I sure hope Gabriel likes my music, when the day is done.

What about art people enjoy and but choose not (or refuse) to pay for? When someone acquires a song, an album, or a movie, from a PTP network, they take pleasure in and consume an artist's work, yet choose not to support it. Or when someone buys a bootleg recording of a concert, or a pirated DVD.

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Why is being an artist considered different from, say, a doctor, or a lawyer? While salary is (somewhat loosely) correlated with competence, there is generally some base level of living wage that being a doctor will provide. Why not for us?

By no means am I trying to say that the situations should be similar; but nor should we assume they should be different, either.

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I've taken my stand on the former issue, too. I always purchase (usually in CD form, but not always) the music I listen to. I do not allow (when I can control it) other people to burn my CDs. I believe it's my moral obligation. Someone who downloads a ripped song is saying they want the art, they just don't want to pay for it. In my personal moral code, that's as much a type of theft as taking the twinkie from the Supermart. I understand other people have different perspectives on it, but I am only making these moral decisions for myself.

If doctors and lawyers didn't produce services people felt they needed, they would struggle too. If no one got sick, needed contracts, or got sued, they'd go out of business. It's both a matter of the availability (CAT scans are not broadcast on public radio) and of people's choices of what they value enough to spend their money on. It's also an issue of percieved necessity. Given a choice between that surgery to relieve and abcess and buying that painting from the artist you like, most people will see the surgery as more necessary. Obviously being able to have both would be the ideal, but few people are in a position to purchase all of what they want and need.

I buy art. I have purchased graphic art recently (and told the artist that she needed to increase the price). I just got two CDs in the mail last week. I buy tickets to the opera, or concerts, or theater. I buy tickets to museums to see art. However, I buy the art I enjoy, even while I recognize the right of artists to create types of art I do not enjoy. I do not think, however, I am obligated to pay for the art I do not enjoy, except possibly through a portion of my taxes.

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I guess my real point is that the very existence of trading on PTP networks implies that a large portion of our population feels that what they are doing is not wrong; that (consciously or subconsciously) something about music, or movies, or what have you, entitles them to acquire it for free.

Should this be?

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Interestingly, no one feels that top-notch gourmet food should be free. Perhaps this is because its material cost is apparent to everyone.

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I think it's more about people's capacity to get art for free. If folks could download gourmet meals as easily as they do MP3s, you can bet they would and find some way of not having a problem with it. One difference, of course, being that much art is easily reproducible whereas most gourmet cooking cannot be recorded, photocopied, photographed, etc.

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There is also a question of marginal cost. If the marginal cost of producing food had fallen to nearly nothing, then we would see a whole lot more 'downloading' of gourmet food. Indeed, if the marginal cost of producing gourmet food fell to nearly nothing, current gourmet food venders would have to adapt their business models -- patronage at restaurants would drop off.

One reason we are seeing so much trading of music on PTP networks is beings the economics behind the music industry has radically shifted -- and the industry has spent much of its effort of legislating its old business model into a new world, rather than investing in the opportunities the internet as a distribution mechanism present.

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Forgot to add, much of the ptp file trading that is occuring today is not necessarily bad for the music industry/musicians. When someone downloads a song, that person is either:

1) Downloading music that he would not have purchased otherwise.
2) Sampling music that he plans to purchase if he likes it.
3) Downloading music in place of purchasing music.

Type 1 has no effect on music sales, and type 2 actually increases music sales. Only type 3 reduces music sales.

(no subject)

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sen-no-ongaku.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-05-10 06:59 pm (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

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ppaladin.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-05-10 07:04 pm (UTC) - Expand

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shgb.livejournal.com

on the other hand, I'm guessing you wouldn't buy a 20x16 oil painting based a 2x2 crop of that painting. Yet this is what music artists, most of them anyway, expect you to do... they put their best track or two on the radio, and then expect you to buy an album based on that. Hell, some of them can't even get on the radio. Am I supposed to buy an album just because an obscure German 'zine said it was good?

If I'm going to spend $15 on a CD, I want to know what's on that CD.

Now, sure, downloading an album for free that you would otherwise pay for certainly hurts the artist (or at least, it hurts the artist's label), but I don't buy into the idea that every download is theft. YMMV.

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And you're entitled to that opinion. But going back to the gourmet food idea... it's like saying your first meal at a restaurant should always be free. That's not the way the restaurant business works, and we don't expect it to.

And actually, I decided to buy the art I bought based on a smaller and lower quality digital picture. So your example is exactly what I did (although it wasn't as expensive as an oil painting, well, neither is a CD).

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shgb.livejournal.com

I've done the same thing (bought an oil painting based on a smaller, and lower quality digital picture). I've also done the same for music... bought a CD based on a smaller, lower quality file (aka MP3).

Just to clarify, when I said 2x2 crop, I meant just a slice, not a shrunk down version. The analogy being to a single track off an album.

Honestly, a comparison of recorded music to gourmet food or theater or original paintings is inherently flawed. With theater or food or other "performance" art, we're paying for the performance. We're paying directly for the material presented to us, which we consume, and which cannot be consumed by others. Once something is recorded, be it a video of a theater performance, an audio recording, or digital photograph of a painting, I think the equation changes dramaticly. Once the reproduction is created, the cost of producing additional copies is marginal, and, obviously, priced as such. At that point, I don't think it's unreasonable to expect to be able to try before you buy.

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And I don't think it's unreasonable for the artist to have the expectation to be paid for the music I choose listen to, even if I end up not liking it. I've made my own choice in this equation, and I understand other people have made theirs differently, and am ok with that.

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Well...to address a more specific point of yours, with the advent a service such as iTunes (I don't know whether other, similar services exist), the expectation is no longer that to purchase one song, you also have to purchase songs you don't know whether or not you'll enjoy.

To address your larger point...I agree that since things such as photographs, music, movies, etc., can be reduced to information and reproduced as such, that our relationship to them is different, both personally and economically. But (as I said in my other comment) the right to sample is not the same as the right to consume.

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Am I supposed to buy an album just because an obscure German 'zine said it was good?

Actually, I have done something, and been quite pleased. Then again, I also had to note that their reviews usually meshed with my opinions.

on the other hand, I'm guessing you wouldn't buy a 20x16 oil painting based a 2x2 crop of that painting. Yet this is what music artists, most of them anyway, expect you to do... they put their best track or two on the radio, and then expect you to buy an album based on that. Hell, some of them can't even get on the radio.

Well, you probably already know that radio time is paid for by recording companies, who decide (often without the artists' input) what songs off of an album are worth putting on the radio. Now, of course, a band can choose not to buy into that system. But that doesn't allow us to ignore the system.

If I'm going to spend $15 on a CD, I want to know what's on that CD.

I agree that some foreknowledge of something you buy is important. But having a concrete sense of what's on that CD, and having what amounts to complete ownership of it without having paid for it are very different things. Can you eat a fancy meal before agreeing to pay for it?

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shgb.livejournal.com

I agree on all points.

The only thing I disagree on, truthfully, is the absolute moral judgement that downloading a track of a P2P network is exactly the same as stealing a twinky. If I steal a twinky, the store can't sell that twinky again. If I download a track of Kazaa the artist hasn't lost anything until I decide that I really like the song and I'd rather keep listening to my MP3 instead of buying the CD (or single track off iTunes or whatever).

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Downloading something and never paying for it is saying that the artist does not deserve compensation for the artistic product you are enjoying. If it's just a matter of *when* you buy it, then it doesn't matter. But instead it's a matter of *if* you buy it. Does an artist then not deserve compensation for a piece you listened to several times, but finally decided wasn't worth 99c to you?

Re: while we're on the subject of P2P

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shgb.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-05-10 08:19 pm (UTC) - Expand

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I think the issue I have is if an artist has had *no say* in whether or not to make his/her/their work available on a P2P network. I imagine that there are quite a few musicians and such who use such networks to advertise their music.

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While information is potentially infinitely reproducible and a Twinkie is not, you are still taking something whose owner has not explicitly allowed you to. The absence of material loss is not justification.

Re: while we're on the subject of P2P

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shgb.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-05-10 08:51 pm (UTC) - Expand

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Actually, I have done something

Uh..add "like that".

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sigerson.livejournal.com

I like it "like that".

I have no useful thoughts to contribute to this discussion. It's all korma-centric right now.

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I would argue, rather than ask 'should artists be better rewarded' ask, is there a problem with our current system -- if so, how can we fix it? Do we raise taxes to establish more grants to support artists, such that artists need concern themselves with 'making money' less? If so, we must also taken into account the market distortions that such a grant-making body would create. An artist would also need to be adept at grant applications and such to receive any of this cash (just as most big name scientists today often spend more time applying for grants that will fund their projects, than working on the projects themselves).

I guess where I am going with this is if artists should be better rewarded, where should that money come from? While our capitalist system is far from perfect, keeping the market as free as possible allows our own innate greed/desire for more video games, money, etc, to serve as an engine for innovation and development.

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I'm not asking, "Should artists be better rewarded?" I'm asking, "Should they expect to be rewarded at all?"

I suppose, in a larger sense, that means, "Do we, as a society, have an obligation to support art? If so, how do we decide what art is, to what extent should we support it, and what subsets of it should we support?"

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Ah, I think I was confused by your question. There are other ways to support art than through money, many more important ones. To reference my subcategories below:

Fine art should be supported through money, private if possible, public if necessary (which it probably is).

"Idea" art should be supported through protecting the constitutional rights of freedom of speech and expression.

Entertainment art should be supported through copyright law, or, where copyright law breaks down, through some other legal structure which protects intellectual property.

Performance art should be supported through art programs in public education which give children an interest and enjoyment in art (this also serves to support pretty much all other forms of art, and has fringe benefits as well).

So yeah, grants, rights, legal protection and public education. These are all important.

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Well, I'm interested in your answer as well; perhaps, in trying to be pithy, I ended up unclear.

I don't necessarily mean to have reduced my proposal to those questions I asked of

ppaladin...

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As a society, we must either reward artists sufficiently to encourage development in the arts (IE copyright) or assume that doing art is its own reward. I would argue that seeing art as its own reward is inefficient -- forcing a truly good, truly dedicated artist to work a crappy second job to support an art habit makes society less rich -- that is, if the net worth of the art that the artist would produce is 'worth' more by some impartial societal scale than the net worth that the artist would otherwise contribute at a non-art job.

Disregarding the role of the artist for a moment, if we as designers of a society want the society have more art, we need to offer sufficient rewards to encourage people to dedicate their time to producing art.

If an artist can not expect any sort of rewards (IE able to put food on the table, not huge amounts of riches) then the realm of art becomes an elite enclave, for the independently wealthy and those supported by the wealthy. similar, perhaps, to the patronage system.

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Interestingly, I feel that the predominant attitude in most of Western culture (and maybe others, I don't know) is the one you call 'inefficient' -- that art is produced for art's sake. I'm not yet sure whether I agree or disagree.

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If an artist can not expect any sort of rewards (IE able to put food on the table, not huge amounts of riches) then the realm of art becomes an elite enclave, for the independently wealthy and those supported by the wealthy. similar, perhaps, to the patronage system.

I would argue that the patronage system actually had the opposite effect of what you claim when it was dominant; at the very least, most 18th- and 19th- century composers whose music we still know today were supported by patrons either wealthy or royal.

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If an artist can not expect any sort of rewards (IE able to put food on the table, not huge amounts of riches) then the realm of art becomes an elite enclave

Even in such a system, though, what about a song I write to celebrate a friend's birthday? What about a nice photograph I happen to take while on holiday, and frame? I (though I have no idea whether you) would still qualify those as art, though they won't be displayed at concert halls, or shown in galleries.

(no subject)

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ppaladin.livejournal.com - Date: 2005-05-10 06:56 pm (UTC) - Expand

From: (Anonymous)

Well, as someone who will very soon be a lawyer... ;) An artist is different from being a lawyer because one is a lawyer by profession. There are few, if any, people (to my knowledge) that practice law as a hobby. Whereas there are professional artists and amateur artists and those who just create art for fun for themselves and/or their friends.

As a doctor or a lawyer, your work is entirely for the benefit of someone else. Whatever joy or satisfaction you get out of helping others or proving your skill, this is secondary to doing your job well so that the sick are healed and the law upheld. This is not to say that some artists are only producing art for the enjoyment of other people, but art is a rewarding enough endevour that many, many people would do it would do it just for themselves.

As for the copyright issues, you may be getting into a whole different topic there ;)

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