Forging a future for the music industry
Jim Carroll
Last Friday, the Contemporary Music Centre hosted a one-day conference at Dublin Castle on The Future of Music In A Digital World. My report on what was a very interesting, thought-provoking and occasionally entertaining day is here.
I have just read your report on the CMC conference on the Future of Music, and I felt compelled to drop you a note in clarification.
I have attended a number of conferences of this nature, and have been continually surprised at the absence of composers and creators from the discourse. By contrast, Friday’s conference had quite a few creators in the room and it was therefore not surprising that there was a concern from the floor about their future as professionals. In an industry which has taken the brunt of the impact from freely available content over the Internet, viable solutions still seem to elude us.
Gerd Leonard’s rather sneering and patronising presentation offered little to those who depend on music for a living, and his clumsy blanket licence solution ignored the unique relationship between a writer and their work. Equally, it seemed to take no account of more focused technological solutions available if the political and commercial will were activated to bring that about.
I agree with you that the panel discussion was disappointing. However, neither the question of royalties nor the considerations of moral rights can ever be left out of a discussion of the future of music, and in that respect, these issues needed to be ventilated. Most composers I know (myself included) are not interested in withholding permission to have our music used. In fact, quite the opposite applies as you can probably imagine. However, a right to deny that permission must be protected, if only to support the concept that creative control and the right to fair remuneration should rest with the writer for a reasonable period in the life of the work. I am sorry that you considered these matters as the “wrong questions”.
(The above comment received as an email and posted on the blog with permission)
Jim – interesting write-up.
The move to digital music started about ten years ago and yet it is still being talked about as if it it only came along in the past fortnight.
The point remains that free sharing of digital music has so far proved unstoppable. The regulatory cost and effort required to monitor use, collect royalties and punish misuse makes it unworkable in my view, but the industry still thinks it can make that approach work.
Music is moving closer to becoming what economists call a public good, which is a type of market failure where a good can be consumed by many people without affecting the quantity of the good concerned (e.e. air – the gas not the band) and it becomes impossible to exclude people from consuming it (e.e. provide an army to protect the country, they will protect even those who do not pay their taxes). In that situation there is no incentive to (commercial) to produce the good and in some cases this becomes a reason for the Govt to intervene to ensure that necessary public goods are produced (public goods are not the same as public services).
Music is different though. People’s motivation to produce it is not just commercial and some musicians (hi!) will continue to produce it at a cost to themselves. Secondly, it’s not entirely true that it is impossible to get money back from making music – it’s just not as clear cut as it once was. Thirdly, there is at least a general recognition out there among listeners that wholesale freeloading now will limit the amount of new music available tomorrow and so they are prepared to pay some contribution towards keeping the whole thing going, though probably not as much as they have been charged up to now.
Sorry for the overly economic take on all this.
I have a hippie version too, which I will type up at some stage.
When did morral rights ever get consideration in the past in the music industry, never mind the future!!
I think a lot of this depends on the type of future we are talking about. Bill is interested in pursuing a future with some links to the way things have worked in recent times, naturally, and there are many others who dismiss any of the old ways of doing things as unworkable in the technologically ruled future. I’m with Dubber in his evaluation in many ways. There’s a transition now and people are using the internet in new ways, and there are all sorts of technological gimics going on to keep heads over water, but there are so many vested interests, a new economic model will emerge for the future which will have to reward creators some bit, and take off some of the burdon that now rests with creators i.e. they are supposed to fund themselves, market themselves and the whole kitchen sink. The vested interests that shape the future of music are more likely to be the likes of Apple or software providers on one hand, and then the old-school strand, who will sustain a model based on buying records, limited aditions bits and bobs and what not because there will still be a certain selection of people who will want to and happily pay for the real good stuff. How that is divided is another matter but I think that’s the way its going to be.
Maybe Bill should really look at the future of his music, he’s been doing well at what he’s doing, but why not take his art somewhere new and exciting, and enjoy the way in which new conditions force him out of a comfort zone. Its challenging to try and compose a piece of music that sounds different to you the composer, but how much more challenging is it to compose something that sounds different, and maybe even exciting to a potential audience. Why doesn’t someone like Bill form a new futuristic Orchestra of musicians who YouStream concerts while they all perform from the comfort of their own homes, or in scenic locations around the world rather than saying you can not continue composing if certain things are in place. Why not why not why not should replace can not can not can not.
p.s. Welcome to the world of OTR commenters Bill, all be it by e-mail you might call this entering in the deep end!
p.p.s. I forgot to say that most of what Bill said there is a good healthy contribution to the whole debate, as will most people I’m sure.
The move to digital music started about ten years ago and yet it is still being talked about as if it it only came along in the past fortnight.
MDR – and there is no need to say any more. That’s what I find most bemusing about all of this – it’s not as if we didnt see this coming down the road 13 or 14 years ago. Back then, the main reason for non-engagement by the record industry was because labels didn’t want to interrupt the still huge windfall profits from CD sales. Back then, the labels would always ship off some junior to deal with the telecoms and tech companies who wanted to do business – I know, I was that junior at London Records who was sent to do meetings with Microsoft, BT and others about developments because I seemed to know something about the internet. Years later, I discovered there was an equivalent of me at every label who did these meetings, reported back with great excitement about what he/she had heard and was then ignored. Easier to sell more E17 CDs
What I found refreshing about the conference on Friday was an approach that it’s time to stop trying to turn back the tide and actually deal with what is happening. This means, as Leonhard argued, a reset. But the problem with this is that those who are now in the driving seat are going to object because it means a reduction or eradication of their income. It will require them to think anew and do anew, which they may not want to do. As a journalist watching my trade go through the same caniptions, I have sympathy for them but I wouldn’t advise them to sit back and poo-poo any and all attempts to provide solutions.
The points raised in your “music is different” paragraph were touched on by various speakers on Friday – I seem to recall some notes about how the fact that people won’t get paid for music may NOT discourage people from actually creating or composing music (the room’s creator quite was was filed by classical and new music artists who may not necessarily depend on commercial outlets for an income).
It IS a fascinating debate but, as you say above, it’s a debate which has been going on for years. Time for some actions.
STY – Bill has really joined the OTR debate via my polite suggestion. He emailed me this morning and I felt his response merited more attention than just my in-box. Happily, he agreed for me to use his comments here because I believe his points are valid and need to be heard. Also, I really (really) think more and more that the future question will ONLY be answered by those who MAKE and those who CONSUME music – people like me and everyone else in the middle can comment and pundit away, but the final say comes down to those two parties.
Apologies for the appalling typos by the way – I shouldn’t try to type and eat a ham sandwich at the same time.
Great write up Jim. I was at the conference on Friday too and I have to say I agree with all of your comments. I thought the morning sessions were well balanced and thought provoking, but I too felt that the afternoon panel discussion was not as successful as it could have been. While I see Bill’s point as the creator of a work wanting to maintaining control about how this composition is used, I don’t think it’s a feasible standpoint in the “Digital Age” (as Dubber coins it)
I firmly believe that the train has left the station on this one. While I’m still considering Gerd’s “music as water” approach I think the sheer population online, not to mention their will and technological adeptness, makes attempting the “three strikes and you’re out” control model via ISP’s the wrong way to go. Fighting against that only makes the lawyers a lot of money, and very little goes to any of the creators.
The fundamental relationship between creator and audience has not changed, it’s all the middle men, the make-up of the “industry” at large that needs to change. There’s an urgent need to be flexible, to adapt, to stay with your audience and not let them get the march on you. This doesn’t always mean doing it yourself, but looking at outsourcing the things you can’t do – which may no longer be things like recording, but rather things like digital management/development. There are countless (low cost) possibilities for connecting with a much larger market and connecting directly with them as an artist, that outweigh the cons in my mind. But you have to know who your audience is, what they are looking for and where to find them.
The opportunity exists to have a lasting relationship with your audience and there are many ways to monetise that relationship, it just might not be in core track sales anymore. The Trent Reznor model (http://www.wearelistening.org/blog/trent-reznor-marketing/) is often cited but it’s worth looking at again. Here is someone who used a fan base to attract overwhelming support, and sales, for his work. His most expensive releases are personalised and sell out quickly despite the price, he still makes significant sales via iTunes despite the very same tracks being available for free on his own site, and he has incredible support from a network of deeply engaged fans, without a record company being involved. He also talks directly to them via his blog, giving advice to other acts on adopting his model: http://forum.nin.com/bb/read.php?30,767183
Ok- I could go for days on this but we have to look at the world we find ourselves in right now, and not hark to the past or try to predict the future. Right now fans have unparalleled access to music as a product, and a huge percentage of what they are exposed to they will never be deeply engaged with or want to buy, but there is a huge amount more out there to choose from so that’s not surprising. As a creator you have to jump on the opportunity, get them interested in you, make it EASY for them to buy your work and price it accordingly, deepen that engagement and build a lasting relationship over time with a variety of ways for them to invest/fund/pay you.
I realise this makes it easier for the live musician than the songwriter/composer, but the model has to be addressed and maybe fee structures for that side need to change. Not everyone who wants a career in music deserves it, and nor do I believe that it becomes a popularity contest online- sure the commercial appeal will work in the short term (with most of the profit going to the industry) but there are key advantages for the “niche” acts too. If your music was once only relevant to say 1,000 irish people, you can now reach countless other samples of a thousand, each representing a niche in their own country, for little or no cost.
Anyhow, I agree with Jim- the creators and the consumers will make the decisions and change the model….but most of the creators need to get more directly involved and to gen up more on what’s going on, they just need to start doing it more quickly so we’re not led by those with a vested interest in maintaining the status quo.
Very good points MDR (am I allowed abreviate that haha)
I guess we’ll see if music is different. If nothing else, the fact that I’ve spent 2 hours practising very hard on the guitar and enjoying it before work each morning the last two weeks is proof enough that music is in fact different.
Maybe we’ll reach a low point though where music as a commercial enterprize kind of evaporates, and then we go back to the old days in centuries past where someone would take in a musician to hear them play, or where there would just be dacent trad jams in sitting rooms with gallons of hooch! Wouldn’t be so bad ay? Maybe’d I’d have to readjust that for the digital age though, a load of guys with midi controlers sitting at computer moniters drinking cans while IMing eachother!
Am happy to be called MDR/MDF/FDR – anything really.
To Bill Whelan: sorry to once again try to just be straightforward and honest (is that the same as sneering?), albeit with a bit of a jaded twist I have inadvertently acquired while working on digital music stuff for the past 12 years: with all due respect, it seems to me you are looking backwards 95% of the time, rather than forward. And this mindset of “should’s” “musts” and “has to’s” rather than “can’s” is exactly what is thwarting every hope for timely innovation in the music industry – while the world is moving at warp speed, the squabble over 30 year old concepts continues among those that have already enjoyed their success during the pre-Internet days; those who don’t know how to post a comment on a webpage rather than send eMails to the editor. Perfect.
Sure, I get it: you have already been successful, therefore you prefer protection over opportunity. Been there before. I guess that would be because you don’t need those issues to be fixed, any longer, going forward – it’s just all the other have-not’s that actually might prefer compensation over control?
Just like most everyone else that has clogged up the progress towards a Future of Music that just may work for everyone, will you, too, forever repeat those tired and hopeless arguments that were quite useless when they were dished up the first few times (remember Napster 1.0?)…? A right to deny permission is important? Sure – as we stated during the discussion – for the secondary use of your music in commercials or films, etc – but denying permission to LISTEN? To PLAY? Are you opposing the broadcasting license, too? Have you had a good look at the real world during the past 12 months? Is refusal getting anyone paid? A Bob Dylan song comes to mind: ‘come rather round people…’ you know the rest. Maybe.
Let me challenge you for a public debate on this, and then let’s see who’s sneering and who makes sense.
@mdr…FDR? Fumblin?
p.s. Jese, Bill didn’t see that one coming I’ll bet!
I agree with Gerd.
Thanks all for these very interesting posts. It’s great that this discussion has become so live. We in the Contemporary Music Centre have been aware for some time that the whole landscape for music dissemination (in the broadest possible sense of that term) has changed radically, due to changing consumer patterns.
Through our membership of our umbrella organisation, the International Association of Music Information Centres (and we had colleagues from 26 countries present at the conference on Friday) we know that the same concerns are being voiced in many countries at the moment, but it seems there is little overall coordination of the possible answers. There probably IS no ‘one size fits all’ solution, but if we can identify some of the questions, that’s a start at least. I believe that patterns of consumer behaviour are unstoppable – we see that in many areas of life – so any solution to all these issues in music has to work well and easily for the consumer, otherwise we’re wasting our time.
Please keep posting!
The root of the problem (from the industry’s point of view) seems to be that not all consumers are customers.
PS: this whole thing was discussed in another recent thread on this blog:
http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/ontherecord/2010/06/10/where-fools-rush-in-the-problems-with-the-music-industrys-brave-new-world/
PPS: if we’re trying to suit consumers we should remebers that it’s not the consumers who are complaining about the current set-up – it suits them just fine.
Reading the recent posts on this topic, there are a number of assumptions that arise again and again, which from a composer’s point of view are both wearying and irritating.
1. There is an assumption that creators will make music whether or not they are properly remunerated. This is of course largely true, as the urge to make music has little to do with fiscal considerations. However, if we were to suggest that other members of our community – software designers, lawyers, doctors, teachers, civil servants, brincklayers – should work for nothing, then I wonder what kind of quality we might expect from their work. When I read STY’s assertion that “a new economic model will emerge for the future which will have to reward creators some bit”, I was appalled by the patronising tone and lack of understanding of what it is like to have to make a living as a composer.
2. Another assumption that regularly appears is that those who do not agree with “futurists” are somehow technologically ignorant and stuck in the Dark Ages. In one of his many smirking asides to the conference, Gerd Leonard suggested that these are the kind of people who “have their emails printed and read to them”. The facts of course are different. Most of my composer colleagues are very techno-savvy, and for my own part, I have been using Macs since the arrival of the SE 30 in the 80′s for sequencing, score notation and sending files over the Internet. The truth is that Leonard’s rather crude “blanket license” proposal does not take into account the power of the current technology to develop a far more forensic and efficient method of royalty collection. Unfortunately the political will is not there to instigate it, and other interests exert a very strong influence to delay and impede its implementation.
Like aoife, I agree with Jim Carroll when he says that this is a matter for the creators and their audience. In fact, I made this very point at the conference – at least once. I have initiated a conference to be held in Berklee School of Music next year which will involve creators – young and old. The purpose is to widen the debate to include their points of view and to encourage us all to imagine how music is and will be used in the transformed world we inhabit.
Until then, may I encourage all those engaged by this subject to please tread carefully. We may have to rebuild the whole structure, but there are certain fundamentals that are worth keeping. The train may have left the station, the horse may have bolted, but to continue the aphorisms, let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater.
comment on irish times blog
Thanks for the post Jim and for all the comments so far. It really is encouraging that the conference sparked so much debate and we’re delighted in CMC to have played a part in bringing folks together on these vital issues.
The key point as others have said in the comments above is about the creators and the audience – how artists and musicians can get paid for their work and how the audience can best connect with musicians. A system based on fairness for the artists is a key to any future for music – musicians and composers must not feel that their music is exploited or misused in any way, which is, I think one of the reasons why the debate became a little heated in the afternoon session.
There was a lot of talk during the day about music as a commodity – it is more than this; for many it is a cultural expression so when thinking about solutions to the problems we face we need to be mindful of how artists see their work and respect this.
I agree with Aoife that the train has left the station and there is no point in trying to fight change. It’s not and won’t be the only time an established industry has resisted change. There is a certain Darwinian logic in all the developments in that only the strongest and smartest will survive. We do need to rethink many aspects of the industry but we do have to take into account where we’ve come from and adapt quickly to the disruptive technologies which the Internet offers.
I see the future of music around greater engagement between audiences and musicians. The Internet has made this possible and there are now more and more ways in which artists can engage with their audiences online. Once you have this connection it becomes easier to expect people to pay for your work. Ultimately I still think that people will pay for music – we just need to be smart about how we go about charging and base future business decisions on convenience, fairness, and openness. The rise of micropayment systems (witness Apple’s App store for instance) will make it more convenient for people to casually pay for music online and these will help stimulate increased sales for music provided they’re fairly priced.
The interesting thing about this conference was that there was a general acceptance that we need change of some sort. This is a great starting point and basis for moving forward. After reflecting on the day, I am optimistic about the future and feel that musicians and audiences will make this change happen and we will all benefit from these changes. Let’s hope that this change comes quickly and that we keep the lawyers out of it!
Don’t feel so bad guys – can you imagine what the Encyclopaedia Britannica feels about the online competition.
” When I read STY’s assertion that “a new economic model will emerge for the future which will have to reward creators some bit”, I was appalled by the patronising tone and lack of understanding of what it is like to have to make a living as a composer.”
Apologies for the tone you got from that Bill, but I actually meant it as a hopeful remark. There are many people who would predict that income would totally evaporate for the majority of musicians in the future, and in fact, the majority of musicians today lose extremely large amounts of money, money that is earned in a day job. My point was, that it would be fantastic to have a future where some kind of model would emerge, where there would be a hope of sustaining a living off music. I’ll admit, I don’t know what it is like “to have to make a living as a composer” on a number of fronts: a. I compose music for fun, b. I one day aspire that the music I make will help me sustain or partially sustain a living, but that isn’t the be all and end all for me. If you “Have to sustain a living from music”, that’s tough, but you don’t have to, go get a job in spar and compose for fun. c. I am 21 years old, I have limited resources, and any money I’ve ever earned through part-time jobs, busking, confirmation money etc has gone on new instruments, recording equipment and trying to better myself as a musician. The reason why I haven’t made a full-time living from music so far in my life is because I’m still learning, I haven’t earned it with a new sound/something interesting people want to pay for/see in a live concert setting, and I haven’t yet finished experimenting with sounds, or a direction I’d like to focus my efforts. I have probably composed as much if not more music than you in the last year, ranging from classical, to a so far clumsy but fun type of rock music, to electronic, hip hop and the list could go on. I’ve mixed/produced my own recordings, some of which I’ve made commercially available and I’ve produced work for other people. I’ve played over 60 live shows in the last year in one way or another, and yet, I don’t expect money back for it, I’d like money back for it, but I’m happy to try and improve, and learn more, and maybe one day find a way to make a living off it. If I made a living off it, I would have more time/resources to improve even more again.
So to summarise, no I don’t know what it is like to have to make a living as a composer, but I’m working on it and sure looking forward to maybe achieving it some day. If I had half of the success/talent under my belt that you have Bill I wouldn’t be complaining/arguing about securing the kinds of income streams that provided a means of sustaining financial stability in the past, instead I’d be coming out with all musical guns blazing, relishing the best thing about being a musician/composer – exploring new ways to create and challenging your own abilities in and out of music. You have a far better platform than me to brave the future, yet I’m less afraid of it. I don’t care if noone wants to pay for my music in the future, because noone does now, why would that change, maybe your fear comes from what you’ve already succeeded, but I sure hope you don’t get that job in Spar and rather I’d hope that you push yourself in some new direction, and learn to adapt and improve on what is already an impressive legacy.
*rant over*
p.s. MDR, nice point, lets take Wikipedia to court for making knowledge free.
I think what we are seeing here is a gap in ideas between established artists and newer, less established artists.
One one hand there is understandable concern on the part of successful established artists who rely on royalties and music sales for a large part of their income.
On the other hand there is the majority of artists who earn very little in royalties or music sales and therefore have to look at other potential sources of income to make a living in the music business.
I would place myself in the latter category and with the greatest respect to Bill Whelan I feel we as composers and musicians have to learn to accept the fact that in this digital age the chances of earning a large income from royalties and sales is limited, even if we are lucky enough to have a hit single, hit show, hit album.
For the past 10 years people have been downloading music for free. Anytime the industry tries to prevent it by childishly suing some 13 year old kid the people rally and find other means of downloading and sharing music.
When I was a kid I shared music with my friends down the road by copying tapes, nowadays kids share music with their friends across the world via the internet.
As Gerd points out in his book Music 2.0, the positive aspect of all this is that this is an age where Niches are Golden. Now more than ever if you work in a form of music that isn’t likely to sell bucket-loads of CD’s, then you can reach a far wider audience than you ever could before the Music Biz executives controlled things. The best way to do this is to let your music out there for free or at a low cost. The benefits will then come to you through gigs, commissions and yes even sales and royalties which wouldn’t have come without this kind of free access.
If you become a cult act, like Mark Kozelek for example, you can then depend on a certain fanbase to buy the limited edition vinyl print of your album and your updated lyric book whilst also reaching less dedicated fans by offering an mp3 download for a very reasonable price. Mark has embraced the digital age in an ingenious way. Check out his website http://www.sunkilmoon.com
Gerd is not suggesting artists lose the right to refuse advertisers permission to use their work. This right is still in tact and will likely remain so. He is just suggesting that music fans around the world like sharing music, they like uploading tracks to youtube so they can create playlists for parties. In other words they LIKE MUSIC.
So if a kid is downloading and then play-listing your music on youtube, embrace it, let them, don’t sue them. Once they become your fan then they’re more likely to see you play when you come to town, they’re more likely to tell their friends that your music is great. All of this adds up to more opportunities for you to make a living out of music.
Of course it also means that the more successful artists won’t make as much in royalties and sales as they did in the pre-download age, but this has been happening for 10 years. It’s time to accept it and respond to the challenges of the digital age.
It’s the age of permission not control……..
Thanks for all the advice about what to do with my music STY. With regard to your “rant”, please be assured that I am driven not by fear for myself, but for guys just like you who are starting out. There was a period in my career when a tax-free royalty cheque made such a difference to my quality of life and my peace of mind. I remember that time very well, and I certainly would not wish any diminution of that on the next generation of composers. It may surprise you that people do not always act solely in their own interest. Sincerely, Bill W.
I’m coming late to this, as I wrote a comment last night that somehow got lost in the ether and I’ve had to compose it from scratch again… and brevity’s not my forte. As a result, I run the risk here of stirring up a battle that seems to have resolved itself somewhat. Be that as it may.
The mantra to keep repeating to yourself here is: “Well, it’s complicated…”
My own issues with Gerd’s essentialism and media-centrism aside, what he’s trying to aim for is a solution that addresses the needs of people who are trying to make a living selling (or otherwise making money from) recordings of music, which is a laudable and commendable goal. Meanwhile Bill is trying to assert the importance of that special relationship that exists between artistic creators and their works, which is an intangible and ineffable, but very real bond. I’ve met and worked with enough composers to understand that composition is not merely a way of making money – and that the creation of a work of art is expression and creative outpouring. An unreliable, perilous, but incredibly fulfilling way to make a career – and very few can make it work. But it’s not the creation of a product – it’s an extension of the self, and as such precious. It’s important that the work be subject to the same principles and ethics that the composer adheres to – and that is at risk in a world where permission is assumed rather than sought.
Neither is arguing on the same ground, and so those positions are fairly intractable. But both are problematic, and only comparatively small pieces of a much bigger puzzle.
To Gerd I’d say: The selling of recordings is a relatively minor (currently representing less than a third of the economic value of the music business), historically recent and demonstrably fragile aspect of the industry. A blanket licence for music online caters to our present (and fading) cultural bias toward the primacy of the recorded artefact, but solves little and falls prey to the hubristic fallacy that ‘the industry must be saved’ (however you’d like that industry to be constituted) – which is neither true nor necessary.
Had we accepted that frame as we moved from sheet music to recordings as the main way in which music was produced and consumed, we would be living in a poorer world indeed. Culture – including cultural production around music – necessarily shifts when the media environment changes. As such, the rules change – and not just the rules about where all that money we used to enjoy can come from next. That’s true whether you’re EMI or a singer/songwriter with a self-produced EP and a MySpace account.
And to Bill: The composer’s sacrosanct relationship with their music, and its need for protection in a ‘Wild West World’ overlooks the similarity that intellectual property has with land ownership.
Like… it was here before we were, man.
It would be a rare composition indeed that didn’t draw from the culture that it springs from, that didn’t acknowledge any influences or antecedents, and that contained no phrases, chord structures or genre conventions that had previously existed. The art of songwriting is a unique and creative work, to be sure, but what it uses as its building blocks belong to us all.
The point here is not to dismiss the important arguments that these two important spokespeople make, but instead to say “Yes, and…” – and celebrate the complexity and diversity of this cultural form we call music – and contextualise the arguments they make by taking a step back.
Meanwhile, two fleas argue about which of them owns the dog.
That’s not to say that there aren’t difficult challenges facing people for whom music is their profession – whether an entrepreneurial venture, a corporate strategy or a monastic calling – but it’s simply to say that when we consider the notion of ‘solutions’, we seem to forget to factor in the most important bit: what music means to us all – as a culture and a society. And we need to think about what that music means in broader terms than simply its commercial, commoditised value, and who has a monopoly of control over its use or who should pay for it.
We’re talking about hip hop and folk, free improvisation, contemporary classical composers pushing against the boundaries of music, and mothers singing to their children. Music is acoustic installations, archives, collecting, DJ-ing, ceilidhs, gamelan, a first-time pianist learning Three Blind Mice, and television jingles. It’s bedroom remixers, singalongs around the campfire, the milkman whistling to himself, the soundtrack to a film or computer game, and that romantic and nostalgic “our song”. We’re talking about a city or country’s musical heritage, the poetry of lyrics, the background sounds in a shopping mall, teenagers rehearsing in basements, stadium concerts, the private acoustic environment afforded by an iPod, buskers on the street, or the simple act of picking up a guitar and knocking out a few tunes for the sheer pleasure of it. And so much more besides.
We’re talking about associations, meanings and memory. Music is part of what we say, make and do as human beings. Culture – which incorporates commerce, and allows for ownership and control – but they are neither the main part of the story, nor are they unassailable and universal rights.
I wish there were solutions. It would be nice to be able to simply ‘solve’ music in the digital age. To say ‘ta-dah!’ and be done with it. But thank god it’s messy, complex and fraught. It’s something we can get worked up about. Something that’s worth going broke over (trust me on this). Something that unites us and divides us. Something beyond and impervious to our private battles and public struggles – and to which we can return at the end of the day, and know that whatever else happens, it makes our lives that much better.
And as long as we can bear all that in mind, and as long as we have a clear grasp of the communications medium (not ‘marketplace’) that is the internet, when we return to first principles and rewrite copyright from scratch we can ask “What is it exactly that we are trying to encourage, promote, preserve or protect here? And for whom?” – and we will come up with good answers that factor in all of these positions in the interests of promoting and propagating music culture, rewarding musicians, enabling music fans and creating better access to music and music-making for us all.
Andrew – thanks for your comment, good to have you onboard as well!
“Meanwhile, two fleas argue about which of them owns the dog.”
one of the finest analogies I’ve heard for this
I was very happy to read Andrew Dubber’s contribution to this blog. I find myself far more harmonic with his considered and thoughtful approach, and while I would argue with him on a number of points, it is refreshing to see this topic being subjected to more careful consideration than is being peddled from other quarters.
However, there is one glaring misconception that seems to inform his approach. He warns that to emphasize the composer’s unique relationship with his music “overlooks the similarity that intellectual property has with land ownership”.
There’s the rub.
Land is indeed similar to intellectual property in may respects. You can own it. Sell it. Lease it. Parse it. Lend it. Borrow it. Give it away.
However, as Mark Twain advised “Buy land, they’re not making it anymore”. Here is where the similarities between intellectual property and land diverge. Land is finite. However, despite the fact that intellectual property may draw on previous influences, each piece is more or less unique and can be newly identified at its creation.
The ownership remains with the creator to grant whatever rights he or she sees fit. The right to copy. The right to perform. The right to broadcast. All these remain in the ownership of the creator to license out as they wish.
How we devise structures to allow fair access to these creations is what this whole debate is about. But I hold that, whatever emerges must retain the notion that the fountainhead right remains with the inventor/designer/creator of any intellectual property.
Bill Whelan
Bill I appreciate your concerns for future generations, but this kind of financial uncertainty is the very thing that has driven art for a long time now. Creativity may never again be a stable way of living as it was in recent decades for a small few, but that shouldn’t effect the creation process, and probably won’t. My main point is that arguing over similarities between land and music are interesting, and I’m not sure who’s point I agree with. Its not about whether new land or new music is being created or not, its all about what there is demand for at the end of the day isn’t it? In 1938 and 1939, land wasn’t worth anything, because a dude called Adolf Hitler decided he could get away with getting it for free. An extreme example, but think of the consumer the whole time in this argument and your closer to a sensable approach. Music is only worth what people want to pay for it, though its value to society and the composer may be much more.
Composers, creators and people on the primary transduction side of music must simply creat ethe best music they can, and try to gauge what way people want it delivered to them, and basically ride out the storm until there is a balance struck between how much people want music, and how much the creaters want for it. More useful however is thinking about a different connection between composer and consumer, something more special, and this relates to the whole niche thing.
I love Mr. Dubbers point about music existing in so many forms in society today, and I think the underlying point was there that music probably exists in more forms than it ever has. More and more of those forms are extremely difficult to monatise, and extremely difficult to value. Bill you argue about each piece of music being unique, though coming from a common inheritance of chords, words, ideas etc as Andrew suggests, but does that mean that each recording, each mp3, being roughly an exact replica of the initial originality is worth something? Every live performance of music is different, every copy of a CD or mp3 isn’t unique, unless it is made unique of course. So maybe that’s where the future lies. Royalties shouldn’t be focused on how many times a replica is used, but how many ways it is used differently, and how many times it is made unique, perhaps through licences, who knows, but we have to change the way we look at music in recorded, written and live form, and value it according to how much the consumer wants it, and how unique it really is.
It is complicated, and none of our bases for arguing any of these points are relevant as they are either based on the old way of doing things, or speculation about the future. Wouldn’t the best policy to follow be to keep creating while casting the occasional eye on how much people value it, how people want it delivered to them etc? ? It doesn’t matter what the composer values the music at, much like it doesn’t matter what the people in Waterford glass in Waterford City thought of what they were involved in creating, the were more complex things going on, much more powerful than what the primary creators thought or wanted that dictated it wasn’t working anymore. Not the most slick of comparisans, but i’m sure you you get my rough point.
oh crap, you might want to delete some of these Jim! Is OTR on auto today?
STY – just cleaned those comments up for you. Don’t worry, OTR is here! Just had a lovely late breakfast @ the Liberty Grill in Cork but we’re here.
Now, back to the Future of Music in the digital world debate. Have to say, I’m finding this whole thing to be very interesting – some fantastic food for thought above.
At risk of putting words in Andrew Dubber’s mouth, I think Bill Whelan takes Dubber’s land ownership comparison the wrong way around. Dubber’s relating of music to land ownership is precisely not that it is property, but instead that music is like land in that regardless of what rights and laws we attach to it, it is a part of the mass of human culture, ownership is something grafted on top of this as a social law. Across human history, ownership of music has never been the norm, it’s only the (relatively) recent rise of the music industry that has popularised this idea of “owning” music but this is by no means the natural state of affairs. This is not to say that composers do not a have a special relationship with what they create, but all works of music (and other arts) are a part of culture, the relationship a composer has with their work is a part of the network of relationships that the work has with everyone who comes in contact with it. The only moral right that this relationship gives is the right of attribution, the right to say “I made this” (a cornerstone of the Creative Commons licensing system), the rights to allow copying etc. are economic rights granted for a limited period, they are not “ownership”. The only way to keep control of your work is to never let anyone else hear it.
The right to allow copying/performance/etc is defined in copyright law, but the point of copyright law is to give the creator a time-limited right to monopolise the work before the natural state of affairs is re-asserted and it becomes public domain. The point of copyright law is not to lock culture away, it’s merely a shield legislation to allow creators the first bite of the pie they have made (so to speak). Although, as lots of people have already noted, the current state of copyright law is horribly distorted, a welfare system for entertainment corporations.
I believe that a lot of the problems we’re seeing now (with the possibilities offered by digital networks) are a backlash to the last century’s abuse of copyright, the commodification of music, the trying to make music “ownable”. Culture doesn’t work like that, once something is communicable then it’s chemically grafted into the minds of anyone who hears it, culture and property are completely at odds with one another. Sharing and communication are the norms of culture, we share things because we love them: and when we find things that we like then we want to support them and make them grow more.
The digital age is still in its infancy, the waters will settle down after a while, but as Andrew Dubber was saying, we can’t approach the digital age with the tools and mindsets of the previous age. I would like to see the laws that govern relationships between creators and society be completely rewritten, to allow creators to live on their work without having to sue their fans, but we also have to allow culture to be culture, allow sharing to be the norm again. I don’t think this is an impossible task, I think that creators and the public would largely be onside with this, there are a lot of middlemen who will simply not be needed, but it’s mostly the middlemen who are the problem here: I tip my hat with respect here to the many wonderful middlemen who understand that culture is an ecosystem and needs to be tended, not pillaged, you’re a rare breed but hopefully on the increase. What we don’t need is a desperate tightening of the legislative grip on culture, apart from the fact that it won’t work (file sharing constantly increases with bandwidth), it’s fighting the wrong fight and asking the wrong questions. The future of music in a digital age is (like the future of everything else in the digital age) is unquestionably bright, as long as we allow the digital age to be truly “digital”, and not just the electronic age in a vice grips.
Scott Mc Laughlin
Feel free to put words in my mouth anytime, Scott. You make me sound informed and eloquent.
Reading Scoot McLaughlin’s succinct and persuasive re-statement of the “creative commons” philosophy, it is hard not to be beguiled by the philanthropy of its tone. Who could not desire a world where music flowed like water, and was freely available to all? This heady Elysian vision is sometimes put forward by composers themselves, who are often even more interested than the audience in spreading their music as widely as possible. To speak against this is to run the risk of seeming ungenerous, greedy, protectionist and old fashioned. However, to speak against it I must – not because I disagree with the principle – but because in all of the material I have consumed from this side of the debate, I have yet to hear a proposal that indicates how a composer is supposed to sustain himself. In a world where the habit of paying for music is being daily excised from public behaviour, there is little material of a practical nature emerging from this utopian discourse to suggest how the next generation of composers are going to survive. Today, as freely available water is being scrutinised from the standpoint of sustainability, so also “free” music should be subjected to the same rigorous interrogation.
The technology available to us now is sweeping us along in an exciting and turbulent torrent of possibility. I am old enough to remember when the first drum machines entered the studio control room, followed by sequencers and then samplers. Like many others, I embraced all of this new technology. (I remember importing a Fairlight from Australia for a particular album project I was producing). All of this was intoxicating for composers and record producers. But as time advanced, many of us began to miss the organic experience of sitting together and playing music – despite all of our imperfections. In the early days the technology controlled us. After a while we learned how to gain control over it.
Scott McLaughlin’s point about the record companies and other middlemen is of course well made. As the early pioneers faded away, the corporate end of the music business performed for the most part, abominably – recycling and reformatting the same product, and reselling it to the public – devoid of creativity or innovation and nurturing nothing. As always there were exceptions, but for the most part companies are now paying the price for their lack of vision and their greed.
On a final point, I am sometimes dismayed that this very important debate is often notable by the absence of the creators themselves. Sure, there are plenty of commentators, cultural gurus, academics and self-styled “futurists” around, but it is remarkable how empty the seats look at the creators side of the house. It is at times like this, that I am reminded of the verse by Arthur O’Shaughnessy…
We are the music makers,
And we are the dreamers of dreams,
Wandering by lone sea-breakers,
And sitting by desolate streams;—
World-losers and world-forsakers,
On whom the pale moon gleams:
Yet we are the movers and shakers
Of the world for ever, it seems.
(With apologies to Jim Carroll for further poetic “ruminations”!)
Bill, more than half the people in this thread are music creators
you, me, STY, Mumblin Ro, Dave Flynn: with apologies to those who may be music creators but haven’t indicated it. Creators are the main talkers in this argument, what worries me is the lack of industry participation. The incumbent players appear uninterested in debating with the mere creators; a point that unfortunately mirrors the current ACTA lobbying situation where the recording industry rewrites globally applicable laws without public, or often even political consultation.
You don’t sound greedy, maybe a little bit protectionist, and the only time you sound old-fashioned is when you insist that music in the digital age is not social, it’s more social than ever! You do sound genuinely concerned, which is fair enough, every one of us is concerned or we wouldn’t be here arguing. We have a situation here where rapid change is moving the practice we know into a very different area, the ground beneath us is shifting. Your concern is that it’s not yet safe to move because the the way you do business is disappearing and no similar looking alternatives are in place yet; you and many others are on a shrinking island with no other islands in sight. My concern is that the industry is building legal/legislative obstacles that will lock us into the gatekeeper model of music business, obstacles that won’t ever allow us to leave the island*, and it’s their island so they’re making the rules.
Metaphors aside, I agree that practical solutions are thin on the ground at the moment, I know I don’t have one yet, and I think we both agree that the whole situation needs to be questioned and analysed. What I’m arguing against is the “shoot first” position that the industry is taking, surely this can’t be the best solution they can offer: those who can’t innovate, litigate…
I do understand their position, they’re concerned too, history shows us that in every great technological change there are casualties, mainly industrial ones; those too big, too slow, or too unwilling to change. I’m concerned that in their fear of Schumpeter’s “creative destruction” they’ll break the internet, lock it down to suit their business model and rob us all of a potentially game-changing environment just to protect themselves. Of course in any change there will always be early adopters, and equally there will be some people who want to stay behind until the new territory has settled down a bit. I’m not condemning those who want to wait a while, but I am condemning those who would destroy the future because it’s not the past.
What I’m not concerned about is that the internet is a problem for creators, history shows us that creators keep on creating, and adapt to the new, because creative solutions are what we do and because change is the engine of culture.
We’re all philanthropists at heart, we all want to think the best of others and help people where we can, of course we have to stop short when our own survival is threatened. Personally speaking, I’m happy to bet the future on the proposition that a sharing model is one that will allow creators to thrive, because I don’t see a threat to what I do and I don’t see any actual damage being done (I see some selling-plastic-discs** industries having a tough time but they’re reaping what they’ve sown). I’ve not seen any evidence that there’s a problem worthy of the sheer hyperbole and panic being spread by certain sections of the industry, while there’s an ever-expanding stream of data coming out that says no damage is being done and that the whole thing is net positive for creators.
I am talking utopia, because utopia is an idealised no-place that we strive towards and get better along the way: as Beckett said, “we can’t go on, we must go on” ***
A final (and slightly unrelated) note, with respect, I don’t think you really understand what Creative Commons is (especially if Mark Helprin is lighting your way). It’s simply a more finely grained tool for defining what people can and can’t do with your work, how can that be a bad thing? You might find this interesting: http://creativecommons.org/tag/mark-helprin
* with apologies for the “Lost” metaphor, it just came out that way…
** thanks to Mike Masnick for that phrase.
*** or even better Luigi Nono’s “Hay que caminar” soñando.”but we must go on” dreaming: from “Caminantes, no hay caminos, hay que caminar.” — Travelers, there are no roads, but we must go on.
While I’m on the topic.
“File-sharing has weakened copyright—and helped society”
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/06/file-sharing-has-weakened-copyrightand-helped-society.ars
Wonderful posts Scott, as another music maker I’m with you 100% on this, although you write it far better than I.
In respect to what will be the new system that replaces the old, we’re just going to have to accept that this is not going to be solved anytime soon. The problem of free v paid content is already evident in the newspaper industry, and as bandwidth and internet speeds increases it will become more and more evident in other areas, TV, film, books, etc. Eventually a quick and simple online payment method will be introduced and universally adopted ( my bet is either a credit card reader built into devices or a finger print reader) and this will change everything once again. People will pay for music, but for the moment we’re going to have to fly by the seat of our pants. In technological and cultural terms, we are living in a period of flux, and we probably will be for the rest of our lives. The relationship between culture and technology will utterly change, and really nobody knows how its going to work. But as Scott said,
“history shows us that creators keep on creating, and adapt to the new, because creative solutions are what we do and because change is the engine of culture.”
enda bates