Among the many forums that the overall debate over copy-protection and piracy has cropped up in, I see this all the time. I see the micro debate over whether or not file-sharing will ultimately lead to no more new music, movies, books, software, or whatever other intellectual property is out there. Whether or not artists will lose interest is creative endeavors because there is no money to be made in it.
Well, I half-heartedly agree that, without any copy-protection laws, the amount of quality (and that’s the key word here, “quality”) music, artwork, literature, software, etc. available to the public (whether at a price or not) would certainly decline.
But, on the same note (no pun intended), artists and scholars have been around much longer than the paid artist or paid scholar has. Remember the term, “starving artist”? That was a valid statement only 100 or so years ago when an artist did what he or she did almost fulltime and for little-to-no money.
My point is that, even if popular musicians or actors or producers were no longer earning $75k-plus per year, there would still be a lot of new music and movies being produced. I mean, think about it: how many truly talented book authors barely earn any money from their hard work, yet they continue to write and with passion.
Do you honestly believe that every rock-n-roll band started up because they expected to become wealthy rock-stars? Not really. Many musicians so love just getting up on stage or having someone compliment them on their recorded work, that that alone becomes their personal source of gold. It is the minor celebrity a garage band earns that is more important than the money, in the beginning. I know this from personal experience. Sure, earning a good buck or two is a prime benefit. But if money is the only reason you decided to work in the arts, sorry, but your shit must suck!
Since when has a world-class concert pianist not enjoyed what they do? Trust me, money was not the inspiring issue for that person in the beginning.
And many programmers, like myself, never ask for money for the code we write in our spare time. Why, if open-source is so successful for software, can’t an open-source version of the music industry be successful? Why not? I am not saying there is absolutely no need for software giants like Microsoft, Macromedia, Adobe, or Oracle; and I am not saying there is absolutely no need for record labels. But…
The issue of file-sharing, in the end, is more about who truly controls the promotion of an artist. The record labels fear not being able to promote their expensive artists as well as some local band throwing their MP3s around Blubster for free. Or should I say that the major record labels fear that spending millions in PR on their prime artists is no more successful than some independent artist using the Gnutella network to spread their name.
Let’s look at a popular band like Linkin Park. Here is a band that made a name for itself by simply getting their fans to spread their music all over the Internet. Then they got signed by Warner Bros. and became a Billboard chart-topper. Me and many of my friends listen to lots of European bands like Rhapsody and the Flower Kings. I guarantee that, without MP3s, incredibly talented bands like these would not have even found a market in the United States or some Third-World nation. The independent record label sector would not have grown so quickly in the past five years if it were not for music downloading.
In the end, this entire argument is not about the “starving artist.” No, it is about resisting change and the corruption of government in the U.S. and other democratic countries. (Canada being one of the more extreme on this issue.) As long as organizations like the RIAA and the MIAA have so much power (through money!) on Capitol Hill and in the courtrooms, the consumer and the public are at a loss. And frankly, any new, thriving artist is at risk too, not because of file-sharing, but because the entertainment industry is too stupid and too stubborn to change its business strategy.
I am not saying we need a “Star Trek”-ian world of working for free. But as a society, we need to be more open to change if we hope to evolve at all. And by the way, did I mention that I do not get paid to write 800-word opinion articles? I used to, but it doesn’t seem to bother me now.
(Wes Royer is a professional webmaster out of Williamsburg, VA, and a regular contributor of news headlines to Zeropaid.com. In his free time, he runs both the OpenUpAndSay.com online music magazine and the NetworkOfMinds.com news portal.)
