Reblog → Image
![Interesting illustration by Brian Rea for a recent New York Times piece on music licensing and copyright enforcement. [via kateoplis]
As I look at this graphic I have to wonder how we might plot ‘Those who listen to music live’ – after all, the accepted wisdom of the moment is that contemporary musicians ‘have learned to consider their recorded output, formerly their bread and butter, as a form of promotion for live shows.’](http://28.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_l6y5f0MOJP1qzprlbo1_500.jpg)
Interesting illustration by Brian Rea for a recent New York Times piece on music licensing and copyright enforcement. [via kateoplis]
As I look at this graphic I have to wonder how we might plot ‘Those who listen to music live’ – after all, the accepted wisdom of the moment is that contemporary musicians ‘have learned to consider their recorded output, formerly their bread and butter, as a form of promotion for live shows.’
Filesharing, remix and … orchestra?
In an interview from last fall with The Rumpus filmmaker Brett Gaylor describes what he took away from his encounter with an anti-piracy lobbying effort by the Recording Industry Association of America [RIAA] during the filming of his ‘open source’ documentary RiP: A Remix Manifesto:
This was an industry that was really out of touch with not just what was going on, but actually with its place in the world.
I have found this to be true of my experience with much of the classical music industry as well, and it’s the reason why I post so frequently about our need to embrace what Gaylor explores in his own work [just replace ‘film’ with ‘orchestra performance’ and you’ll see what I mean]:
It’s not piracy I need to be afraid of; it’s obscurity. The problem is not that people are ripping off my film, it’s that nobody’s heard of my film, it’s a tiny little film. And that’s why I was very insistent that my film … be free to travel through networks.
Gaylor bases his entire approach on a fundamental notion of cultural influence which also underlies all of music history – that art springs from conversation with other art. Open sharing of recorded musical product doesn’t seem so dangerous from that perspective, does it?
Reblog → Quote
'There is no ‘must’ in art, because art is free.'
Reblog → Stop selling scarcity
Orchestra professionals, pay close attention to these words from Jeff Jarvis:
The real story in nonphysical goods is one of deflation. Value in once-scarce — well, once-controlled — commodities like news, information, and advertising decline as the internet explodes creation and competition. The internet also destroys the ability of many to control distribution and thus value. But at the same time, the internet drastically increases efficiency thanks to platforms and open distribution and the ability — no, the need — to specialize and collaborate.
This is why the old controllers of scarcity have such trouble rethinking and remaking themselves for the economy of abundance. Their reflex is to control more, when that only decreases value.
So stop selling scarcity. Scarcity has no value.
As Jarvis points out the theory holds true for performers, many of whom are finally beginning to understand that ‘putting our content and information out there is how it gets distributed, how we find new people, how we build new relationships, how we realize new value.’ [via Frank Chimero has a blog.]
Reblog → Curation Culture
Frank Chimero has a blog.: It’s a wonderful time to be a maker because there are so many ways for people to appreciate your work.
Reblog → The Sound Of My Head Banging Against The Wall
ck/ck: I suppose that’s a major theme of this decade that has just been: the failure of companies to give consumers what they want, which in turn has resulted in a culture where illegality, piracy and hacking are the norm.
Reblog → A copyright ‘thought experiment’
In the wake of news that Capitol Records is suing Vimeo over music employed in the latter’s uploaded video content, Tumblr lead developer Marco Arment offers a copyright ‘thought experiment.’
Marco.org: What if copyright infringement were made completely impossible? What if we had perfect enforcement at the technical level? (I know this isn’t possible, but bear with me. It’s a “thought experiment.”)
Music and video sites would instantly and perfectly detect any copyright infringement in uploaded files and refuse to host them. People would be forced to create (or find) content that’s licensed permissively enough, such as under the Creative Commons, to allow their usage. We’d give the big music and video publishers exactly what they think they want. But it would actually demolish them. It would be the best thing that ever happened to those who speak so strongly against “all rights reserved”-style copyright enforcement.
Today’s demand for permissively licensed content is nearly zero because most people can get away with small-scale infringement. If that were no longer possible, all of these infringements would be replaced by much more demand for permissively licensed content. Any publishers unwilling to satisfy the demand would be left in the dust by those who would.
As a professional performer I tend to agree with Marco, and sense that a vast majority of artists would be on board with a licensing system that facilitated the sharing and creative reuse of their content [especially if that system helped to eliminate the profit-oriented content management mania that infects major media corporations]. Regrettably, the intersection of commercial interest and art rarely yields such a neat solution; we can probably only hope that the persistent openness of the internets forces broad acceptance of a model like the one Marco envisions.
