The major labels strike an increasingly hysterical line about what’s legal and what’s not in music filesharing.
But it’s happening, and I’m more interested in whether internal controls, like a developing ethics of filesharing, are appearing.
Some things I hear are:
- Won’t trade indie artists
- Buy things afterwards if they like them
- Only give low bitrate files so downloaders have to buy the decent version
- Not linking to leaked albums
- Only overseas stuff
- Only local stuff (promoting locals, who aren’t making money anyway)
I read a thread on M+N promoting a blog called Sure ’nuff ‘n yes I do. The blog’s sole purpose is providing free album downloads from artists like Ash Ra Tempel, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, John Fahey, The Congos and Arvo Pärt. Aside from their good taste in music, I was a bit disturbed by comments like:
I don’t believe in selling music personally, I think it is something that should be shared. Not everyone has hundreds of dollars to spend on CDs. Don’t you think that poor people deserve to hear music too?
That’s nice, but the reality is someone will search for, say Mick Turner’s record, find the blog and download it, instead of going and buying it from whatever online store where it’s actually quite cheap.
And as Emmy posted:
it’s not just audiences who are poor, it’s artists too. An artist like Mick Turner isn’t rolling in cash, you know. He lives in suburban Melbourne with two young children and a partner who is also a musician – it’s not exactly a financially stable lifestyle.
It does feel cheap and mean. With the music by dead people, and the stuff that’s commercially unavailable, I say big ups. But many of those listed are amazing records by people who are still alive, and I think that sort of blog/fileshare situation disrespects the artists it purports to be about.
The alternative, and pretty seductive viewpoint (quoted from forum regular Blake3030) goes like this:
I don’t mind the Dirty Three. I’ve never heard Mick Turner’s solo music. Usually people from bands’ solo work isn’t as good as their bands work. I wouldn’t risk $25 of my money on it when I have a list of about 30 records I do like and want to own that i’m trying to find. However, I would download it for free and if I enjoyed it, I would buy it.
I tend to think that’s too idealistic. I mean could you imagine going into a restaurant, asking for a meal, and then paying if and only if the meal was a taste-bud sensation (and in the real world, most people not even paying for a mind blowing three chef hats 10 course spectacular).
A friend pointed out that the issue becomes one of scale: most people have shared a CD/record with a friend, made them a copy. But with blogs you make the ability to make a copy to a much wider group.
She says MP3s are starting to act more like unauthorised time shifted radio – which rings true, because people now have vast troves of MP3s, many of which won’t get a repeat listen. The question really doesn’t become how to stop it, it becomes how to harness it.
Comment by matt — October 31, 2007 @ 8:06 am
It’s interesting how little the parameters of debate have changed between this current argument over blogging and the previous ones over Napster.
Personally, my problem with blogs that are simply mp3 smosgasboards is that do little to nothing to actually think about the music they’re posting. The possibilities of a music ‘community’ around blogging are great – and on blogs like your’s and others that type of thing is happening – but so much blogging is so uncritical that’s it’s painful.
Comment by Lawson — October 31, 2007 @ 12:04 pm
i agree with lawson.. about the parameters of the debate not changing.
but maybe that’s cos it’s still so bloody hard to compare music and ‘art’ with practical things like food and toilets (things we need). even though food can be 3 chef hats like calico says, or 2 minute noodles.
basically, ppl will justify their actions til the cows come home – to suit their own desires.
ie. the most self-righteous music lover may pontificate about the ethics of to receive music and being fair to the artist – but then simply download til their personal bandwidth maxes out. *hey, worst comes to worst, at least the knowledge they gain can help further ‘expose’ the starving artist.*
ethics are a load of crap. one person won’t download from a torrent site but then will completely rubbish an artist unfairly. whose ripping who off?
Comment by Tim — November 5, 2007 @ 1:55 pm
[...] all my conjecture about an emerging ethics of downloading and filesharing, that’s really just about music fans, [...]
Pingback by Fortune Grey » Blog Archive » 14 year old girls and music ethics — November 6, 2007 @ 11:26 am
Apart from recordings by a few favourite artists, and a few local &/or independent artists who I particularly want to support, I’ve stopped buying music. I’ve gone from spending a few thousand dollars a year to a few hundred. I still spend at least as much or even more on gigs and merch tho.
Why? I don’t like CDs or vinyl. I have a room full of the stuff and would rather be rid of it. I listen to files these days. Much more convenient.
* Not MP3s. As a musician/producer, MP3s sound awful to me. They’re fine for podcasts or previews, but I’d never pay for them. These days I mostly listen to FLAC files, that I either download or rip from CD.
* Online music stores mostly suck. I will never pay for anything with DRM and I refuse to pay the current prices for crappy mp3s.
If there was an online store that sold FLAC files at, say, $5 per album, I might start spending thousands again. In the mean time I have no qualms with my behaviour.
Much of my favourite music these days is on free netlabels, and that’s a culture that I fully support, like open source software. In fact I run a free netlabel of my own, which I believe distributes some of the finest experimental music around.
Experimental music. Remember, many genres of music are not financially viable from the pov of selling CDs, and never have been. I have the scars to prove it.
Unfortunately we’ve been sold a lie by the mainstream media that all artists can make a living from CD sales and are therefore having their livelihood stolen every time someone shares something.
Even many obscure artists still believe this nonsense. Deep down everyone wants to be a pop star. It’s an illness.
Comment by Shannon — November 27, 2007 @ 11:18 am