A new ridiculous EU law - for whom it may concern

Unfortunately, I work in security and know to well the weaknesses of all of the new schemes. Even Palladium can't stop a simple output hack of the line and steering the signal back into some cassette recorder or computer audio in. And these type of physical hacks are done by 16 year olds (there has always been some type of phreaking going in that age range for years... I'd even put Farnsworth and the TV there). Plus there's always the microphone-recording problem when you play the music...

The big thing, howevere, is that music is, and always has been, something that can be done by a small creative entity (the band, or even often these days, an individual). But the record industry has attempted to make album production akin to movie production, with many positions like sound engineering, marketing, and, of course, executives sucking on the money line. And for many years, these entities that grew off of the creative artists have even taken control, and continue to decide these days who should be given the advantages of this leviathan machine.

But it is changing. With the a computer and the net, it is now quite possible for a band to do all of their production, engineering, marketing, and manufacture, and even printing, without getting up before noon. This is making the entire industry slowly obsolete. The same is happening for the movie industry too, but they haven't realized that yet. Also the animation industry is getting more and more power for rapid development now that well established object libraries are available with standard vector algorithms for all sorts of movements. It really looks like it is a return to the artist as creator which had diverged in these technical arts because of the sheer complexity of the process. But as the process simplifies, more and more these industries crumble. And they look more and more like the gasping railroad tycoons of the late 1800's, sending their buddies off to make laws and point guns at anyone who dare make a move towards their money...

Sad but truth.

Hum, galathaea I don't really agree with your point about bands doing all their work and movies becoming more of a commodity.

A friend of mine studied sound-engineering. Before he started, he had been a musician all his life, having his own studio at home and recording music which sounded kind of nice. As the final project for his studies, he made an album. Now, comparing the kind of stufff he made before and his album, there was a *huge* difference in quality and depth of the music (just from the sound engineering point of view). It may not be obvious that some recording is bad, but when you start comparing the same recording mixed by someone who knows how to do it and mixed by a hobbyist, you can tell there is a big difference. There are quite a few professions like that in the music biz that do contribute a lot to music and I'd hate it if every band were recording in their basement.

Movies are never going to become a commodity and cheap to produce. A movie is a highly complex thing which requires a lot of different people. If you look at the credits of major movies today, the number of people has grown quite a bit since movies of say the sixties. I'd hate it if movies were all done with CG (computer graphics, not codeguru :p) and I don't think this will happen. There will be more of course, but that doesn't necessarily mean they get cheaper to make. Who would go watch a movie that looks just like in-game graphics from some game ? So if movies are not done in CG, then you require props, locations, actors, cameramen, lighting, sound etc... And all of that is a big expense.

Having been the Chief Software Architect for Otari's first all digital console (Advanta), as well as having worked on their automated analog consoles (Priemer and Elite with Eagle Automation), as well as having been involved as a stage-tech for many years, I feel qualified to join in on this.

Both Yves and Galathea have valid points that do not need to conflict.

Prior to 10 years ago (the exact time is debatable but this is safe for illustrating my point), it was virtually impossible to produce high quality recordings without significant financial backing (recording company, university, rich daddy). This technonogy is not available for less than the average (small professional) band has spent on their instruments and amps. So the door is opened up to alot more people.

Equipment does not replace talent however (I know, I can get a decent mix, prevent feedback, etc, but other than that I have NO skill for producing music). When commercial sound was coming from the recording comanies, there were many bad Sound Engineers. Fortunately for the general publec, they were fired (or more likely never even hired) before we heard their work.

With the increased availabiliy of equipment and distribution channels we are sure to hear more. Some of it will be quality and some will be "less" [and I am NOT referring to musical styles here]. How all of the equations (currently with unknown coefficients) will balance is anyones guess. And that is all it will be a guess.

Amn, it is clear that you're not a supporter of intellectual property. The whole point of the law is that it tries to promote democracy, not inhibit it. It's protecting the rights of the person who created the material. If someone worked for years on something that could be copied, such as decoding the human genome, composing a masterful piece of music, writing a world-class novel, etc. then it's not fair for you to take it from them for free just because you can. They put man-hours into their work, and that translates to money. If you pay enough for it, fine, you can have it, but otherwise it's their property because they put effort into making it. This is the idea behind intellectual property.

In this country (not sure about internationally, but it's likely to be the same), the most frequently broken law - by far - is copying copyrighted materials. Of course there aren't going to be policemen patrolling your home for copied stuff and throwing you in prison for it because it's so common. But I know some people who won't even listen to a burned CD because it's not "fair" to the person who originally made the songs.

Let me give you an example. Look at the computer you're using right now. To create the hardware and software, to make factories creating these, to market it, the years and years of research and theory in the field of computers, the millions of man-hours spent creating these items, and the meticulous refinement of every aspect must be worth a lot. That's a no-brainer. Now, imagine you could copy this computer. You can have a completely identical computer - in fact, you can have as many as you want - for only a ten cents ($.10) each. Do you want another one? Sure you do. Go on, nobody will know. Now let's say the computer companies have put all these billions of dollars into creating these machines we have today, but they get no profit. Big deal, right? You already have all you want from them? Well, they'll be discouraged from continuing research, etc. because costs are high and income is in the basement. They go out of business. 10 years from now, think of all the great stuff we will have - but wait a sec, the companies all went out of business, right? We're stuck here. It's simply too dangerous for a company to risk itself and millions of dollars to create a computer, have it sell about a dozen times and then no more, because people are copying it endlessly. It's all about money. You can't expect the companies to exist without them making a profit somehow. The same thing exists for intellectual property - and the profit comes from your wallet.

You have to get the creator's consent. If they say it's free, then you've committed no crime at all. But if they say their work is worth $100, even if you think this price is outrageous, it's a crime to own it for $99 or less. Because you've stolen money from the owner of the property.

As for my opinion - go for it, you can't stop the masses from copying this stuff. But morally it's wrong. As long as you keep this in mind, then whatever you do will fall on your own conscience alone. But if you get caught, you've never met me ;)

Using Logic Audio Platinum with proper VST plug-ins for noise reduction and sound manipulation along with proper miking of instruments (and use of digital instruments with direct lines in), I and friends have been able to produce fully composed pieces with editing and mixing of a quality far superior to the recordings of the seventies (where line levels are often hideous, there is clipping everywhere, and whoever was on EQ was drugged so hideously that they must have been perceiving some completely different reality)... And that is today, where most of the music I listen to has been done by one or at most four or five people completely throughout the process. The stuff that remains done in other projects by others can easily be conceived to be done by programs in the very near future, as they are often the rote stuff where artisitic direction is masked by minutiae of engineering.

The same really is happening in movies, but as I mentioned, most of the movie industry hasn't realized this yet. It is so easy now with the a digital camera and, say, Final Cut Pro, to do all of the organizing, producing, directing, editing, etc. You just need actors and actresses for this media, as you would a play. Take a look at the decreases happening in staffs because of these technologies, like that in the recently released Tape, Chelsea Walls, etc. In fact you have things like Run Lola Run where the guys coming up with the movie and filming it are also the ones making the music for it. It is really becoming the artists direction because of the technological advances happening. I really stick by this. I may not think we are there now, or will be there in five years, but I think this is the process that is happening evolutionarily in these fields, and why we see so many legal responses occurring.

In fact, SolarFlare, I think its perfectly compatible with intellectual rights to be upset at these laws. Because the intellect creating these pieces are not the ones benefiting today from the legal actions. It is the fat, rich, old money that hasn't created anything but contracts and money sucking industries...

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and whoever was on EQ was drugged so hideously that they must have been perceiving some completely different reality

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Personally, I dont remember this being a problem, in fact it was often the point... :D

Of course it was a totally different culture back then....

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Originally posted by galathaea
In fact, SolarFlare, I think its perfectly compatible with intellectual rights to be upset at these laws. Because the intellect creating these pieces are not the ones benefiting today from the legal actions. It is the fat, rich, old money that hasn't created anything but contracts and money sucking industries...

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That's true, but you're distorting the truth and being very biased.

First of all, it's clear that you're not impartial to the situation as you have generalized all the people in question as fat, rich, and old.

Second, these people are the ones that work for the musicians (or other type of intellectual artist). The reason they get money from it is because they help "market" the product so the artist can get some money, too!

I'm a bit tired so it may not be entirely clear but you get the point.

I think its actually too simplistic of an interpretation of the economics to assume that the industry works for the musicians. When I was younger, I was a libertarian, and this was precisely the same type of response I would have given based on my readings of Hayek, vonMises, and Friedman. But as I've interacted, more, with the economy, I have found these notions to be incorrect. Here is why I make the claim...

It has always been a struggle for independent artists to make breakthroughs in music. The major corporations, through payola, distribution deals, and simple ownership of airwaves and outlet chains, had built themselves a great exclusionary industry through which they and only they could choose who would get popular airing. It was purely a control relationship they had over the artists. I am thinking of the well known suppression of certain black artists back in the first half of last century here. As rapcointelpro.com says, "If you don't own your s#!t, your just a sharecropper..." That, sharecropping, I think is the better economic model for the relationship between the industry (the land owners, since their relationship with the government in the backrooms has prevented increasing the bandwidth of radio for years now) and the musicians.

You see, an up and coming artist for years could not compete with the monolithic structure of control that the industry had constructed. Copying has been a problem since the age of personal cassette recorders, as other have pointed out. But I find it very telling that such a massive effort by the industry was not undertaken to suppress these new distribution channels until the internet came along and subverted all of their built up control mechanisms. The internet provides open bandwidth that the music industry cannot control. Marketing is suddenly available to those without connections.

I am not impartial, since I consider myself one of the artists thus affected. And I really think it is a new age now...

In no way did I say the economy works for the intellectual artist. I'm sorry if I was misinterpreted this way. For simplicity's sake, I will simplify my statement and refer to the intellectual artist as the musician.

As any intelligent being has realized by now, the economy does not work for the individual, regardless of profession. The economy works to promote the society, but let's not go there; it's too tangential for now.

The point is that the musician does benefit, even if by some miniscule amount, when you pay for their music, and they do not when you copy it.

Yes and the industry used to give out promos to stations to play the music to entice the buying of the records. The artists received no money for these promos. Yet, there were people enticed to buy the music. Now, the promos are in a different format. But that is still what happens. As others have pointed out, many of us still go out and buy CDs (quite many, I believe). We just have a much broader selection of promos that is finally under our (not the industries) control...

So you're saying that if only half the population burns a CD and the other half goes out and buys it, the musician still has sufficient motivation to continue production.

Here's the problem with that (aside from the "one person doesn't make a difference" theory): the companies will increase the price of CDs to make up for lost sales. More and more people will be encouraged, against their good nature, to burn the CD instead of buy it. It's a positive feedback cycle, and soon only a third or a quarter of people will be buying it. As you see, it's downhill for the musician...

Then why didn't that happen when cassettes were made available?

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Originally posted by galathaea
Then why didn't that happen when cassettes were made available?

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If you mean make it illegal to copy them, then the answer is that my country did make it illegal to copy them.

The US only made it illegal to copy for redistribution, which is the same law that applies to all intellectual property. In the US it has always been legal to copy for backup and self-use or fair-use.

But my question is: why didn't the spiral of prices you are afraid of occur, since there has been home media-copying abilities since the sixties?