanwhile, as an outsider, the thing I wonder about when I think of the current debacle in the world of music is: to what degree do musicians really need all of the specialists whose fees inevitably raise the cost of producing a recording?
Jon is an amateur musician and with not a great deal of financial investment involved, he has acquired the ability to record his compositions at home. So why aren’t more musicians embracing the technical advances which now give them the ability to be their own recording studios? Also, as most musicians are aware, nothing in the past has equaled the opportunities afforded by the Internet for publicizing oneself. You’d think that in a way the world is their oyster.
From an economic point of view, the current music industry is a rigged marketplace; it’s an anachronism of the past. And if you dig even a little into the issue of recording rights, you will come across a musician or ten who feel like they have been chewed up and spit out by a soulless machine. Let’s try a different business model.
Finally, on the analogy of Jon’s situation to that of musicians, Jon has decided to keep doing p2pnet, despite the fact it is not covering the rent, because he really believes in what he is doing.
We are both trying to make money in other ways to make up for the shortfall. If a musician really loves doing their music, in a brave new world where there is no RIAA, they may have to make the same kind of choices Jon is making.
You decide what you want from life and you do your best to make it happen.
Liz Newton