A recent documentary film producer was asked to pay $10,000 for the rights to use a six-second cell-phone ring tone that was derived from the theme from ROCKY (Gonna Fly Now). Tragically, he couldn't afford a team of lawyers, so he had to pay a negotiated amount less than that, even though he was not convinced that he had to pay, legally, for it's use in a documentary.
That is not really farce anymore: it's tragedy.
(From a discussion on usenet)
Skip this if you don't want to be bored. But if you think
the CD as the medium of distribution for music might soon be obsolete...
Actually, your point is well taken. I have often thought and said that I
wish some days that the copyright-holders get exactly what they wish for.
Because it would kill them off more quickly. What I believe is happening is
that copyright holders want it both ways. They want to benefit from
widespread exposure. Then they want to assert the right to not expose their
work.
I firmly believe that if the government had required Microsoft to put
effective copy protection on all of their products, we wouldn't have the
monopoly we have now. And I firmly believe Microsoft knew that, and that is
why, when Word Perfect, for example, removed copy protection from their
product, Microsoft almost immediately did the same. It is therefore
hypocritical of Microsoft to demand protection from competition, by
asserting their copyright. Compete! you .... And, in fact, you can easily
see that Microsoft has been very circumspect on this issue. They know dimly
what Google understands completely: there's a lot of money to be made in
giving away your product.
As for music, copyright holders want their music exposed, on radio and tv,
in promotional tie-ins, scandalous newspapers, etc., etc. If you truly
believe that Ashley Simpson gets her face on my local entertainment section
because even a Kitchener, Ontario newspaper believes she is so talented she
deserves it, God bless you, but I don't. She is there because her corporate
Svengalis want her "exposed". They want you to see her face. They have
established a very sophisticated and effective system of promotion that
ensures that her face will be on magazine covers. They will also want you
to hear her music-- why else would you buy her CD? Most commercial radio
stations only play music by artists they believe will obtain wide exposure
through tv and magazines. One hand washing the other. They all profit by
selling advertising, not music.
Since I have no intention of spending one red cent on Ashley Simpson
products, I would have no problem with her corporate Svengalis being
absolutely, totally successful in preventing me from being exposed to her
music, her face, or her tantrums, without having paid for permission. Go to
it! Please-- be absolutely successful. Prevent her music from ever being
downloaded to my computer, or played on my radio station, or her face from
being on my tv, or in my local newspaper, unless I actually offer you money
for it.
I have absolutely no problem with finding my music by reading reviews or
hearing personal recommendations from people I know instead. I also like to
support local talent.
But that, of course, does not happen. And up until recently, this system
worked to the advantage of the big corporations, who could control access to
the actual product, the CD. Now the corporations have lost control over the
actual product, so the system is becoming unbalanced. But only if you
believe that for the rest of all time, we must all consume music by
purchasing a discrete material product, and music companies must only profit
through the sale of that physical product.
That model has been made obsolete by technology and the music industry (and
Hollywood and television) are crying the blues and they refuse to accept
it. They are the carriage-makers of our era. They deserve to go out of
business because they have failed to adjust to changing market realities.
In retrospect, does anybody doubt that if the music companies had moved
aggressively to make their entire catalogues available as paid downloads in
a high quality format that they would not have made a killing? It took
Apple to show them it could be done. But it might well be too late. As
with prohibition, individual transgression has been replaced with a
trangressive infrastructure that will not be easily suppressed.
Google, iTunes, eBay, and Amazon, and even Microsoft, are the new emblems of
astute corporations that understand where the market is going and what it
wants. All this wailing and gnashing of teeth is misplaced. The music
industry should sit down together, face the fact that the old model of
business practice is now obsolete, and move on to something new, or join the
other dinosaurs in the museum.
Congress, despicably, in exchange for ready election campaign cash, is doing
everything it can to keep an obsolete business model afloat-- this from
alleged believers in a "free market" ("free" for everyone else). It's like
requiring train companies to keep stokers employed. Or more like when a
city in Bolivia tried to make it illegal to save rain water in order to help
a private American company make a bigger profit with it's monopoly on the
water supply.
The museum is full of creatures that failed to adapt.
Finally, I absolutely believe that a very profitable music business model
can survive downloading. How does Google make money?
The difference is, the Recording industry will have to work hard and use
their brains. That might be asking too much....