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The saddest, stupidest sentence I've ever read

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Re: The saddest, stupidest sentence I've ever read

#21

Post by davidw »

SirWart wrote: post #19
jsjenkins168 wrote: post #4

That sentence is taken out of context. Reading the whole post, it is clear that Arrington is referring the importance of recorded music in monetary terms, not artistic.

Given that the Beatles' best albums came after they stopped touring, it would be a real shame if we didn't try and preserve the monetary reward of recorded music, because we would be doing everyone a disservice if bands were forced to tour to support their recording career.

Also harking back to that era, Brian Wilson also comes to mind as much more of a studio guy than a touring guy.

It's a tricky problem...

Re: The saddest, stupidest sentence I've ever read

#23

Post by mixmax »

rms wrote: post #13
tim2 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The TC article title clearly says that artists should not be compensated for recordings. No context, that's the title and therefore the overall message that Arrington wants us to take away. What most of the article says is that the artists shouldn't expect to be able to retroactively be compensated when they had previously agreed not to be in this particular situation. The problem here is that, all context considered…

>Of course this is quite disapointing to me as much of the music I listen to cannot be created live by its artists but instead takes days or months to prepare. What kind of music?

I'm an avid house fan, and a lot of that genre doesn't work well in a concert setting. However the people producing it are often DJ's, and make their money from gigs.

Re: The saddest, stupidest sentence I've ever read

#25

Post by tim2 »

mixmax wrote: post #23
rms wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Of course this is quite disapointing to me as much of the music I listen to cannot be created live by its artists but instead takes days or months to prepare. What kind of music?

I'm an avid house fan, and a lot of that genre doesn't work well in a concert setting. However the people producing it are often DJ's, and make their money from gigs.

Yes those are a good example of (something like) concerts being the best business model for a group of artists now. I just find it funny how we all have witnessed the success of so many different business models, and then for someone to say that only one is possible.

Re: The saddest, stupidest sentence I've ever read

#26

Post by dejb »

jsjenkins168 wrote: post #4

That sentence is taken out of context. Reading the whole post, it is clear that Arrington is referring the importance of recorded music in monetary terms, not artistic.

The sentence was not taken out of context. That was the saddest part of Arrington's article - the fact that he seems to no longer be able to view music as anything other than a commodity.

Re: The saddest, stupidest sentence I've ever read

#27

Post by dejb »

I think it ranks up there with 'Ideas are worthless'. You could just as well say the 'Air is worthless' or 'Air is nothing more than medium that can be used for commercial flight'.

The ability to monetize something is not the only measure of its value - the benefit that it causes the world is another important measure if value (this could be measured economically or otherwise). In an ideal economy, total 'value' would be maximized when the 'benefit' and 'monetization' metrics of value were closely aligned as it would lead to the best allocation of resources. Or to put it another way - things would be best if people were rewarded for doing good, useful things.

Of course the practicalities of the world don't always make this possible. But to try to cut someone down like Arrington did for suggesting that it would be better if musicians could received compensation for the enjoyment their recordings provide is in my view incorrect and immoral.

Re: The saddest, stupidest sentence I've ever read

#28

Post by ojbyrne »

pius wrote: post #17
xlnt wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you give an example of something Toohey said that you think has a similarity?

I don't have a specific quote I can think of, but the sentence evoked the character in my mind instantly because of how it (out of context, at least) forsakes substance for popularity and generally trashes the value of an artist's work in favor of the buzz around it. Toohey was a prominent architectural critic who could make or break an architect by a yea or nay in his column. The guy's statements always forwarded an…

That last quote reminded me of something I just read on gigaom:

"Seesmic is a video startup I’ve shied away from writing about too often, because I’m not sure I really get it. But I figure if so many smart people think there’s something good going on here, I should keep an eye on what the company is doing."

That's everything I disliked about silicon valley right there.

Re: The saddest, stupidest sentence I've ever read

#29

Post by aston »

bmaier wrote: post #7

He mistakes a mistaken analogy. The poets that he names are not selling out live readings and the sculptors are not putting on live creation events. When it comes to music, yes, a concert tour is more profitable for the artist than their recorded music is. This is the one difference between musicians and other artists. While I don't completely agree with Arrington, I do believe that this blog post calling it the sadd…

The number of recording artists/groups making money--that is, a profit--on tour is dwarfed by the ones trying to scrape by any other way they can ('real' jobs, selling cd's and other merch at shows, bar mitzvahs, etc.). Even a lot of the top-of-the-charts artists don't draw a big enough crowd to make their tour their livelihood.

Re: The saddest, stupidest sentence I've ever read

#30

Post by stcredzero »

He's right. Anyone who's been a true musician or a true artist eventually realizes that the "products" are just messages. They are not exclusively an end in themselves. They are messages about awareness. They are communications from one life to another. Really, the important thing is the life lived, and the inner life shared.

This is why museums are nothing but directories or a table of contents. This is why "intellectual property" is so absurd.

A musician's "product" is as much a message as someone's blog post. One hopes that the message is understood and absorbed and possibly re-transmitted with elaborations and new insights.

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