How Evil is Downloading Music?

very evil.

incredibly evil.

it's so evil that....











are we clear on this?





*

Artists should be paid for their work?

"Artists should be paid
for their work."

it's a self-evident truth - hard-core
catechism in copyright conversations...


...a consensus-builder so true
it conjures a moral high ground
and occupies that contested terrain
in just  7 words.




nice one.





***

"Artists should be paid for their work".

beauty. it even sounds like
it means something.

***

not surprisingly, lots of Artists
eat this up with a spoon.
many can and will regurgitate
it at the drop of a hint.



***




for the Industry, it's a talking point,
sound byte, core message, mission
statement, free beard and a license to spin...


an injection of credibility,
that comes complete with a congregation
happy to "amen" as required.




sweet.

***

TAKE ONE




"Artists should be paid
for their work."

some might say this is a sad cliche,
a Commandment wanna-be that's
actually just a Hallmark moment. 
useless, yet smug.

...be that as it may, Artists are suffering
in the pursuance of their respective Muses every day, and every night. 

math must be done. eyes must be crossed. t's need be dotted.

there won't be any cheques
in the proverbial mail 

until somebody answers
the musical question:

"how much is that doggie
in the window?"

source

***

TAKE TWO

"Artists should be paid
for their work".

Sure. Fine. Great.


Let's do it:

How much?




When?


Who's holding the money?


Who's signing the cheques?



***




What's 'work'?




***




What's an 'artist'?

***

TAKE THREE

"Artists should be paid
for their work."


right on.
no question.
abso-fucking-lutely.

amen.

So should Moms





and the children who grow up
and look after their Moms.






So should veterans.









So should their widows.

luckily for the Music Industry,
the line forms of the right.

- tbc -

.

Who are the real pirates?

it was many years ago that Bertolt Brecht
asked the eternal question...

"what is the crime of robbing a bank,
next to the crime of owning one?"

one might ask the same question
of the music industry these days,
when it comes to 'pirates'...

Edgar Bronfman Jr convicted
in Vivendi case

The Warner Music Group chairman, Edgar Bronfman Jr, was convicted today of insider
trading and fined €5m (£4.2m) over his conduct
as vice-chairman of French company Vivendi nearly a decade ago.


it seems that shareholders in Vivendi feel they were misled about the financial health of the company after an acquisition buying spree by  the former Vivendi chief executive Jean-Marie Messier...


With Vivendi Universal SA on the edge of financial turmoil in 2002, Edgar Bronfman Jr. began selling shares in the company using inside knowledge that the business was in shambles, according to allegations made in a French court.



Mr. Bronfman is appealing the judgment
but in the meantime, he can take comfort
in the knowledge that it could have been much worse.

While $6.7 million US might seem like a lot of money, his fine would have been much larger
if he was guilty of downloading 100 songs from the internet...




read the whole story at The Guardian

and for more background, try the Globe and Mail

- 30 -

.

No Song Is Illegal

at some point in this copy right
or wrong situation, a lot of musical questions start coming up, including:



what kind of mind makes it illegal to enjoy a song?




what kind of people bust campfire girls, grannies and students for possession of music?



why are their spin doctors not laughed out of the building whenever they show up with their absurd statistics?




is the music industry any different from the police industry and the drug industry?

and if i was a legislator, i would like to put a few questions to the Industry itself, like...

how many of the alleged downloads
are theoretically "your music"?


how many of the alleged downloads are from completely legitimate sources?





how many of the files being downloaded
can be purchased from you today?







what are the demographics of "the pirates"?
who are these uploaders & who is downloading them?





why do you have such a bee up your butt about music you haven't cared about for decades, if ever?

but i'm not a legislator,
so here's a question from me:



how long is it going to take you to figure out
that all those music blogs out there
could be the best friends you ever had?

more where they came from, 
but that'll do for now.

questions like these trouble me, and i'm troubled about the discussions we're not having about some pretty important issues, with a very long tail we will have drag into the future with us.

the Music Industry has positioned itself in a fashion similar to the Holy Roman Church in medieval Europe. Big surprise. they are the font of reason, with a double-shot of moral authority back.

RESPECT

when it comes to loving the Artists,
the Industry might not walk the walk,
but they have certainly bought the talk.


if all the money the Industry has invested in this process has done one thing well, it has put a long term lease on the vocabulary of the conversation and straight-out bought the box we're going to have it in...

it has "defined the issues" so effectively that there are only their issues. there is no room left at the table for any other arguably less self-interested voices.

they have created  an urgency where none existed. Canada represents a whopping 2% of the international music market. passing this legislation will not change that fact. this one's not about the money. this one signs up for the digi-Coalition of the Willing.

the war on sharing is an American-driven war. another big surprise. more accurately the War on Sharing is a project of the music and film divisions of several trans-national corporations.

it's a remix that drops DC in for New York, New York, to the effect that if you can get something like this passed there, you can get it passed anywhere. it's up to you, DC, DC...

make no mistake about it -

we will get the legislation they want...

and there will be inspiring sound bites about how Canada, our Canada is no safe place for "pirates".

and how we were once laissez-faire, but now march in the first rank in the war on sharing, doing our bit to constipate the internet..


this legislation will pass in Parliament because
good and evil are all laid out. it makes everybody look good, it sends a message that Canada is open for business and there's no bad guys here except 'the pirates'.

you can even mention how you care so much about Canadian artists, you've given them their own level playing field. it's almost like giving them money, except it's free.

***

but between then and now, can we call a cease-fire on all those earnest sermons about how this is for the Artists, and pointing out other crumbs that may or may not fall from the tables of our betters? 

it's too depressing.

- 30 -



the illustrations for this rant have come from a variety of pirate places that used to exist on the net.

if you like looking at album covers,

you really want to go to:


LP Cover Lover

Incredibly Strange Albums

the Worst Album Covers of All Time!

.

Valuation - a PPS

it just happened again tonight!

i'm home alone, watching the Habs kick some prime New York butt, and they blow one of those whistles that means we're going to commercial.


...and sure enough, up pops a commercial for the the SunLife post-retirement plan. where once there was an OK hockey game, now there is a room full of rich old white people at a cocktail party bursting into song.

not only song, but dance... and not simply dance, but a routine.

these rich old white people, who've clearly been hoovering the free liquor, go into an energy bunny full-on honky pantomime of the Temptations.


OMG, it's a 21st century minstrel moment
- a Pat Booney Geritol remix a la Glee!

***

the song they are miming to is Get Ready.

originally, it was a classic Motown moment:
the Funk Brothers playing a song written and produced by Smokey Robinson, with  Eddie Kendricks singing lead over David Ruffin, Melvin Franklin, Paul Williams and Otis Williams harmonies.

how good a song is Get Ready?

good enough that after the Tempts charted with it in '66, it would be covered by The Supremes, Dusty Springfield, Smokey with The Miracles and Rare Earth, who charted even higher than the Tempts did with it four years later in 1970.

the Proclaimers have done it, which makes my brain hurt just to think about and mercy me, even Fergie of the Black Eyed Peas has humped it. it was also Ella Fitzgerald's last record to hit the US charts in '69.

***

a song that can do all that and survive is a song built like the proverbial brick shit house.

***

at one point, the images in this SunLife appropriation cut to the people at the party
who are watching this all unfold.

among the faces are a black man and a black woman. they look like they are tripping...
like "what the hell am i supposed to do with this?"

it's a brief moment, but a deep one and it's certainly a fair question, but i can't answer it.

***

Get Ready was a total feel-good song- one that makes you want to move, and maybe even sing along.

now it's a song that says no matter how much you've got, you need more. you may already have a better life already than 99.7% of the people on the planet, but you can have more.

you know you want it,
and baby, you so deserve it...

watching the gyrations of these smug Boomers, one can't help but share their awareness that looking this good is not going to get any cheaper in their days ahead...

and given how well-fed, well-fixed and pampered these people are, it's a safe bet that the off-ramp to the dirt nap is still a long way down the road...

which may be why this is an ad for a "post" -retirement plan. i'm not even sure what that is. does it mean the money to retire on is already in the bag, or what?

***

anyway, you can bet the licensing fees for this
were not cheap, and that the copyright holders are probably OK with it. no piracy here. no infringements.

it's all good.

***

but is it?



the reason that the song "has value" is because
it was a dream team of creative people working together to create something special. but that's not the only reason...

the song also has value because millions of people welcomed it into their lives. they listened to it, and danced to it and bought millions of copies of it so they could hear it again and again.

but according to the law, none of us have any
rights in this situation. the fact that a piece of our lives has been appropriated to make one more financial institution seem more warm and fuzzy is a non-issue.

this idea that the song has value because we - the audience, the listeners, the 'fans' - invested it with meaning has no standing in a court of law. like so many other acts of cultural and emotional piracy, this moment of musical necrophilia is strictly legit.

***

the only reason this song, like so many others even matters is because we made it matter...but it doesn't matter now. it's just one more musical memory reduced to so much aural Epicac. it's just business as usual.

the idea that this ongoing whoring of a shared heritage might be a contributing factor to an overall decline in the "value" of music - real or perceived - is not going to be discussed in at any marketing meetings or in any boardrooms any time soon.

it's just business.

.

Music and Math - the Devil's combo!

If there's one thing that hasn't changed
about the Music Industry over the years,
it's a love of numbers... 

From the first wax cylinders to the latest ring tone, it's always been about the numbers.

Recoupable expenses, outstanding royalties, payola, price fixing, pay to play? Numbers. 

Charts, trophies, ticket counts? More numbers.

...and obviously, in any situation where
it's all about the numbers, B.Y.O. is the
way you want to go. Totally.

***

The Industry has brought more than a century
of numerical creativity and a whole lotta cash
to its efforts to change federal laws, international agreements, the internet and the nature of music.

As mission statements go, it leans towards the ambitious but it doesn't stop there. The cherry on the top - the piece de resistance - is that those governments also stooge up as the designated enforcers, at no cost to the Industry.


Sound a little funny?

Guess what?

It's virtually a fait accompli...

***





Ha-ha.






***

Here are some fresh numbers,
courtesy of the BPI (British Recorded Music Industry)!

In September 2010 BPI commissioned Harris Interactive to conduct an in-depth online survey...here are a few highlights:


BEST POSITIVE VISUALIZATION AWARD
In total, Harris conservatively estimates that 1.2bn tracks will be illegally downloaded in 2010 – equivalent to a stack of CDs some 74 miles high stretching well into space.




Holy cow... that's a big stack. But 74 miles up
is too nebulous, know what i'm sayin'?  Let's take those miles down to the street - check this out...

8 Mile - the off-ramp

- dude, if you were standing on 8 Mile Road in Detroit, that CD stack would run half-way out to Kalamazoo... or more conveniently, to Ann Arbor and back.

- yo, if you were standing at the bottom of the CN Tower in Toronto, bro, those CDs would go to Guelph and back.

- in Glasgow? to Edinburgh and back.

8 Mile - the high

PEOPLE DON'T SHARE OUR VALUATION? WTF?
More people are regularly using illegal sources to access music than some of the biggest legal music services on the internet – usage figures show Spotify (18%), Last.fm (15%) and we7 (8%) have many fewer regular users than P2P.

8 Mile - the book about the high

THE NEED IS STILL GREAT
~ 23% of all respondents are using P2P to acquire music illegally, the same percentage recorded as research carried out by Harris in February and November 2009.

8 Mile - the (other) movie

WE'RE HURT, OF COURSE, BUT WE'RE ALSO CONCERNED
Worryingly, a substantial proportion of illegal downloaders claim not to realise that their actions are unlawful.

8 Mile - the varietal

SEE WHAT WE'RE UP AGAINST? YOUNG PEOPLE ARE VILE!
Nearly half (44%) of all P2P users stated that they believed their actions to be lawful, rising to 69% for those using overseas pay sites and 56% using cyberlockers via board/forums.

***

THE REPORT - READ, WEEP

8 Mile - the book about the high

8 Mile - the varietal

8 Mile - the (other) Movie

.

You Don't Need a Weatherman

Bob Dylan does the face palm thing.

to know which way this wind blows...

V

V

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websheriffbdwatch has sent you a message:

Re;Bob Dylan
WEB SHERIFF
Who You Gonna Call
Tel +44(0)208-323 8013
Fax +44(0)208-323 8080

STRICTLY PRIVATE & CONFIDENTIAL
ATTENTION ADDRESSEE ONLY
COPYRIGHT PRIVILEGED COMMUNICATION

Hi *****,

We hope you’re well and, by way of introduction, Web Sheriff represents Columbia Records, Special Rider and Bob Dylan in relation to the administration and protection of their on-line rights.

On behalf of the label and artist, we would kindly ask you not to post original video / audio clips of Dylan — or live concert video / audio clips of Dylan — on YouTube (or any other sites or forums).

We do appreciate that you are a fan of / are promoting Bob Dylan, but the artist and label would again greatly appreciate your co-operation in removing your clip in question. We are writing to you directly, as a fan, in order that your YouTube account does not get suspended or terminated…

***

it seems there are changes afoot at YouTube, courtesy of the Sony Corporation....

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"Sony Music and Bob Dylan are pushing Bob Dylan fan videos off YouYube as we predicted last fall. When the Day of the Locust video was removed from our story Bob Dylan original art and prints Drawn Blank it was just another Dylan video “removed” by YouTube.

A search for “Bob Dylan” on YouTube produced 65,000 videos, down from more than 110,000 in September of 2009. For the most part, the Bob Dylan videos remaining are on official channels like BobDylanTV and VEVO, both of which are owned or controlled by Sony Music."

***

get the whole story right here...
it's just one of many fascinating articles at the NJN Network.

...and don't forget to check out the comments made by Bob Dylan "fans"- they add up to a course in Music and Marketing in the Digital Era.

 
...or is that 'Error'.

- 30 -



.

the MPAA - been wrong so long...

...that it looks like right to me.

music is a big thing in my life. it has been for a long time, which is why i tend to focus on that aspect of the discussion of copyright and copywrong...

but for every dumb idea about 'intellectual property in the digital age' in the Music Industry, there's 2  or 3 people in the Movie Industry reading
from the same script*.

One of the biggest mouths in movies about all
this was the late Jack Valenti. Valenti was a war hero and a Beltway insider before Lew Wasserman brought him out to LA in '66 to head the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), a not-for-profit trade organization.

What are the key functions of the MPAA? 

We are the voice and advocate of the American motion picture, home video and television industries, domestically and, through our subsidiaries and affiliates, internationally.

from the MPAA website

***

The organization is funded by the “big six” studios: Paramount, Disney, Fox, Sony, Universal and Warner Bros.

When Valenti retired in 2004, after 38 years
as president, the MPAA's annual budget was estimated at more than $100 million a year.

 

Valenti was 82 years old when he retired.
His term as the industry's spokesman spanned nearly four decades of unprecedented technical
and social change.

When he began in 1966, the "new thing"
was the audio cassette.

It would be 10 years before the great Videotape Format war and 10 again until VHS finally
achieved total global domination.

As that fight was raging, more cool new
tech toys were hitting the street every year.

Personal computers really caught on, and so did compact disc players. Modern life was taking
a turn to the digital. The genie was out of the bottle, and getting ready to  leave the building .

The 90s brought the rise of the DVD and worse,
oh yes much worse by far - the world wide web. 

***

"His personal passion and extreme comfort
around politicians gave him credibility that
others ... would lack.
Mr Valenti was a consummate salesman, who
like all great salesmen ... worked himself up into believing the truth of his clients' message."

William Patry - copyright attorney for the Clinton administration

***

THE MPAA ON CABLE TELEVISION

A huge parasite in the marketplace, feeding and fattening itself off of local television stations and copyright owners of copyrighted material. We do not like it because we think it wrong and unfair.

Comments on the Cable television industry,
in testimony to Congress (June 1974)

Satan's little helper

THE MPAA ON VIDEO CASSETTE RECORDERS

"I say to you that the VCR is to the American film producer and the American public as the Boston Strangler is to the woman home alone".

"We are going to bleed and bleed and hemorrhage, unless this Congress at least protects one industry that is able to retrieve a surplus balance of trade and whose total future depends on its protection from the savagery and the ravages of this machine."

THE MPAA ON BLANK TAPE

We are facing a very new and a very troubling assault on our fiscal security, on our very economic life... it is like a great tidal wave just off the shore.
This video cassette recorder and the blank tape threaten profoundly the life-sustaining protection, I guess you would call it, on which copyright owners depend..."

THE MPAA ON IT'S COPYRIGHT PREFERENCES

“Forever plus one day.”

Valenti's suggestion for Sonny Bono's Copyright Extension Act.
Passed in 1998, the act only extended an additional 20 years^ .

THE MPAA ON BACKING UP YOUR DVD

You've already got a DVD. It lasts forever.
It never wears out. In the digital world, we don't need back-ups, because a digital copy never wears out. It is timeless.

Valenti responds to a question on breaking encryption to make a back-up copy of a DVD.
Harvard Political Review (2002)

THE MPAA ON INTERNET 'PIRACY'

Q: Can Internet piracy be contained?

A: It costs us $3.5 billion a year, but it's not going to go unchecked. We have the best brains working on this. I'm optimistic that in the next eight months to two years, we'll have this thing under control.
Jack Valenti, USA Today June 2004

“We’re fighting our own terrorist war
against people who would pirate movies online.”

***

Lions and tigers and bears!
Oh my!



Click here for part 2!

***

^ Since the Copyright Act of 1976, copyright would last for the life of the author plus 50 years, or 75 years for a work of corporate authorship. The Act extended these terms to life of the author plus 70 years and for works of corporate authorship to 120 years after creation or 95 years after publication, whichever endpoint is earlier.^[1]

***

* Disclosure...
i like movies. i'm not like some of my friends, who think  their annual film festival program book is a kind of foreplay, but i've seen a few.

i also studied movies for a while in university, i've made films, helped friends make films and when i lived in Vancouver, working on film sets paid the bills for a lot of my friends.

there was a time when news of a Fellini retrospective or a new Herzog film would set my heart a flutter, but it's been a while. i actually don't remember the last film i saw in a theatre.

.