I'm not saying there aren't serious issues for creators concerning being paid for their hard work. I think however the solution is not the mob style tactics of old from the likes of the RIAA and MPAA. The point of entry for a new musician has all at once become insanely easy and dangerous...insanely easy to upload their music so anyone can hear it, but how to make money on their work when it can be pirated? Bands have other avenues of income like touring, authors on the other hand would have a harder time, I think what keeps them alive now and hopefully in the future is the peoples love for BOOKS. The old fashioned kind you can touch and smell and of course read.
On Wed, Jan 13, 2010 at 10:43 AM, Constance Warner <[email protected]> wrote: > Well, we all know that the RIAA is nuts. But the problems you > cite--disappearance of paper books and Big Brother controlling the > officially received version of history--are there too. > > And the basic problem for me is still: if you write something, do you, or > do you not, get paid when someone consumes it? In the long run, if you pay > for something, you get more of it. If you don't pay for it, that item > becomes scarce and/or deteriorates in quality. What happens to my > field--fantasy and science fiction--if nobody, or next to nobody, gets paid > for producing it? No great loss, the Great Literature types would probably > say; but in the long run, the Mainstream Literature types are going to be > worse off than us. The SF community has adapted to some degree to the > online world; there are a few markets where you can get paid for online > content. Online publishers of fantasy and science fiction are scrambling to > find ways to pay for it; a few of them have been (moderately) successful. > > But what happens when SF, and serious literature, is produced--and > published--exclusively by wealthy amateurs who alone have the leisure to > produce books--or book-length projects? What happens when your favorite > author can't write that next book you're eagerly awaiting, because he/she > has to take a part-time extra job at Home Depot to make up for the income > the book would have provided? (To take one case I know of). > > The situation isn't all bleak--there are good things in the Internet > revolution as well as bad. (And mainstream publishing is no rose garden, > either.) But, basically, if authors (and other creators) don't get paid, > there will be much less of the good stuff for you to enjoy, whether you > download it for free or pay $24.95 for a new hardcover edition in a > bookstore. > > --Constance Warner > > On Jan 13, 2010, at 11:55 AM, mike wrote: > > I was thinking while reading this...some, if this were Dick Cheney type of >> a >> guy would be saying well now he's just being paid off by big Music and >> Movies. By the end that's what this seems to become, a collaboration >> editorial about the evils of music piracy. I think there are larger >> issues >> on the web they don't touch on...the various projects of scanning books >> frightens me because in 50 years or 100 will there be any paper books? >> Will >> one company or government have access to history and be able to edit it to >> their will as easily as we edit office docs? He decries the lack of >> punishment of music pirates, I can't seem to bring myself to care when >> drunk >> drivers can kill and pay less than someone who downloaded 24 songs. 1.9 >> million for 24 songs...when is the last time anyone saw someone pay like >> that for almost ANY crime? >> >> There are real issues with piracy of intellectual property, but cases like >> the 2 million dollar fine make most dismiss piracy because those on the >> other side are so crazy about punishment. >> >> >>> >>> A provocative article in Tuesday's Science Times (the New York Times >>>> >>> Science pages, http://www.nytimes.com/pages/science/): >>> >>>> >>>> "The Madness of Crowds and an Internet Delusion" by John Tierney >>>> >>> >>> >>> ************************************************************************* >>> ** List info, subscription management, list rules, archives, privacy ** >>> ** policy, calmness, a member map, and more at http://www.cguys.org/ ** >>> ************************************************************************* >>> >>> >> >> ************************************************************************* >> ** List info, subscription management, list rules, archives, privacy ** >> ** policy, calmness, a member map, and more at http://www.cguys.org/ ** >> ************************************************************************* >> > > > ************************************************************************* > ** List info, subscription management, list rules, archives, privacy ** > ** policy, calmness, a member map, and more at http://www.cguys.org/ ** > ************************************************************************* > ************************************************************************* ** List info, subscription management, list rules, archives, privacy ** ** policy, calmness, a member map, and more at http://www.cguys.org/ ** *************************************************************************
