[p2p-research] Arguments against generalizing copyright-less strategies for musicians, was: arguments against applying open/free to other content

[M. Fioretti]

Greetings, everybody, and thanks to Michel for the interest in my
thoughts and the invitation to discuss them here. I had said I'd wait
a week to answer to finish other work, but the discussion is just too
interesting to wait.

Some general points before I answer in detail to some of your comments:

a) I have changed the subject because I don't think the one Michel
   used to present my article reflects its main point. I'm not saying
   that open/free doesn't apply to other content. I'm saying that the
   arguments usually brought to the table to say that copyright should
   be abolished altogether seem much less solid or general than
   advertised

b) I'd suggest to please read again http://digifreedom.net/node/58 and
   http://digifreedom.net/node/59 before answering to the comments
   which follow.

c) Before answering, I've read all the messages in this thread so far,
   and I already knew all or almost all the counter-arguments. With
   all respect, I'm not really interested in knowing and investigating
   more about music and musicians. Not now, at least, and I'll dare to
   suggest that focusing there may not be the most effective strategy
   to fix copyright problems. I've published some thoughts about
   _copyright_, not about music and musicians. I have just been
   forced, you may say, to include music and musicians in the piece
   because that's just what I've often found repeated without enough
   analysis.

   Several things I've written may be summed up as "whatever the right
   thing to do about copyright is, maybe the idea that you can
   generalize to all creative activities what has been proved to work
   quite well for musicians is a myth, or at least it needs much more
   investigation to be accepted".

   Copyright or its abolition impact much more than music. Fixing this
   problem in a way that works wonders for musicians may be...
   suboptimal, much like fixing the problems created by proprietary
   software or software patents in a way and inside a mental framework
   (the GNU/FSF way and framework) made to order on the brains and
   interests of enthusiast programmers, that is of a tiny, terribly
   tiny minority of all computer users of today. I already knew that
   musicians can live well (if not better), without ever doing the
   "all rights reserved" thing, thank you. What I ask in my first
   article is, "are you really sure this is equally true for all
   creative activities, or that abolishing copyright because musicians
   would be better off without it is really necessary and effective"?

d) I've seen the word "artist" thrown around a lot in this thread, and
   I've done the same myself. However, unless explicitly noted, I use
   the terms artists, author, creator as perfect synonyms in this
   context. I suggest it is crucial to keep in minds all these
   meanings.

   Because, again, copyright impacts on, or covers, much more than
   music: music, pictures, source code, novels, technical manuals,
   lyrics, text-books, movies, stock market analyses and so on. Trying
   to separate all these activities, by finding a separate solution
   for each of them, is both intrinsically wrong and practically
   impossible. So you must look for a solution which is feasible and
   works decently for all the involved activities, from real peaks of
   artistic inspiration to very prosaic and boring texts.

This said, I'll now answer some specific points of your messages:

Samuel wrote:

> Most our argument seems to boil down to getting rid of copyright,
> vs. keeping it, and "myths" that you think people have or perceive
> about these issues.

Most of my first article is simply "whatever should happen to
copyright, the "facts" that people usually quote as natural truth
against it are much weaker and/or less general than they seem". And
it's not a perception of mine at all: that article is little more than
a reformatting of things that any number of people have *actually*
said to me as "facts", often accepting them without any thinking, and
of my answers. One of the reasons I wrote that piece is that I had had
to repeat those things so often that I thought I may save some time in
the future by just handing a link and the number of the answer.

> I think you should do some talking to artists, and musicians who
> make a living from art/music, you may be surprised about their
> attitudes.

see point c) above

> I think you are wrong that saying that "side jobs don't even count
> in discussing these issues". Maybe they do not count for you, but
> they sure as hell count for me. There is absolutely no reason not to
> consider *anyone* who is making money, and decisions about making
> money as an artist/musician/creative, into the equation.

there is probably a misunderstanding here, sorry. I meant "side jobs
of the artist", as is "let's ignore the assumption that creative work
should just happen as a part time activity, while the artist's food
and shelter are paid by a non-creative job of the artist". I didn't
refer at all to other jobs of other people around the artists, working
for or thanks to the artist himself.

> The ways that you discuss are not the only ways to survive as an
> artist.

Did I said they are the only ones? Where? I said let's not exclude any
single way, not even those coming from a (reformed, see second
article!!!)  copyright.

> the times when most independent artists are able to charge multiple
> license charges from one piece of work are often far less than the
> money they make from producing unique works for individual paying
> clients.

Pray elaborate on how this is really applicable for all kind of
artists (cfr what I wrote in Myth 3) and above all on how maintaining
a reformed copyright would _prevent_ this (which again was the
central, if not only, point of my article)

> in real practice, and in the emerging media ecology, there are more
> ways to make a living from creative works than just encircling them
> with copyright and demanding that any and all users pay you.

Please point to where I _deny_ this fact altogether. I say something
different: a) it is not true that this is equally effective and enough
for all kind of creative works; b) there is no reason and no harm to
not let the two (all) models coexist, not if copyright is reformed as
I suggest in my second article.

Stan wrote:

> 2. You say "But if this is the _only_ way to survive for an artist,
> if an artist cannot be just an artist full time, with as little
> powerful patrons and intermediaries as possible... it isn't a good
> thing for society as a whole, we haven't progressed all that much
> since the middle ages"
>
> This assumes the artists are all of sufficient value to society to
> earn a livelihood.

I believe all this and similar discussions are *only* about artists
who indeed are or could be of sufficient value to society. Why should
we care about the others? They'd disappear very soon anyway, whatever
the model is, and would disappear much sooner or almost never appear
by reforming copyright as I suggest, something which would make the
current corporate behemots who push such artists today completely
unattractive to investors.

>  1. Distribution of information--nonrival goods--is continually
>   approaching zero cost.

So what? Production of quality information, that is presence and
constant, continuous, focused use of talent, is not going to be worth
less or approach zero needed time anytime before we all turn into pure
energy. If I'm a loser and create something worthless, I'll soon be
forced to change activity and it doesn't matter which model I tried or
had available. Let's just ignore that scenario.

But if I'm really good and it takes me twelve months full time to
produce the best novel ever written or the clearest text book since
the invention of the alphabet, is it really wrong if I (have the law
structures in place to) demand a contribution IF I WANT and/or NEED
IT, always in the reformed copyright context I suggest, directly by
every end user of my work and nobody else, to cover at least my cost
of living for those twelve months?

Does having this possibility forbids me to go with Creative Commons
for that or future or previous works or with donations, patrons,
whatever? Do you really HAVE to abolish the most direct, simpler and
fairest way to cover my costs (because that's what copyright would
grant in my scenario, not some faceless stock holders) only because
there are other ways, which yes, are probably much more effective...
for musicians?  Is it really NECESSARY??

Ciao,
	Marco Fioretti

-- 
Your own civil rights and the quality of your own life heavily depend on
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