Article:  |
A Musician's Take on File Sharing, DRM, and Copyleft Licensing | |
| Subject: | from John, an unsigned artist | |
| Date: | 2003-08-01 11:34:38 | |
| From: | anonymous2 | |
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nor do i plan to get signed by a major label. i'm glad that most people are of the mind set that artists should be paid for the work they do. i was not impressed by the post where someone told a working musician to get off his ass and do more shows a week when he was already doing 4-5 shows a week. there's a guy doing it himself, puting out good music, gigging, and trying to provide his fans with a good sounding product. please support that. most people do, from what i've read. anyone who thinks music should be free is just wrong. it will never be, not because I SAY so, but because of the constitutional rights of copyright given to creators of art and science. if you want things to keep progressing, we've got to support innovative minds. labels are desperate, they're going down. they're signing deals that have as much as 50% royalties to the artist!!!! not that that's not the way it should have been since the beginning, but that's where it's going. i think we'll see more of our artist friend out there working the scene themselves with their own exclusive label. however, all those people who said that bands should tour to get money, who do you think fronts the money for tour support? THE LABEL. ticket prices are going up becaues labels don't have money to put towards touring. so pretty soon everyone will be bitching about that, too. so artists will start to loose more money there. then the only thing people will do is steal music. there's got to be money going to the artists somehow. look at it this way--i'll utilize the benefits of file sharing to illustrate...you live in california and you find a great band in florida, "gator inflator", over file sharing. but you don't pay for the music because you're going to support them by seeing one of their shows. meanwhile, gator inflator is on their own label, doing REALLY well, pulling in about 300,000. each guy of this 4 piece band pulls in about 75,000 a year. now do you think that if the labels are weary of sending bands on tour since it's not a big money maker that four dudes from florida are going to embark on a nationwide tour with the anticipation that they'll turn a profit? it will rarely happen. it's great that they got their exposure to you, but it's really a shame that you, as a fan, stole their music when you could have bought it for $.80-1.00. my main concern is people who think music should be free. artists work as hard as anyone else with the added stress of risk. if they know that their stuff is good and that they have a big audience and fan base, but the money is not coming in, how long do you think they will stay in the business (ESPECIALLY if it's their own)? don't steal candy, don't steal cars, don't steal music--support the artists you listen to...i know i could use it! check out mp3.com/ushers. there's free downloads, and if you like those you can order our old cd for $5 and the new one for $8. later all! |
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Showing messages 1 through 3 of 3.
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from John, an unsigned artist
2003-08-28 07:11:57 anonymous2 [Reply | View]
You know what, im tired of hearing people complain about the artist and lables losing money because of mp3 sharing. They may be losing money but look at it this way, these "artist" get payed hundreds of thousands even millions of dollars TO SING A FRIGIN SONG. When they have a real job working 17 hours a day in a plant having to support a family, then they can bitch about losing a few thousand dollars due to people not wanting to pay 17 bucks for a cd with 2 good songs on it and the rest be shit. Until then they can just shut their damn mouths. They can come live in my shoes or hell half of Americas shoes and see that its not as easy as singing a song to make a fuckin living. They can come live a real life and understand why normal people dont wanna pay to listen to their favorite songs. Im not an artist, maybe thats why i still understand that you shouldnt have to pay to listen to a song, but i guess since im not a millionare piece of shit snobby artist that my opinion doesnt count.
So does losing a little bit of money sound as bad as losing all your fans instead. Use your head its ok have your frigin copy rights. NO ONE WANTS TO STEAL IT WE JUST WANT TO HEAR IT. So quit bitchin and do some actual work tour more make more of an effort. Get back to reality.
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from John, an unsigned artist
2003-08-01 12:49:49 anonymous2 [Reply | View]
Right on, John! I, too, am an unsigned artist, and have been for the past 40 years in the music business. If I tour, it has to be booked in advance (by me) and the money has to come from somewhere. By me selling my CDs, tapes, whatever, paid for out of my own pocket (Don't quit your day job). If I post my stuff on-line I get a crap-load of publicity, but no gigs, and no money. Therefore, I won't post it. If anyone else does, that's piracy, plain and simple. And anyone who makes musical noises by sampling may be creating an artistic statement of some kind, but it ain't music, and they ain't musicians. Musicians are people who play instruments and/or sing, not computer techs. Consequently, the dreck that passes for "music" these days is only suitable for brain-dead twits that wouldn't know a major from a flat-9-flat-5. So you goofs go ahead and steal all you want from major labels, they've been ripping off the artist forever, and the AFofM has been a willing co-conspirator. And by stealing our music, you become just one more person ripping off the artist. While you're doing that, I'll play music, real music, live music, for friends and fans, and sell my CDs/tapes/whatever off the front of the stand between sets. But for every one hour of public performance, I've probably put in 5-10 hours of practice. The public is mis-guided because we call it "playing" music. Any musician who's been on the road, or who's spent a half-hour trying to master one God-damned riff by playing it over and over again `til you're ready to barf; those musicians will tell you it's anything but "playing". Then why do we do it? Because we HAVE to. If nobody listened at all, we'd still be playing and singing. And we always will. You non-musician pirates and sample goofs will never understand that, nor acheive the satisfaction we derive from the actual creation of actual music. Hang in there John, we probably won't get to the "helicopter and limo" level of show business, but who wants to be "flavor of the week" anyhow? (signed) Unsigned in Canada
So does losing a little bit of money sound as bad as losing all your fans instead. Use your head its ok have your frigin copy rights. NO ONE WANTS TO STEAL IT WE JUST WANT TO HEAR IT. So quit bitchin and do some actual work tour more make more of an effort. Get back to reality.
NATE