| dschumm said: (more off topic) I agree with most of your points. But I will say that while I might be sad about the amount of blog based drivel that people push as fact ,most local newspapers would be better staffed with your average blogger. There will always be a demand for the highest quality in journalism, tastes may become more banal but that line has been used about USA Today, TV, Internet, Video Games and everything else. It is the law of supply and demand. The New York Times and Wall Street Journal will survive, but only if they are willing to show up on my computer screen take marketshare from my local paper and from blogs. I think any falling in tastes is compensated by the larger diversity of voices we hear in news, and any prejudice needs to be balanced against the fact that at least people are up front about it now. Anyone can now be a reporter, and I don't need the title of editor in order to tell my opinion. I am a firm believer that musicians deserve fair compensation but we need to remember copyrights and patents were invented to foster innovation for culture and public good not set up a welfare system. If they were smart they would have had a music download service availble with DRM free music years ago. Where the big losers are in the music industry is the distributors. They want the same money for the same service. Consumers don't have a problem paying money for music, they just don't like the distribution service. It is shameful I can't go to my local big box store click on a kiosk and have it spit out whatever combination of movies an music I want on CD/DVD/Blu-Ray for a fair price. The digital age has made access to things easier so why would a company try to limit how you can give them money? |
Yes, the democratization of the media definitely has positive effects as well. As you said, it's fantastic that everybody can get his views across to the people. But when it comes to information, I'd rather read a somewhat "boring" newspaper that sticks to the facts.
What you said about copyrights is interesting, because that is handled very differently in the US and Germany (where I'm from). The German equivalent is called "Urheberrecht", which roughly translates to "creator's right". Other than the copyright, it is part of the human rights, and it is inalienable, e.g. Michael Jackson could never have bought the Beatles' songs like he did in the US. If you wrote a song/book/whatever, it's yours from the moment you created it until you die (and 70 years beyond, for music anyway). So the primary purpose of the Urheberrecht is not "to foster innovation for culture and public good", but to protect your intellectual property.
Anyway, you're right that there's too many people in the music industry to feed, most of which have become more and more obsolete - especially in distribution and fabrication (I still heavily favor Vinyl, but it will inevitably become extinct). After all, we live in the internet age. Technically it is possible to access all songs there ever were from anywhere (and it will be even easier in the future), so any attempt to restrict access is doomed to failure. But how will composers get paid, who will make promotion and all that when running a label becomes completely unprofitable? I really don't know.
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