Thanks for checking out my View From The Keg. I hope you’ll become a frequent visitor and add your comments to the discussion. In spite of the title, this post isn’t about baseball. It’s about Digital Rights Management , aka DRM.
As you may know, the music you purchase on-line (via iTunes or a similar service) has limitations on the number of CD’s you can burn, the number of computers it can be played on, etc., etc. In a recent announcement, Apple founder Steve Jobs said he wants to do away with those controls. This is actually old news, and you may have read articles touting the various merits of doing away with the system as it is today.
I’m not here to engage in on the general discourse of whether DRM is right or wrong – I already did that in a post to Rob Pergaro’s ‘Faster Forward’ blog some weeks back. What I feel I need to do is clear up some terrible mis-conceptions folks have about life (and money) for a professional musician. If you’re interested in reading the entire debate, start here:
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fasterforward/2007/02/steve_jobs_doesnt_like_drm.html
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fasterforward/2007/02/readers_continue_the_drm_debat.html
Here’s what I said on Feb. 19:
DRM, in principle, is not an inherently bad thing. It is in its execution where problems arise. Artists alone are the ones who should decide how and to what extent their “intellectual property” should be protected – period. This problem stems from the fact that, in order to have a “major label” deal, the majority of artists are required to sign away a portion (often quite large) of their ownership in their own music. Once people realize that it’s ultimately the artist who suffers, then perhaps we can begin to address this issue from the proper perspective, and achieve something approaching a realistic solution.
Now take a look at the latest in this ongoing debate:
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fasterforward/2007/04/post.html
What’s killing me is the idiocy of the people defending the theft of music artists have worked to create, when they have absolutely no idea what goes into making a career in music. One of today’s brilliant commentators says:
…smart people can not be expected to pay $10 for 10 songs or even $1 for one song, when it doesn’t cost anything to replicate the files.
Stop right there – is he serious? He clearly has never made a recording for possible sale at any level. It may not cost much to simply ‘replicate the files’, but it can cost several thousands of dollars to create the music that becomes those files! I know – I ran a recording studio for the better part of 17 years which turned out hundreds of master recordings that were turned into ‘product’ for local, regional, and national artists to sell. Regardless of whether the end result is a CD, cassette tape, LP, or file, the least expensive albums I recorded still cost a couple grand at the very least.
Our genius continues:
If the record companies want everyone to pay for music they will have to sell the audio at very low prices, like $.25 a song. As far as the musicians are concerned they are going to have to tour in order to create revenue for themselves (bold print mine). We will see, in 10 years their will be no music piracy, because the effort to find free music will not equal the low sale price. Thats just the way it will have to be. (Posted by Kevin).
Well Kevin, if things go the way you think they should, you’re right – there will be no music piracy in 10 years, but not because of the reasons you state. It will be because there will be no music being made by professional musicians!
Let’s just set the record straight: touring is a very expensive proposition. Kevin has absolutely no idea what it costs to bring even a simple show to your local small to mid-size venue. Transportation and hotel costs alone can be staggering. In fact, many of what were to be band dates in the 2006 Nils Lofgren Band tour were turned into solo dates because of the cost vs. reimbursement. And this is not the first time I have witnessed this happen in my 35 plus year career. Believe it or not, the only ones who make real money touring are the likes of Bruce, the Stones, Madonna, Kenny Chesney, etc., and the musicians who play with them. While 2nd and 3rd tier musicians can make a fair living touring on a small level, it in no way adequately compensates for the years of practice and dedication required just to get to the point where you can begin to make money at it. As a friend of mine once said to me “with all the years you’ve put into music, you could’ve been a doctor”.
Other comments were made recalling the ‘good old days’ of vinyl and cassettes, and how there was no talk of piracy back then. Where was that person – unborn?! There was plenty of talk about piracy in those days, particularly when high quality home recording equipment became affordable. I seem to remember the price of blank tapes rising when the record company lobby finally got Congress to impose an invisible tax on cassette tapes. And did the musicians themselves see any commensurate increase in their royalty rates? That would be no.
Then came Digital Audio Tape (DAT). This format was the beginning of the widespread panic in the recording industry, because consumers finally had the technology to make copies that actually sounded great at a relatively modest cost. DAT never really took off as a consumer format – partly of the development of CD’s, partly from the insane taxes that were levied on the consumer versions of DAT recorders (not to mention copy protection circuitry built into the machines – the first DRM scheme). It did explode on the studio scene, however, and made our lives easier, our projects a bit less expensive to produce, and our backs healthier by not having to lug around so many reels of tape.
The next great leap was the CD recorder. No, not the ones in all our computers, but the standalone versions. Just as with DAT recorders, there were 2 types of these: consumer and professional. You could tell a consumer version just from the type of recordable CD it used. If it used a ‘music’ CD to record, it was a consumer machine. What made those CD’s so special that they cost more than standard CDR’s? Only another invisible tax imposed on those consumers who would record their own CD’s (DRM scheme #2).
Folks, I hate to tell you, but piracy has always been around the music industry – and it always will. If it isn’t being done by consumers, it’s being done by record companies themselves through their reprehensible behavior toward musicians. It’s that simple. Piracy will not be eliminated by lowering prices; it will only disappear when people fully respect the rights of others’ intellectual property.
I stand by my Faster Forward comment. DRM isn’t wrong, it’s merely being administered and controlled by the wrong people. Record companies should not decide on their own how (or if) to protect an artist’s music. The artists themselves should be involved in any choices made in that regard. If an artist chooses to make his/her art available for free (or without copy protection), so be it. Granted, they will risk losing their contract with the label, but that is their choice to make. Why is it that, in order to be considered ’successful’ in this business, we must give away our rights to our own creative output?
With the advent of cheaper, more powerful computers, not to mention inexpensive recording systems (computer and otherwise), things are beginning to change. We musicians are finally learning that it’s possible to maintain a far greater degree of control over our art than we ever thought possible.
In the next post, I’ll turn you onto what I believe to be one of the best business models a 21st century musician can embrace. In the meantime, think about the points I raise the next time you’re preparing to download music from your favorite peer-to-peer file service.
I look forward to your comments…