Online Piracy Finally In the Crosshairs

  • Thread starter drumming sort of person
  • Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
Artists develop art.
Gold star! Very good!

They spend many years honing their craft.
Well, no. Creativity and creative craft doesn't always require "honing". In some cases, there's creativity in lack of traditional training, time or "honing". Have you studied art very much? Part of why it's hard to determine the monetary value of art is that it's very subjective. When it was more difficult to distribute content, it had a higher value objectively based on the physical medium it was stored, transported, retailed and experienced on.

They shouldn't be forced to sell t-shirts or use a virtual begging bowl to get paid
Nobody is forcing them to do anything, but at the same time, the universe doesn't owe them or anyone else jack squat. While one person may feel a line across a white canvas is genius art and should be sold for a million bucks, the next guy to come along, you'd have to pay him to take it out to the trash. You can try to assign value to something, but you might be wrong. Only the actual consumers decide the actual value of anything. This is especially true in today's world where control of the general population and information flow is so impossible. Traditional journalism, marketing, retail... It's all changing.

Plenty of money is changing hands due to their art. Most of that money belongs to them.
Why? Are they the ones building, maintaining, supporting and managing a giant open content delivery platform allowing the media(art?) to be shared and experienced where it most likely would not have been previous? All they did was arrange some notes and claim the arrangement as "theirs". As I pointed out, that could be anyone from a toddler with a bongo, to a master composer with a full orchestra.

The biggest issue is the fact that google will allow end users to upload content and then make money from it. This sounds good, except as you're so rapt to remind, quite often, people will just take another person's material and put it up to make money from. The very structure of paying people for what they upload changes things in a bad way and encourages them to steal popular works for direct, individual profit. Forget google making money from their distro platform, that's just deliberate theft and profit by an individual.

At this point the ship has sailed, and even though I worry it's not realistic, I think that these people are the ones who should be the recipients of lawsuits, absolutely NOT the 80 year old grandmas or end users who are simply listening to music online, transferring data over a content platform.

My ideal would be going back to when it was just a media sharing site. People uploaded music because they loved the music and wanted to share it, not because they made cash. I've found so much new music through youtube that I never would have experienced at all based on the old distribution models where executives decided what was cool rather than open user sharing and input. I've spent real money on real goods, shows, and music for bands I found on youtube rabbit hole binges. Lots of it.
 
Last edited:
Creativity and creative craft doesn't always require "honing". In some cases, there's creativity in lack of traditional training, time or "honing". Have you studied art very much? Part of why it's hard to determine the monetary value of art is that it's very subjective. When it was more difficult to distribute content, it had a higher value objectively based on the physical medium it was stored, transported, retailed and experienced on.

Show me something that took no skill or effort to create, and I'll tell you what it's worth. The cost to listen to or view the art should be up to whomever created it and decided to make it available. They may decide to give it away, or they may demand whatever they wish. No one should be able, or allowed, to circumvent that.

Nobody is forcing them to do anything, but at the same time, the universe doesn't owe them or anyone else jack squat. While one person may feel a line across a white canvas is genius art and should be sold for a million bucks, the next guy to come along, you'd have to pay him to take it out to the trash. You can try to assign value to something, but you might be wrong. Only the actual consumers decide the actual value of anything. This is especially true in today's world where control of the general population and information flow is so impossible. Traditional journalism, marketing, retail... It's all changing.
Nothing is changing, except that laws are being broken and the creators are getting ripped off. Oh, and people like you keep trying to say "this is the new reality".

Are they the ones building, maintaining, supporting and managing a giant open content delivery platform allowing the media(art?) to be shared and experienced where it most likely would not have been previous? All they did was arrange some notes and claim the arrangement as "theirs". As I pointed out, that could be anyone from a toddler with a bongo, to a master composer with a full orchestra.

Open content delivery system? Oh brother. The Internet was developed by the government. Computer servers and hard disks were created by computer hardware manufacturers. The "platform" you're describing could be created by any high school kid. All they did was arrange a few computers on a network and write some html. The "platform" is NOTHING without the content.

The biggest issue is the fact that google will allow end users to upload content and then make money from it. This sounds good, except as you're so rapt to remind, quite often, people will just take another person's material and put it up to make money from. The very structure of paying people for what they upload changes things in a bad way and encourages them to steal popular works for direct, individual profit. Forget google making money from their distro platform, that's just deliberate theft and profit by an individual.
It would be easy to require users to prove they have the right to upload content. It would also be easy to distribute the money generated to the proper people.

My ideal would be going back to when it was just a media sharing site. People uploaded music because they loved the music and wanted to share it, not because they made cash. I've found so much new music through youtube that I never would have experienced at all based on the old distribution models where executives decided what was cool rather than open user sharing and input. I've spent real money on real goods, shows, and music for bands I found on youtube rabbit hole binges. Lots of it.
Nobody uploading music is making "cash". They're making pennies. Google is making the cash.

You keep bringing up record company executives and how they used to "decide what was cool" or "rip off artists". What experience do you have with any record companies? I've worked for and with many, and while some were better than others, I never felt like they ripped me off.

I was always able to discover great music. I didn't need to waste hours in front of a computer screen to discover music.
 
Thanks to the moderators for indulging this discussion. A couple of final points I think are important, that are getting lost in all the noise:

-- I detect a recurring theme here: the internet as it is today is the future and there is nothing anyone can do to change it, so suck it loozarz, get a real job. Whatever the current thing tech fans say is OK for musicians to make money on is what it's OK for us to make money on for now. Everybody else has to STFU, surrender your revenue streams, because the future. That's the crux of what I've been hearing for years from all levels of tech triumphalists, from pirating forums to Wired to actual tech corporate

As I've repeatedly pointed out-- for some reason nobody wants to talk about this-- the current state of internet commerce did not happen by accident. People had to pass some laws to make it possible. The people making the most money currently are spending a f__ton of money lobbying congress to make sure nobody changes those laws. But Google and Amazon are one anti-trust lawsuit away from being busted up like Ma Bell and Standard Oil before them. The right tweaks to the Safe Harbor provision of the DMCA could force ISPs to get serious about pirating, and force YouTube to get serious about copyright infringement-- either removing infringing content, or paying the copyright holders. To give a couple of examples. The point is, the internet is a regulated, man-made environment, and it is entirely possible and desirable for government to aggressively shape it so it serves the interests of everyone, not just the few hyper-wealthy businesses that are currently best at exploiting it.

-- We got into something about a music professional's attitude, and how it's different from a semi-pro, hobbyist, or consumer attitude. What makes you a professional is that you do a thing for money. You make an actual business out of it and you have a bottom line to take care of, and everything else that goes with that. You're also aware of public issues relating to your industry. Going out and publicly boosting for the annihilation of revenue streams-- or redirecting them to someone else, usually-- just because you like the internet, is something you wouldn't actually do. Zuckerberg doesn't go around saying Facebook's money should go to Google because they're such a more futuristic company.

That's the least of it. We've got people here basically arguing that music has no monetary value, and is barely even a thing-- no more valuable than the 1s and 0s it's encoded as.

It's insane for any musician to talk that way, much less any that has any pretension of being any kind of serious, professional artist. Grown adults have no problem understanding what software is, they can also understand the concept of recorded music. Denigrating your own product this way is deeply messed up. Anti-professional is just the start of it.

-- I'll also say: this has gotten contentious, but none of this is meant personally. I'm attacking the issue because it's important, more important than anyone's feelings and emotional attachment to their opinions.
 
Hey, as long as we're having pointless arguments ... so what?

Why should Google mention "poverty and hunger"? They're a company. Their existence as a corporate entity doesn't _cause_ poverty and hunger. And they end poverty and hunger for millions every day: the people the directly pay, and all the people they pay, and so on.

I mean, I hate Google too, but not because they aren't out trying to solve charity problems (I hate them because they have a weird and culty and condescending culture [which is smugly shared by the employees of just about every other company like them], and because they don't make anything real, they're just life-sucking middle-men).

Am I taking crazy pills? Corporations don't need to reflect my beliefs or try to browbeat me with their "values" and "mission statements". Just make the thing, pay your workers, and maybe I'll buy it.

Old Fashioned Values! That's what. I never said i hated Google but for an Entity with an Infinite Namesake it is a very narrow Mission Statement. Just because they are Companies doesn't mean they should have no Moral Compass. In fact they should be leading the way! The day that Shareholders became more important than the Customers was the beginning of the end. These companies could pay off some countries National Debt, but that might resemble Fairness. Everyone talks of Political Correctness , well why not Capitol Correctness?
 
Ramsi Woodcock - Professor of Legal Studies said:
The mission of antitrust law, first articulated by the framers of the Sherman Act in 1890, is to ensure that markets contain large numbers of equally matched competitors. That’s why Europe calls its own antitrust rules “competition law.”

The Sherman Act implemented this goal by prohibiting two things: “restraint of trade,” such as price fixing, and monopolization, the attempt of a powerful company to keep competitors out of its markets. European competition laws have a similar bipartite structure.

The EU case against Google falls under the second category, monopolization, or as Europeans dub it “abuse of dominance.”

https://theconversation.com/eus-ant...cebook-uses-abandoned-american-playbook-80659
 
It's insane for any musician to talk that way, much less any that has any pretension of being any kind of serious, professional artist. Grown adults have no problem understanding what software is, they can also understand the concept of recorded music. Denigrating your own product this way is deeply messed up. Anti-professional is just the start of it.

Exactly. Thank you.
slow_clap_vanderbeek.gif
 
Humans are a useless / way behind database, wait till the robots get all Arty on your Ass!

Pete, I have often noticed that your contributions are short, snappy one-liners that seem to (gently) provoke. Trolling perhaps? I have at least once been very mildly disturbed how you have "intercepted" a thread. Now I'm starting to see that your posts are celeverly designed to stir things up in a thought provoking way. Sly fox.

Artists develop art. They spend many years honing their craft. They shouldn't be forced to sell t-shirts or use a virtual begging bowl to get paid. Plenty of money is changing hands due to their art. Most of that money belongs to them.

I think this sounds perfectly reasonable. And perfectly justifiable on ethical grounds. However, I'm not sure musicians have ever generally got their fair due, even back in the "good old days".

Am I taking crazy pills? Corporations don't need to reflect my beliefs or try to browbeat me with their "values" and "mission statements". Just make the thing, pay your workers, and maybe I'll buy it.

I agree with this.

Old Fashioned Values! That's what. I never said i hated Google but for an Entity with an Infinite Namesake it is a very narrow Mission Statement. Just because they are Companies doesn't mean they should have no Moral Compass. In fact they should be leading the way! The day that Shareholders became more important than the Customers was the beginning of the end. These companies could pay off some countries National Debt, but that might resemble Fairness. Everyone talks of Political Correctness , well why not Capitol Correctness?

Strangely, I also seem to agree with this. Ultimately though, it's for society and, gasp, the state to determine that "moral compass" and make companies stick to it. Commercial entities on their own will always be guided mostly by their inherent nature and purpose which is to make money.
 
Mike, i'm going to take thought provoking over trolling anyday. In my mind the Corporates have no more right to screw people than i do. Why is that so unsettling?
 
Mike, i'm going to take thought provoking over trolling anyday. In my mind the Corporates have no more right to screw people than i do. Why is that so unsettling?

I like to waffle a bit too much in my posts.

Sharp, focused statements are sometimes much needed to get to the point and prevent a debate from losing it's purpose.

I like your style.

You're very good in summarising in a few short words the essence of what needs to be said.
 
Even in the heyday of the recording industry, there seemed to be acknowledged value to an artist's creations. Not just the products, the collectibles, as BFY puts it, but in the music itself. The same was true of writing. I mean, that is the fundamental agreement that created copyright and intellectual property laws, isn't it?

I kind of see that idea drifting away. I meet a lot of people who don't think that has inherent value. I usually hear that stated explicitly from people who work in the tech industry, interestingly enough. I get the feeling that the content doesn't matter much - it's the distribution that matters. That's where the money is.

In fact, I have talked to people who are offended by the thought that an artist would get paid just because their song got played. They're ok with paying the artist to PLAY the song, but they don't find value in the song itself. They'll pay a performer, but don't want to pay a songwriter. At least, that's how it seems.

This is a good description of a situation that a lot of people are noticing I think. The saying used to be "don"t judge a book by it's cover".
Now it seems that everything else is considered much more important than the actual content itself. Technological revolutions can bring about good change and people need to adapt. But this should not entail the breakdown of principles that have held true for so long and seem timeless. The ideas of intellectual property go way back I can't accept that they should be discarded so carelessly just because some technological revolution has made it easy to undermine them.


Not quite. It would be the same if the coal miners were losing their jobs and more coal was being sold now than ever.

Exactly. Music is hardly a thing of the past. It continues as ever and artists deserve their rewards.

Nobody is forcing them to do anything, but at the same time, the universe doesn't owe them or anyone else jack squat. While one person may feel a line across a white canvas is genius art and should be sold for a million bucks, the next guy to come along, you'd have to pay him to take it out to the trash. You can try to assign value to something, but you might be wrong. Only the actual consumers decide the actual value of anything. This is especially true in today's world where control of the general population and information flow is so impossible. Traditional journalism, marketing, retail... It's all changing.

Of course artists aren't forced to do anything. And of course they aren't owed anything by default. But that's beside the point. The point is that some artist's material is being used by third parties for the immense benefit of these third parties. Once they have done that it just confirms very clearly that they attribute value to that content, lots of value. At that point the artist has every right to expect their fair share of the spoils.
[/QUOTE]

The biggest issue is the fact that google will allow end users to upload content and then make money from it. This sounds good, except as you're so rapt to remind, quite often, people will just take another person's material and put it up to make money from. The very structure of paying people for what they upload changes things in a bad way and encourages them to steal popular works for direct, individual profit. Forget google making money from their distro platform, that's just deliberate theft and profit by an individual.

My ideal would be going back to when it was just a media sharing site. People uploaded music because they loved the music and wanted to share it, not because they made cash. I've found so much new music through youtube that I never would have experienced at all based on the old distribution models where executives decided what was cool rather than open user sharing and input. I've spent real money on real goods, shows, and music for bands I found on youtube rabbit hole binges. Lots of it.

Well, here we are moving closer to agreement. I recognise that you at least identify a considerbale flaw in the way things are currently handled, and allowed to be handled. I think most of us are probably much more in agreement than we realise. I think there's a general aspiration amongst us for the music world that things should be much better. Despite accusations by others that some here do not care about musicians, I find that a little far-fetched.

IMO, what happens when a system goes through large-scale changes is that it creates tensions. In the worst possible case these tensions have a polarising effect and people find themselves pushed into groups of "changers" versus "rectionaries". I think when a situation is strongly polarising it's a clear indication of an imbalance which must be addressed. People's grievances cannot be ignored or talked down in the name of change and having to adapt.

It's not good for wider society.
 
Show me something that took no skill or effort to create, and I'll tell you what it's worth.
Nope. The best you can do is tell me your irrelevant personal opinion of the value. As I already pointed out, the next guy to come along would assign different value. Quite often, the effort involved is literally completely irrelevant.

The cost to listen to or view the art should be up to whomever created it and decided to make it available. They may decide to give it away, or they may demand whatever they wish. No one should be able, or allowed, to circumvent that.
Your assessment that "no one should be allowed" to do something doesn't actually change reality. If you price your 1's and 0's too high or make them difficult to get and people actually still want that content, it will be stolen and shared. The only conceivable way anything else could happen is through the loss of privacy, ultimately un-enforceable laws, consumer-hurting loss of rights to the content they pay for, and invasive technology that simply won't be adopted.

Your content does not have the value you think it does. The delivery of content is a different thing, and actually has more monetary value than your arrangement of 1's and 0's that are copied and shared with literally zero effort.

Nothing is changing, except that laws are being broken and the creators are getting ripped off. Oh, and people like you keep trying to say "this is the new reality".
You got it, pal. The world is not changing, everything is static, the internet and technology changes nothing. Very astute assessment.

Open content delivery system? Oh brother. The Internet was developed by the government. Computer servers and hard disks were created by computer hardware manufacturers. The "platform" you're describing could be created by any high school kid. All they did was arrange a few computers on a network and write some html. The "platform" is NOTHING without the content.
See, you make statements with this much ignorance to these systems, and then expect us to believe you're a software developer in this arena? Seriously?

It would be easy to require users to prove they have the right to upload content. It would also be easy to distribute the money generated to the proper people.
No it would not. You're still not getting the volume and pace we're talking about here. Trying to say "now hold on before you post that, you need to check with us!" is beyond stupid. It would render the entire concept of a media upload/sharing site useless not to mention be physically and virtually impossible. Making people wait for some imaginary check system to post the video of their dog eating cake would simply make those people use another site that didn't act idiotic.

Nobody uploading music is making "cash". They're making pennies. Google is making the cash.
You really are clueless about this entire subject, aren't you? There are many, many individuals raking in hundreds of thousands per year from youtube content streams and associated branding. It is a viable source of real income for creative professionals who aren't stuck in the vinyl age.

You keep bringing up record company executives and how they used to "decide what was cool" or "rip off artists". What experience do you have with any record companies? I've worked for and with many, and while some were better than others, I never felt like they ripped me off.
As little as possible. Except for their golden acts, the record executives in big labels do not care about you. They made the huge lions share of everything the same way google does, through distribution of content and with the added aggressive application of control. Difference now is that they've lost the ability to control that in the way consumers care about.

You may keep pretending that they are our friends looking out for our best interests if it pleases you.

I was always able to discover great music. I didn't need to waste hours in front of a computer screen to discover music.
Cool, this totally invalidates my discoveries and purchases through youtube and related. I remember getting music in the days before all this, and I know what it's like now. You're just being obtuse. It's hard to even find real music stores in most areas and dumbass publishing companies make radio nearly useless for real music fans. They push what they want.
 
Last edited:
To be perfectly clear:

I want the old ways to die. I want the traditional recording and distro to not exist. We don't need them. We have all the power that they lorded over us in the past. 25 years ago, you needed these idiots in order to get stuff recorded, produced, marketed and distributed. Now, literally, my nephew can do all that without them.

I want the power to be squarely in the hands of the actual content creators, not large somehow-consolidated organizations who would then have complete control over creative content and a very scary ability to say what is and is not acceptable, lock out other content creators, strong arm completion and force a harmful business model on the world. This is what the recording industry wants... And it's easy to see why. They get to go back to being kings through tyranny of law.

We have to accept some very drastic change to our thought on this, but the future is better for us and art. Also, it can't realistically be stopped. Business models become invalid every single day especially in this age.
 
To be perfectly clear:

I want the old ways to die. I want the traditional recording and distro to not exist. We don't need them. We have all the power that they lorded over us in the past. 25 years ago, you needed these idiots in order to get stuff recorded, produced, marketed and distributed. Now, literally, my nephew can do all that without them.

I want the power to be squarely in the hands of the actual content creators, not large somehow-consolidated organizations who would then have complete control over creative content and a very scary ability to say what is and is not acceptable, lock out other content creators, strong arm completion and force a harmful business model on the world. This is what the recording industry wants... And it's easy to see why. They get to go back to being kings through tyranny of law.

We have to accept some very drastic change to our thought on this, but the future is better for us and art. Also, it can't realistically be stopped. Business models become invalid every single day especially in this age.

I understand your opinion here, but I don't really see how it addresses the issue of piracy. It seems to me they are separate problems.

As I see it, we have three entities at play -
artists who produce
distributors who disseminate (or provide a platform for it)
consumers who consume

We don't even seem to have a consensus here on who the pirates are, but someone has a problem with whichever distribution system is in place. Either they are unfair gatekeepers, or they allow uncontrolled distribution but don't don't compensate artists for using their content.

Am I understanding what I've been reading correctly? Admittedly, I have to stop in and read in little chunks, because I'm busy earning a living, lol.
 
I understand your opinion here, but I don't really see how it addresses the issue of piracy. It seems to me they are separate problems.
Actually, there's a very clear link here. As I've said multiple times, it's too late for the old way of media control and distribution. It can't be controlled in the way it was before. Where previously it was difficult to make and distribute, it's now not. Where previously it was FCC easily-controlled airwaves that allowed nationwide music sharing, now it's a open internet where they don't have a hope of keeping track. Un regulated internet radio and it's access are growing swiftly just like all the other new tech.

The part I'm trying to warn against is that there are forces at play such as the OP claims to be a part of that want to take back control of this information flow and do with it as they please. The OP already hinted that he's looking to implement across the board DRM extending all the way down to the play-back devices that will be allowed to "see" the media through it's privately controlled locks. Thinking about this for a moment, not only does it strangle creativity and open standards, it also removes privacy and introduces very specific tracking, then it also gives them the ability to decide what goes on the platform that controls all the way down to the playback device. It gives them a scary amount of control and trusting them to not abuse it is really dumb. We do not need them. We won't let them invalidate our devices or strangle the competition; nor will we let them fragment things so that only some media is going to work with one groups devices while another works with only the competitive devices.

Now, lucky for us, they won't get away with it unless the government gets extremely draconian and falls into bed with these groups. It's far too late. All of these efforts will fail extremely fast and that's if they even get off the ground.

We don't even seem to have a consensus here on who the pirates are, but someone has a problem with whichever distribution system is in place. Either they are unfair gatekeepers, or they allow uncontrolled distribution but don't don't compensate artists for using their content.
So then, onto "piracy".

When I was a kid, we swapped tapes. We'd copy each others tapes, spend hours listening and trading learning music and being exposed to the music that enriched us as humans. I suppose we were pirates. Back then my attitude was the fbi can kiss my ass how dare they tell me I can't listen to sounds in the air? Then for the first time when I was walking down the street I saw someone selling these copied tapes on a folding table and it made me think. This is what should be "wrong". He shouldn't be able to sell someone else's art. This isn't sony or maxell making money from the tapes I copy material on and distribute, this is a guy profiting from another artist's stuff directly.

Humans should have the right to exchange information without government or corporate interest control or the invasion of privacy they would need to enforce that control. They shouldn't have the right to profit by selling someone else's work. Google might be providing the digital tapes, but they aren't directly selling someone else's work without paying them.

Am I understanding what I've been reading correctly? Admittedly, I have to stop in and read in little chunks, because I'm busy earning a living, lol.
You'll have to tell me! I know what my philosophy is, and it's safe to say I'm not siding with the corporate micro-managing pay-per-play bullshit.
 
Am I understanding what I've been reading correctly?

For the most part, yes.

My two areas of contention are: The term extensions on copyright to extend beyond the lifetime of the creator are detrimental to the promotion of the useful arts. Copyright violations should remain a civil tort and under no circumstances be criminal.

Whenever I want to listen to something for free, I just check it out from my local library. I don't feel the slightest bit bad about it because the money for it was already taken from me. It'd be foolish to pay again.
 
What I find most amusing is how DSOP doesn't seem to accept that the Internet is a wonderful discovery tool for media.

It is the discovery tool for many of us. I've bought records from stores and discovered artists the 'old' way, quite a few wonderful artists, actually - but I've found a Hell of a lot more through the Internet. Guess what? I can buy their music from them directly without going through a record label. I've had personal thanks from artists who've seen me buy things and then found me on Twitter and I've done the same in return whenever I've sold anything.

I sell my music on a limited GNU licence. Attribution, non-commercial. I can choose my licence and mine is by no means the most open. I set my own pricing, I do my own promotion and it's great. Do I make a living from it? No, I don't treat it professionally. Is it possible to make a living from it? Absolutely.
 
Your content does not have the value you think it does. The delivery of content is a different thing, and actually has more monetary value than your arrangement of 1's and 0's that are copied and shared with literally zero effort.

I think I understand the point you're trying to make, and in sheer business terms you are probably factually correct.

However, I think you should reread your statement and see the fundamental message that it conveys to people on this forum who will invariably have a tendency to interpret it from an artistic perspective.

The message is basically: "Your music isn't worth diddly squat compared to the giant money generating colossus of the tech industry which is much more valuable to humanity".

I know this is just an interpretation, however your statement does strongly underline a concerning shift in values. Before, it was "Art is the signature of civilisation". While art might not have been necessarily always grandly rewarded, at least society had a broad appreciation of it's value. Now we're moving closer to "Kneel all at the altar of the tech gods whom you shall value far above all else".

You got it, pal. The world is not changing, everything is static, the internet and technology changes nothing. Very astute assessment.

Your sarcasm is misplaced here I think.

I don't think DSOP was in any way denying that the internet and other tech develoments have brought about large scale change in the music business.

Instead, I think he's simply suggesting that despite these often much celebrated changes artists are still being screwed like back in the "good old days".
If you read between the lines, this is a tacit admission that he too knows the old industry wasn't always all cuddly and rosy towards artists.
 
I want the old ways to die. I want the traditional recording and distro to not exist.

I want the power to be squarely in the hands of the actual content creators, not large somehow-consolidated organizations who would then have complete control over creative content and a very scary ability to say what is and is not acceptable, lock out other content creators, strong arm completion and force a harmful business model on the world. This is what the recording industry wants... And it's easy to see why. They get to go back to being kings through tyranny of law.

I fully share your sense of "freedom" here (yeah, the very abstract "F" word, I know). While your statement sounds a tad zealous, ultimately the reasons you state are reasonable: we should not be beholden to an all powerful industry.

However, while the "old industry" has been vastly weakened, the world now has a new one to contend with, the tech companies. Only this time they are much bigger, global entities with much greater power and reach.

Some people see in them more of an opportunity. People like yourself prove that there are benefits to be had. However, in the same way that you despise the old music industry for good reasons, it's only normal that many should be equally wary of these new tech giants who are just private companies at the end of the day.


I understand your opinion here, but I don't really see how it addresses the issue of piracy. It seems to me they are separate problems.

As I see it, we have three entities at play -
artists who produce
distributors who disseminate (or provide a platform for it)
consumers who consume

We don't even seem to have a consensus here on who the pirates are, but someone has a problem with whichever distribution system is in place. Either they are unfair gatekeepers, or they allow uncontrolled distribution but don't don't compensate artists for using their content.

Am I understanding what I've been reading correctly? Admittedly, I have to stop in and read in little chunks, because I'm busy earning a living, lol.

Finally, someone is writing with some clarity. Keep it simple and to the point like this and we'll work it out in the end.
 
As I've said multiple times, it's too late for the old way of media control and distribution.

The part I'm trying to warn against is that there are forces at play such as the OP claims to be a part of that want to take back control of this information flow and do with it as they please. The OP already hinted that he's looking to implement across the board DRM extending all the way down to the play-back devices that will be allowed to "see" the media through it's privately controlled locks. Thinking about this for a moment, not only does it strangle creativity and open standards, it also removes privacy and introduces very specific tracking, then it also gives them the ability to decide what goes on the platform that controls all the way down to the playback device. It gives them a scary amount of control and trusting them to not abuse it is really dumb. We do not need them. We won't let them invalidate our devices or strangle the competition; nor will we let them fragment things so that only some media is going to work with one groups devices while another works with only the competitive devices.

While I don't feel that you're quite addressing the question at hand, I think that you're raising a very important and extremely relative issue. As I said previously, I share your sense of "freedom" and it's undeniable that the internet has provided us with a way of communicating freely on a much grander scale. It has above all allowed a much more fluid flow and easy access of information. This sphere must be preserved and curtailing it would likely pose a threat to certain liberties that we cherish (at least in a democracy).

You have been insisting on this all along but I think you're intended message has been submerged in numerous long posts and tech talk. In the heat of debate I can see how some, myself included, understood you to be taking sides with tech companies in opposing controls and by doing so effectively taking un anfavourable position to what we see as musicians rights.

I'm going to be bold and try to summarise this in a way that I hope will lead to some agreement:

The contentious issue of artists rights in the digital age merits close scrutiny and it appears necessary that these rights are clarified and that existing legislation be updated so as to better adapt these rights to the internet and vice versa. At the same time, it is important to aknowledge the technical challenges in this regard. More importantly, we must be aware that any attempt to curtail certain practices in the virtual domain could lead to an introduction of repressive and invasive policies that might seriously threaten the very concept of the internet as a sphere in which information can be freely exchanged. This would constitute a grave loss of liberty and be in stark contradiction to the values of our free democracies.

So, what do you all think?
[/QUOTE]




So then, onto "piracy".

When I was a kid, we swapped tapes. We'd copy each others tapes, spend hours listening and trading learning music... ...my attitude was the fbi can kiss my ass how dare they tell me I can't listen to sounds in the air? Then for the first time when I was walking down the street I saw someone selling these copied tapes on a folding table and it made me think. This is what should be "wrong". He shouldn't be able to sell someone else's art. This isn't sony or maxell making money from the tapes I copy material on and distribute, this is a guy profiting from another artist's stuff directly.

Google might be providing the digital tapes, but they aren't directly selling someone else's work without paying them.

After all the daft analogies in this thread, this one finally seems extremely relative. Why didn't you just use this one straight away?! :)

At first glance, it looks like a robust argument for your position.
However, there is a considerable difference between the tape manufacturers and the likes of Google.

Whilst the tape manufacturers would certainly have been aware that their product was being used to make duplicates of copyright protected material, they were not actually involved in this practice in any reproachable way. People bought the tapes, took them home, and made copies all on their own using their personal home stereo equipment. Sony, Maxell, or any of the other tape brands could hardly be held accountable for that.

Tech companies on the other hand are considerably more complicit with the actual practice of copying. The digital platforms used are nothing else but their own servers. Whilst we talk about "cyber space" and the freedom of the internet, let's not forget that there is still this physical element that needs to be controlled. Whoever is responsible for the servers is in effect "hosting" whatever practice is carried out in their domain. How can "hosting" on the internet be free of responsibility whilst a person or company would be held acountable by the law if they hosted an illegal practice in their home or offices?

I'm old enough to remember the use of tapes. I'm not aware that the common practice of making copies for personal use or passing on to friends was ever in any way a big problem for the music industry. I'm not aware that "pirate tape sellers" were ever that common either.

Modern tech companies and their "platforms" on the other hand allow content to be instantly available to the whole world. The scale, ease of access, and low-to-non existant cost of this content availability is out of all proportion to what could be done with tape copies. This is what has given rise to abuses and subsequently led to the outcry we're hearing.
 
I'm old enough to remember the use of tapes. I'm not aware that the common practice of making copies for personal use or passing on to friends was ever in any way a big problem for the music industry. I'm not aware that "pirate tape sellers" were ever that common either.

Mike,

Don't you remember that episode of "What's Happening" where ReRun sneaks a cassette recorder into a Doobie Brothers show? Back then, they called them "Bootleggers" and not "Pirates".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKEgqF4Sq1c
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top