On 30 Jan 2005 at 17:47, Aaron Sherber wrote: > At 04:54 PM 01/30/2005, Darcy James Argue wrote: > >It's no more "artificial" for workers to fight for their jobs than > it >is for corporations to try to eliminate jobs. For crissakes, the > >entire free market system is an "artificial" human construct. > > >Again, it doesn't matter if you're a musician, a lighting tech, a > >secretary, a nurse, or a worker at Wal-Mart. You have an absolute > >right -- I would even say a responsibility -- to fight for what's > best >for you. There's nothing "artificial" about it. > > Darcy, I think there's a difference between your right to *fight* for > a job and your right to *have* that job. I agree that workers have the > right to fight for their jobs, and *should* do so, and that there's > nothing artificial about that fight. If the iceman's union says, "We > know that there is now this newfangled technology that lets you have > an electric icebox in your house that doesn't actually use any ice, > but we'd like to restrict the manufacture of those devices in order to > preserve the jobs of our members," they are absolutely entitled to > make that request (or demand). But actually *limiting* refrigerator > manufacture would be, I think, an artificial way of staying > technological progress.
The icemen could be completely eliminated from the equation. Musicians cannot, unless the Broadway producers are prepared to go to a world in which there are *no* live musicians in the pit. That is, they have to work with the union to get the live musicians for the prestige shows, so the live musicians can still exercise clout over the pressure to go to synthesized orchestras. I'm of two minds on this. I think Broadway (and other large venues where the money is in the budget to be able to afford live musicians) should continue to use live musicians, simply because the results will be so much better. On the other hand, small performing organizations that can only afford a handful of musicians can now greatly enhance the depth of what they can produce by adding in synthesized performances (and is it not the case the the old "inflexible" argument is dead, now that there are devices that allow beat-to-beat control of tempo?). -- David W. Fenton http://www.bway.net/~dfenton David Fenton Associates http://www.bway.net/~dfassoc _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [email protected] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
