7
Do musicians and content makers benefit from piracy?
Musician Jonathan Coulton joked on Twitter about whether content makers were finally making money now that Megaupload was shut down. Here, he performs at the Williamsburg Waterfront on July 29, 2011 in New York City.
To view this content, Javascript must be enabled and Adobe Flash Player must be installed.
Kai Ryssdal: Couple of quick updates on the Internet piracy story that's been bubbling all week. First of all, it looks like the blackout Wednesday worked. Wikipedia and a whole bunch of others turned themselves off to protest SOPA and PIPA, the two piracy bills pending in Congress -- except they're not pending anymore. Today, leaders in both the House and Senate put 'em on hold indefinitely.
Also, there were more police raids related to the Megaupload shutdown today, the service that lets you share big files like high-quality videos for free. The Justice Department shut 'em down yesterday.
We saw a tweet about it this morning that struck us, from singer-songwriter Jonathan Coulton. Here's what he said: "Any other musicians out there notice that ever since they shut down Megaupload, the money has just been POURING in?"
We thought that was kind of clever, so we called him up. Welcome to the broadcast.
Jonathan Coulton: Nice to talk to you.
Ryssdal: So obviously you're being sarcastic with that tweet. But are you as a musician able to make money with all the piracy out there?
Coulton: I am. I've been happily co-existing with piracy for the last six years. I make a better living as a musician than I did when I was writing software.
Ryssdal: Really?
Coulton: Yeah.
Ryssdal: But isn't it just wrong to do what Megaupload has been letting people do?
Coulton: Yeah, I don't have any question in my mind that what they were doing was illegal and probably immoral. But what I was getting at with that tweet is: Does the activity on that site really affect my bottom line very much? Or indeed the bottom line of any content creator? If groups like the MPAA spent more time creating a platform where people could buy their stuff legally and easily, instead of trying to block all this piracy, I think they'd get better results.
Ryssdal: Well you know, the Motion Picture Association -- as you said, the MPAA -- and a whole bunch of other people are, in theory, working on that. But what about you as an artist? Do you ever put yourself up there and see what happens with it?
Coulton: Yeah I do that all the time. In fact, when I first started, I wrote a song a week for a year and I put them all up for free, under the theory that piracy was in fact good for an artist, and really what you want is exposure more than anything else. It seems to have worked out pretty well for me.
Ryssdal: Yeah. I wonder if you do what a lot of people do: You know, you'll try to pay for something, either on Netflix or iTunes, and then if it's not there, you'll go get it from Megaupload or any one of the other zillion sites that are out there.
Coulton: Exactly. And when you try to attach a value to the damage caused by the activity on a site like Megaupload, I think it's important to remember that not every download is the same thing as a lost sale. And frequently, people are downloading things because there is no legal way for them to acquire it.
Ryssdal: How old are you?
Coulton: I'm 41.
Ryssdal: Oh. So -- this is going to sound terrible -- you're not a young guy. You're not some 22-year-old college kid doing it.
Coulton: No, I'm an old person. And I know how to use the Internet.
Ryssdal: What do you make of the argument offered by some -- usually on the younger side of the demographic spectrum -- that, you know, information wants to be free and we're entitled to have this stuff?
Coulton: There's no rule that says a creative person is entitled to be paid for their creative work. In fact, for most of human history, music and art was not something that people got paid for at all.
Ryssdal: Yeah, all right, so this is where the cards and letters are going to come on in this segment, because there is this whole copyright law thing and protection of intellectual property.
Coulton: Well don't get me wrong -- I believe in copyright. And I make no secret of the fact that I would love to be paid for music. I'm very grateful that that is my job. But all the time, we, through our actions as individuals, demonstrate what we value as a society. And I think we've all made it pretty clear that our opinions about copyright have really shifted. I just don't think the laws have caught up to that yet.
Ryssdal: Jonathan Coulton, he's a singer-songwriter in New York City. If you listen to his stuff, buy it, will you? Pay him for it. Jonathan, thanks a lot.
Coulton: Thank you.
I think there is a dynamic going on here that I have not heard made publicly. I am part of that younger generation. I am also a long time fan of Jonathan Coulton, who for a long time on his website, next where you can pay to download his songs, has had a link that says "Already Stole It?
No problem. If you’d like to donate some cash, you can do so through the PayPal link in the sidebar."
He understands, as he said, that oftentimes piracy is just easier then the legitimate methods, because the legal methods' business models haven't caught up. But the phrase I quote above has another implication, and it has to do with the face-off between industry and the internet-savvy generation.
Recent years have seen the industrial organizations, such as the MPAA, RIAA and others, have gone from invisible to the public to massive villains in the eyes of the young. They are criticized for how they have gone about litigation, for unfair pricing practices before the digital revolution, and for perceived unjust treatment of artists. They are seen as dinosaurs, flailing and whining because their business model doesn't work anymore.
At the same time, more and more people have become content creators in the ever-broadening social media landscape. The remix culture Lawrence Lessig described has raised serious questions on the nature of intellectual property. This generation has become more and more sympathetic to the artists, and less and less sympathetic to the industrial giants who seek to structure and limit creative output. Jonathan Coulton has the "please pay me if you pirated my work" link because people actually do go back and give to the independent artists they wish to support. The change isn't just about piracy, or even just about music. It is instead the same spirit that created Occupy, and the Tea Party, and the resentment of money in politics, and the SOPA/PIPA reaction. Its the populist notion that the power being all in the hands of the industry and the wealthy doesn't work anymore. There is a hunger for the freedom to create without fear of censorship, to move creative control back to the creative folks, to reward the artists instead of the corporations. It is the desire to assure that those who they feel deserve to be rewarded are the ones who receive the reward.
Of course the commercial interests have long lusted after some form of monopoly control over the free exchange of ideas. Not fully understanding that should they succeed in cutting open that cat and isolating its purr, it would necessarily sacrifice the cantankerous cat.
An Invisible Hum rules the internet, kinda roughly analogous to Adam’s Smith’s notorious invisible thumb. Like the thumb, it relies upon the goodwill of morally upstanding individuals. Sure, there are unscrupulous operators, and we’re schlemiels. We won’t find recourse in any rule or court of law. We could have understood what kind of place this was before we ever mistook it for the ultimate Big Box store.
David A. Schmaltz
From: http://www.worldwidehippies.com/2012/01/20/the-invisible-hum/comment-pag...
As I see it, copyright law is similar to Prohibition - too strong and things become *extremely* counterproductive, because it's unenforceable.
The key takeaway message from this interview is this: "not every download is the same thing as a lost sale. And frequently, people are downloading things because there is no legal way for them to acquire it."
Piracy in its current form, I too would argue, is predominately a distribution problem.
Finally, we can always rely on Big Content to lobby for longer and longer copyright terms, lest their most profitable items become public domain.
A note regarding Mr. Coulton's statement that, "And I think we've all made it pretty clear that our opinions about copyright have really shifted. I just don't think the laws have caught up to that yet."
Copyright exists as a Right of the people expressed in Article 1, Section 8 of the US Constitution: "Congress shall have the Power… To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries."
In my opinion we need stronger copyright laws with higher penalties that are easier to enforce, not weaker laws based on people's proclivity to steal. As an artist I want my rights to be easily defensible and those who violate those rights to pay a penalty.
Then you must be an artist that makes stuff that people don't want. If you made a product desirable to consumers, you wouldn't worry about that 1% that copies your creations without paying because you would be too pleased with the profit you made from the other 99%. Coulton elaborated on this subject on his blog[1] today: "Make good stuff, then make it easy for people to buy it. There’s your anti-piracy plan. The big content companies are TERRIBLE at doing both of these things, so it’s no wonder they’re not doing so well in the current environment."
Louis C.K. recently did an experiment to test how much of a problem piracy really is. He charged $5 online for his latest standup routine. He said “The experiment was: If I put out a brand new standup special at a drastically low price and make it as easy as possible to buy, download and enjoy, free of any restrictions, will everyone just go and steal it? Will they pay for it? And how much money can be made by an individual in this manner?”
Louis C.K. made $1,000,000 in one week from that experiment. No advertising, no distribution; completely skipping most of the traditional means of production.
Simply making new laws doesn't fix anything. You can ask for all the SOPA-like laws you want to be passed and the only noticeable effect will be the limiting of the free speech of the entire country just to catch an extremely tiny portion of the total population who rips off content.
Ever read about prohibition? That sure worked well didn't it. Clearly new, more oppressive laws are the answer to all our troubles.
