
Music Industry Starting to Target "Copy Left / Free Culture" Enemy - ALee
http://www.digitalmusicnews.com/stories/012209ascap
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numair
I'm sure most people here will consider me crazy for saying this, but I really
hope the music industry manages to make some inroads with these initiatives.

Here's my problem with the free culture / "information wants to be free" crowd
-- when you decide you no longer place monetary value on intellectual
property, you are merely impoverishing intellectuals and keeping those who run
enterprises such as oil and mining companies in control of the world's wealth.
Rather than making the world a better place by making intellectual property
free, you're putting it into the hands of the very people many in this crowd
hate.

I'm not saying that intellectual monopolies/oligarchies such as those seen in
the 20th century are sensible; I'm merely saying that the free culture is,
quite literally, economically retarded. Allowing creatives and intellectuals
to pursue their art as a profession is one of the greatest accomplishments of
modern society, I think; even better is the fact that you can pursue these
things and make a significant amount of money which can be used to do lots of
interesting things. We really need to figure out a way to preserve this -- the
balance of power created by wealthy creatives pushing initiatives that run
counter to the aims of wealthy industrialists is extremely important (Bono not
withstanding, of course -- kidding).

~~~
gruseom
I don't think you're crazy, just totally wrong. As we know, the recording
industry worked out _so_ well for artists.

~~~
numair
You make the classic mistake of arguing against the record industry as a means
for arguing against payment for intellectual property... While the record
industry is involved in this, and they are the chief whiners, the overall
situation is much greater. We have an entire generation of people around the
world who see no point in paying for intellectual property.

This may actually be a situation in which society has made a decision to
change its values, in which case the situation is irreversible, or will
require a new generation before it can change. See: smoking, equal rights,
etc.

~~~
gruseom
Stuff changes. How long has copyright law been around? Are we supposed to
believe that the entire human race was doing it wrong before us?

I'm not against copyright. I'm saying this is a shift of historical magnitude
that no RIAA or MIAA or WTFIAA or for that matter anyone has the power to
stop. Like anything, its effects will be both good and bad and depend on your
point of view. For example, the record industry may consider it bad that they
have less money for plates of cocaine in the boardrooms where they've swindled
countless musicians out of their life's work. Personally I find that one
rather pleasing.

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jerf
I'll be intrigued (in the academic sense) to see what they come up with.

The GPL couldn't be fought (I consider the fight basically over after the last
court ruling) because it _gives_ rights where most software licenses remove
them. In a way it is on _firmer_ legal footing than conventional licenses,
because it is much more clearly a contract; the law grants you these rights,
but if you do X and Y, you get Z from me in return. It's hard to imagine how
to eliminate the GPL without also eliminating software licenses.

Similarly for the creative commons; how can you block open culture which gives
people rights they wouldn't have without losing the same legal structures you
use to remove rights? Removing rights exercises those legal mechanisms _far_
harder than a standard contract, just like with the GPL vs. standard EULAs.

I suppose they could try a pure social approach but I submit that they've
_already_ lost that fight. Trying to advertise that people shouldn't use the
free thing is going to be one of the fuddy-duddiest things an industry has
done in a long time, and calling further attention to free culture is unlikely
to do them any favors.

~~~
misuba
They haven't lost the social fight; it hasn't even started. The average person
has yet to even think to question bog-standard intellectual property
practices; that Overton window has a long ways to move yet.

I'm not hopeful. Lessig, for one, is so bad at speaking to the uninitiated
about these issues that he lost a debate with Stephen Colbert, who was trying
to _make fun_ of the opposing position.

~~~
jerf
They've lost the leading edge already... and how do they propose to roll even
_that_ back? "No, that free stuff which you can freely examine and come to
your own conclusions about sucks because we say so, come spend $20 on thirty
minutes of generic music again?" They've lost because there's just no way to
dress this up in a way that can get past the cynical 21st century consumer.

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cabalamat
The idea behind copyleft boils down to "I'll share with you if you share with
me". And Creative Commons boils down to "I've got some copyrighted work; I
choose to share it under certain contitions".

If ASCAP want to argue against these ideas, they've chosen a hard task for
themselves. Probably all they will achieve is reinforcing the music industry's
image of being out-of-touch dinosaurs living in the previous century.

