There’s also another side to the file-sharing argument, which is that the record companies have been engaging in unethical behaviour for a long time. Look at what they are trying to do to fair use of copywritten material. They are using lobbying pressure to get laws passed that favor them against the consumer (for example, extending copyrights repeatedly so that music and other forms of intellectual property never fall into the public domain). They’ve even engaged in outright underhanded behaviour, such as having a bill illegally amended aftter it was signed into law, taking performance rights away from artists (the copy editor who made that ‘mistake’ was subsequently hired as a main lobbyist by the music industry - at a huge salary).
So it’s not exactly a free-market, even playing field. The entertainment industry is using the hammer of government to gain more and more control over the culture. The entertainment industry gives more money to politicians than any other special interest group in the U.S. They dictate our technology choices, they strip away fair use rights, and in general meddle far too much in the evolution of our culture.
And not only that, they’re usually wrong. I remember the huge fight over video recorders. The entertainment industry said they’d be destroyed by them. Then when video rental started arriving, the first rental outfits were beseiged with lawsuits from the movie industry. Cassette tape was fought by the RIAA. Thank God they lost those fights, because we’re better off for having video rentals and video tape. And not only that, but the entertainment industry has found a way to make even more profit from those developments, once their legal dinosaurs got out of the way and gave up the fight.
Wow, Sam Stone, I agree with you. Brrr…it’s cold in here.
The entertainment industry and it’s massive lobbying power has completely perverted the original intent and purpose of copyright, which is spelled out quite clearly in the constitution. While we may disagree about the details, it is pretty clear the perpetual copyright does not help the arts (the purpose of copyright) but hinders it. The recent and massive changes to copyright have served only to conecentrate cultural power and stall change.
This is why I believe in filesharing. I don’t presume to think that it’s legal. I don’t presume to think that it is in all ways ethical. But the people creating this technology are doing one of the most important functions to freedom and art in the world- spreading information. In an age where informational power is increasingly restricted and concentrated, and where a few companies seem to have limitless power over congress, it’s these technologies that will continue to keep culture alive.
And it impossible to stop them. Progress will always triumph over old broken business plans, even if it has to go underground to do so.
An example is abondonware- old software that is no longer profitable and whos commercial interests have long disbanded. Most software only remains profitable for a year or two. The companies don’t stay around long and a lot of old media is degrades quickly. If it wern’t for filesharing, we would have lost a lot of this software forever. We’re better off having information and art than not having it? right?
I’ll put it in bold for you, for the RIAA, and for everybody opposed to file sharing:
A download is not the equivilant of a lost sale
If there were no such thing as filesharing, your son’s CD would have sold most likely no more than it did. If it was that great, downloaders may have bought it to have a hard copy. They may have recommended him to friends who would purchase it. Unless you can show me how tons of people heard of your son and actively decided to download as an alternative to purchasing legally, you’ve got nothing.
I’m so very tired of this argument. Every download is an instance of copyright infringement, it’s an instance of getting something without paying for it, but it does not mean “one fewer sold.” It sounds better for your case that way, but it’s just not true.
Filesharing is not illegal. Filesharing of copyright material without the copyright owners permission is.
Pearl Jam are making their own songs available for downlaod from their own website.
I cannot feel any real sympathy for the record companies. They have been found guilty of price-fixing in the late 90s, and had to cough up $450million. CD sales have been increasing for at least the last 5 years.
It is also not true that every download results in a sale, which is the arguement being put forth by those who want to be able to download music without paying for it. There are three types of people, #1 people who download a song then go buy the CD, #2 people who download the song then don’t buy the CD and #3 people who download the song and then delete it because they don’t like it. The arguement for filesharing ignores #2. It also ignores the fact that you can go to almost any musicians website and listen to clips from a CD before buying it. There is an arguement to be made that a band might be better off releasing the stuff for download to the public but that should be the individual artists decision, not yours or mine.
There are other problems with file sharing. The band Dream Theater recently released a new CD. They were set to have a release concert and do all the stuff that normally happens when a band releases a CD. The release parties are a big deal in the music world, it’s the first time the rest of the world gets to hear the music. Somehow the CD was put up on a file sharing site before the band actually released the CD. Fans of the band started discussing the CD on the bands message board before the CD was released. The band was less than happy and shut down the message boards until the release date. I don’t kow if shutting down the message board was the right response but then there wasn’t anything else they could do to show their displeasure at having their unreleased CD given away for free to the public before the band was ready. IIRC the same thing happened with Metallica, songs were put up for download that the band didn’t want released.
Absolutely. So what is it equivalent to? 1/5th of a sale? 1/10th 1/100th? Well no-one knows for sure. How many illegal downloaders would have otherwise bought the CD if they couldn’t get it for free? Unfortunately, if you ask people this they have every incentive to lie. But no matter what the actual figure, let’s consider the morals. Is it ok to deprive the recording artist of 1/100ths of their rightful money? How about 1/10th? 1/5th? Where do you draw the line and who decides where it goes?
Or do we do the right thing and say that taking someone else’s work for nothing, when they wished to be paid for it, is immoral. It’s maybe not the greatest sin in the world, but let’s not pretend it’s right.
And I just have to add; I thought the OP’s belief that musicians should entertain for nothing but the love at it, while everyone else gets paid for their labour and skills, to be almost amusingly naive and ridiculous. Almost. I also liked the way he decided there was universal agreement over what was “good” music and that the music industry wasn’t providing it.
I agree with you that downloading copyright material without the owner’s permission is wrong. So what do we do? Ban all filesharing networks? But filesharing has lots of legitimate uses. Ban all copying of CDs? But what about fair use then? Making back-ups?
I think the situation is that filesharing is here to stay and the record companies and recording artists have to find a way to live with it. If legal downloads are made available people will use them. Just they way they did with cassettes. There are means of doing this. If the record companies want to stay in business they have to embrace these new models of distribution and make them work for them.
My perspective is that America is a very individualistic and capitalist nation. As such, the goal is to take as much money as one can from everyone else without getting into trouble. If pharmaceutical companies can triple their already high prices and get away with it, they would do it. At the same time, copyright protections, at least as our leaders tell us, increase technological innovation by providing financial incentives for people to create new things, at least in the U.S.A. where people live only to make money and consume. In my ideal country, people would create new things just for the sake of advancing civilization, not because of personal financial gaining. But, I am very idealistic and humans for the most part are genetically incompatable with my intellectual paradigm.
So regarding music, the CEOs and bands only goal is to make as much money as they can, cleaning consumers our financially as much as they can without getting into legal trouble. Consumers on the other hand have an interest in getting as much free stuff as they can without getting into legal trouble. So, it’s CEOs versus consumers. who will win? I say the CEOs will because they are very intelligent and educated, have lots of money, and can make good inroads into government. the consumer on the other hand is non-united and can’t work together on anything, most are poorly educated and have middleclass to poor levels of money, and generally consumers lack the IQ requirements needed to outperform the music CEOs. The average consumer is just interested in going home from work, opening up a 6 pack of beer and dominos pizza, and then spending the next 4 hours watching the sports channel and/or Hollywood fiction: no time is alloted for intellectual thought. Such an american consumer base, in my opinion, can’t win against the CEOs.
You’re the second person who does not understand what I was trying to say, so I will make it clearer for you.
This is what I am against:
Someone who becomes a musician because he wants to make money or become famous. Someone who, if you asked him why he plays music, answers “because I want to be a big rock star and get girls.”
What I am trying to imply is that people should become musicians for love of music, not for love of money. This is not the same as saying that musicians should not be paid. Of course they should be paid. But they should not go into the musical lifestyle hoping to get rich.
How about if I want to make a career out of helping people across the street? It’s just too hard for me to do that with today’s traffic technology, when anyone can walk across the street without compensating me for my effort or even asking for my help. And it’s not like I can just refrain from helping people across the street unless they agree beforehand to pay me for my service… that could never work.
So your concern is actually for all those wanne-be rich and famous, but struggling, musicians? You’re protecting them from themselves? Or are you just deciding that no-one should get rich from being a musician, and if everyone copying their work stops them being rich, well, that just serves them right?
Why is it ok for a lawyer to want to be rich and famous, but not ok for a musician? Shouldn’t they become a lawyer for the love of truth and justice, not for the love of money? Why should anyone be rich and famous for doing anything? Shouldn’t we all be working and doing our best for the sake of society?
Your problem here is you want to apply different standards of behaviour for musicians, just so that you can cling to some romantic notion about your music being unsullied by money or any other common, worldly concerns. Illegal filesharing fits in nicely with this impossible idea, and, most significantly, has the extra convenience of being something for nothing.
Traditional music production results in artists getting ripped off by big corporations. File sharing lets artists get ripped off directly by the consumer.
This after the numerous cites listed, in this very thread, that demonstrate how file sharing can, in fact, be extremely helpful to artists? Wilco is not an isolated occurence, guys.
I would, in fact, argue that the American music scene has been healthier in the past five years than it has been in decades purely because of file sharing. As both a musician and an avid music fan, I can personally attest to that- the number of bands that I pay to see live each year has more than tripled since I started downloading music, and my band, while not successful even in the broadest definition of the term, has gotten far more exposure by making our demo tracks available for free on Myspace than we ever would have attempting to sell them using the traditional business model.
As an example: I heard about Wilco’s “Yankee Hotel Foxtrot” entirely though internet buzz brought about by the fact that people were downloading them like crazy on the internet. As a result, I downloaded the album, and started listening to it. At first listen, I was only marginally impressed, but I could tell there was something there, so I kept listening. It grew better with each listen, and soon I became a fan of the CD. As a result, I bought it - and bought a copy for a friend for his birthday. Then when Wilco came to town, we all went to see it.
Had there been no file sharing, this bad would have lost two CD sales, and more importantly, three concert ticket sales. And I’m not an exception to the rule - Wilco has said that their attendance at live shows skyrocketed after their songs wound up on the file sharing networks.
There are numerous artists who have thoroughly embraced file sharing. Despite the fact that it’s hated by their agents, record labels, record stores, and pretty much the entire old guard music distribution chain. There’s a reason for that.
I find it ironic that in this thread we are discussing how small businesses lost out to large corporations, yet here we are discussing how the large record companies are losing out to artists/consumers.
An artist (like Wilco) can bypass the record companies and directly reach the consumer, providing exactly what they require. Unless the record companies change their way of doing business they will go under, lawsuits not withstanding.
Just because you bold something does not make it true. You are correct that every downloaded song is not a song that would have been paid for. For many people, the only reason they would have the song in their collection is because they could get it for free.
But lets not pretend that we are doing anyone a service by file sharing. At least not intentionally. We download files for two reasons - it’s free and we can. Everything else is just an excuse for legitimizing something that we have been told not to do. I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t give a shit about the bands or the RIAA. Maybe it does hel get the buzz out there for that new alt-rock or hip hop group. Who gives a fuck? I just want to add a catchy tune to my iPod.
The reality is that file sharing exists and seems to be unstopable. Maybe the future will be a world with no CDs or RIAA and everything is digital and shared openly. Bands would still make money touring and they would still need marketers to get their name out there so people would even know the music exists.
IMHO, file sharing is neither all good nor all bad for the music industry. It is simply a radical change in the environment they work in and they must either adapt to it or go out of business.