Finally, Some Sense
Totally off-topic for SML, but I had to get this off my chest.
The whole “music must be free, since I can download it for free” nonsense has, by tradition, been little more than a shouting match between folks who will never listen to anyone but themselves, and the occasional person willing to debate with them (at least until they determine their opponent has no ears).
However I read a blog post today that made some really good points.
Instead of the usual “blah blah because I say it has to be this way blah blah”, Hank nicely lays out several points that are somewhat difficult to argue with. Of course I had to comment, but I feel too strongly about this topic to successfully keep myself under control. As someone who spent years making music and doing whatever possible to make a living at it, I do have strong feelings - and am only concerned about the musicians who make the music and the fans who listen. Everyone else can bugger off.
There’s a ton of bile that’s resulted from the music industry’s horrendous treatment of both the artist and consumer. I don’t think anyone would argue with that, either. However, the belief that music must exist under a free distribution model does more than get rid of the offending industry - it also removes the primary incentive for the musician to get started in the first place.
- Not every musician is 18 and dreams of living out of a tour bus 10 months out of 12.
- Not every musician is an aspiring t-shirt artist who dreams of making money on branded clothing.
NOTE: That download that was free for you? Well it most likely had an initial cost of thousands of dollars to produce. And that doesn’t include the actual time spent writing, practicing the music or time spent learning the instrument(s) the song was recorded with. Please, PLEASE stop the inane BS argument about the cost of copying being free somehow negating the fact that it still cost somebody thousands of dollars to produce.
Also, attempting to compare music and software is nonsense. Apples and bicycles, folks. That is cray-zee.
Speaking of software, the majority (if not all) open source projects are pretty much practicing the model that the crackheads are advocating for the music industry. Guess what? Nobody is making any money, or at least enough to talk about. There are an endless number of rants out there from open source developers who couldn’t believe how happy folks were to just take that software for free, and never return any sort of gratification to the folks that produced the software.
For example, one guy who is a huge fan of the crackpipe music distribution model runs his blog on WordPress. He’s making a ton of money on advertising, as well as using the popularity of his blog to generate other sources of revenue as well. I wonder if he’s ever, EVER donated anything back to Matt and the gang, who produced the software that made his blog possible?
My personal experience on several open source projects is not to expect much. Actually, don’t expect anything at all. Not only are you going to spend freaky hours writing software for free, you’re going to have to pool money together for hosting and spend even more time running around looking for donations to make it possible for your project to exist at all.
Pretty bleak, like becoming the Jerry Lewis of Cyberspace.
And there are open source projects that generate some source of revenue by selling ads on their forums or getting donations from a handful of appreciative consumers, but ultimately those generous souls represent less than 0.000001% of the people that use that software. The others happily continue to use the software, and quite a few loudly complain when the software doesn’t do exactly what they wanted. They almost never think to offer to help, or chip in to make it possible for someone to help them get what they want.
But I digress.
Something tells me that the same model for music would be a devastating blow to an art form that already suffers from the creators being in a very difficult place for survival.
A true musician, at least in my book, is one whose primary focus is their art - making music. Not performing, not branded toilet paper, not constant gigging. Making music. And for a huge number of them, that is the only thing that truly matters to them.
Saying music must be free removes the artists from the art. Or it will have that effect, eventually.
Tags: crackpipe logic, teh stoopid
September 19th, 2008 at 02:57
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September 29th, 2008 at 11:51
The music is copyrighted by the artist. Therefore, this is the artist’s title. Unless he indicates the music is free, it most certainly should not be free. You need to take note what can be copyrighted, and what cannot. A melody can be copyrighted, but scales, chords, harmony cannot. Therefore, if a piece is improvised, and sounds VERY generic (ie. basic chord progressions, as a study), you cannot copyright that piece. However if it has a distinctive melody, etc, it CAN be copyrighted.
Being semi-serious here only, I find that most of today’s music sounds very generic, so this type of music should all be free
Quite frankly, I find it a rip off to charge $20 for a CD for generic type music and performance. This is why people resort to the internet to download the music for free. Clearly, music of the past is more of an art, than it is today.
September 29th, 2008 at 13:31
I completely agree with you on the sentiment that most music nowadays is garbage. Even popular musicians and performers openly deride the major labels for churning out music with no nutritional value.
Oh the flipside however, whether you like music or not should have no effect at all on the distribution terms of that work. There are plenty of bands out there that I think completely suck - but that does not grant me some sort of personal license where I can download that music for free.
That’s part of the bonehead reasoning that I am deriding in this post. Everyone complains of lousy music, but they also refuse to pay for it even if they listen to it. Ensuring that musicians starve no matter what will only make that situation worse. Right?
November 11th, 2008 at 17:27
“Saying music must be free removes the artists from the art. Or it will have that effect, eventually.”
Maybe you are considering the wrong model? If what you’re concerned with is the up-front cost of composing and recording music, why are you trying to cover those costs through distribution fees? Especially when distribution has more value to you, as an artist, then it does to your audience?
If you could figure out a way to get paid specifically for the creative process, you could give away the results without harm. If anything, lowering the barriers to distribution should make it even easier for you to obtain funding for future creative endeavors: larger audience, profounder impact, etc.
Just because patronage and government funding for the arts are out of style, it doesn’t mean they are bad ideas. If, as an artist, you don’t like performing or teaching, then you should probably be cultivating sources of funding, or hooking up with someone who is. That way if the whole cheap download thing works itself out, you get a big bonus; but if not, you don’t have to quit or starve.
November 11th, 2008 at 17:41
Note to self: Migrate this post to mitchitized, it has nothing to do with Spacemonkey Labs *blush*
All good comments Chris. Here’s a scenario to consider then.
Say you are an artist, and you make music because you love to create. Performing on stage is either undesirable (you don’t want to) or unworkable (maybe the style doesn’t translate to the stage well). You are only interested in making music, because you are a musician and a composer.
Where do you fit in all this?
Ok, so a kid with a drum machine who is more interested in hopping around in front of a crowd will hugely benefit from this model - absolutely agreed. And nobody really cares about the drum machine, because they are really there to see the kid strut his stuff - he’s a PERFORMER and that is what they are paying to see. But what about someone who only cares about the music?
As a songwriter and composer, you have no incentive, no opportunity to monetize the music that you create. This model only rewards performers (not musicians or composers). Ok, there’s the branded toiletpaper too. *giggle*
November 11th, 2008 at 19:04
“As a songwriter and composer, you have no incentive, no opportunity to monetize the music that you create. This model only rewards performers (not musicians or composers).”
Which model? Selling tracks or playing gigs? Selling tracks is a long-shot proposition at best. That leaves gigs, merchandising, teaching, and patronage. If you can’t/won’t play gigs or sell TP, you can teach or you can hustle up some grants and commissions. My focus would be on the grants and commissions, because they pay you to actually produce music. My “real” composer friends have been doing it for years, but it’s totally under-tapped in popular music. It shouldn’t be.
A good parallel may be all the small farmers who make a living outside the system through community-supported agriculture. Rather than monetize the product, they monetize the *production* of the product.
Ping me when/if you post this to your personal blog. It’s fascinating stuff.
November 11th, 2008 at 19:14
Dang, now I really have to move this over.
I’ll move your comments as well, so they don’t get lost. I also feel like this is a fascinating topic.