In my conversations with anti-copyright proponents, both publicly and in private, I ask about the alternative: How does an artist make a living in a post-copyright world?
I'm a big fan of open source art. I use the Open Clip Art Library extensively, both using its art for my site with clip art and a tool for creating digital mash-ups with it and contributing art to it. I've got a collection of a few dozen songs from ccMixter in a folder of songs I could use as stock music for video soundtracking.
I think these are great projects and they serve the public good, but I don't see many people making even beer money from the hours and hours they put into them. And while a lot of artists don't get rich from their art, a great number do make a living or a respectable supplemental income from it. Still, teenage boys don't hop a bus from Wichita to L.A. with nothing but a duffel bag and a guitar because they dream of session work on commercial jingles. They dream of fame and fortune. They dream of being a household name, of having women throw their underwear at them, of having their favorite rock star ask them for an autograph.
Basically, all the business models the opponents of copyright cite as alternatives to the current one are possible now. Although a few types of mash-up works are still prohibited by current law (without getting permission from the copyright owner first) there is nothing stopping talented people from releasing original artistic works into the public domain, under the GPL, or under one of a handful of Creative Commons licenses. Many of them do. But, in general, these models haven't produced a truly breakout star who proves that the models work and isn't doing it just to get "discovered" by the megacorporations.
As far as I'm concerned, to be proven viable, these business models must produce some breakout stars who are as famous as the stars produced by the copyright-driven models, but stick with the uncopyrighted models because they're making enough money that the corporations can't woo them away. Kids don't dream of toiling in obscurity and working a "day job" to support their art unless they're dreaming about the three weeks during which they'll "pay their dues" before being discovered.
So I pose a challenge to those who would abolish copyright and show us that open source is superior to copyright in all pursuits that produce "intellectual property": show us your way works... not just for software, but for art. Put all that considerable brainpower into proving artists whose work is distributed solely through open source channels can attain the same name recognition and wealth that their copyrighted contemporaries can. Show kids that they can reach their dreams of fame and fortune on the open source road.
Let's set some ground rules for quantifying success and give you a year to put in place an online organic buzz machine that can turn 5 open-source artists, each in a different field, into household names. Those artists will be...
- A cartoonist whose strip name or personal name is as well known as "Dilbert"/"Scott Adams".
- A band or singer whose name is as well known as that of the most recent "American Idol" winner.
- A writer of fiction whose name is searched for as much as Stephen King.
- A film director who attracts $5 million in financing for a copyright-free film and completes it.
- A film actor who works solely on open source films and spends at least 10 weeks in to top 10 of IMDb.com's IMDb Pro STARmeter.
To prevent cheating, the artists cannot name themselves, their bands, or their projects after any existing top search terms/phrases (i.e. "free porn"). They cannot come into this already famous for works they have released under copyright. Furthermore, all of the artists must earn at least $100,000 during this period from their copyright-free work based on donations, sponsorships, ad revenue, product placement, or a mix of the four. Now this last part you could easily cheat on, but if you do, the business models fall apart shortly after the challenge and you prove nothing.
If it works and you win the challenge, the success will be its own reward and attract artists to your business models in droves, generating tons of open-source, copyright-free content. If you lose the challenge, the failure will be its own punishment.
To give this some significance, we'll make the date at which the challenge ends July 4th, 2008... Independence Day. What's more fitting?
So, if the open source world accepts my challenge... get to it. You have until July 4 of next year to create 5 break-out open source artists that can inspire generations to come with dreams of fame and fortune via the open source route.
I really and truly hope you win the challenge. But I'm not holding my breath.
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Sorry, but I think this challenge is flawed. Stardom is inherently coupled to the "copyright" business model, as it the best way to make money off a single investment as many times over as possible.
Open source / copyleft or whatever you call it would be less about stardom and more about infinite variety. More variety actually requires each niche to be smaller.
Imagine 100 artists with a decent wage outputting 100 times more and better content than a superstar. By your definiton, that would be a failure.
"Open source / copyleft or whatever you call it would be less about stardom and more about infinite variety. "
There goes the flaw in the anti-copyright movement. Fame and fortune are motivators that inspire a lot of people to create. Even if they don't reach them, having them as a possible outcome or goal is a driver of creation.
Where is your proof that there will be more people producing more content if the potential fame and fortune are removed from the picture? Where is your proof that they will create as much when there's no chance of significant personal gain as they would if there was? Where is your proof that what they do create would be better or more original?
For one thing, one of the arguments against copyright is all the artists who can't create derivative works because of the limitations copyright places on them. I've been on CCmixter and seen a dozen different pieces that all have the exact same vocal track, but different variants on the music. This isn't 12 different singers each putting their own spin on a song, but one single recording used 12 times.
How is this better? Maybe it produces more art, but the same vocal track 12 times, is not better in my mind. It's grating and annoying. I'd much rather hear 12 different singers. I do not consider endless variations on a theme better than a smaller amount of complete originality.
But if you say the trade-off for a superstar is 100 artists making a decent wage... let's define a decent wage. How much does it cost to support a family in a decent middle-class life style with a home in a nice neighborhood near good schools? Let's say $50,000 a year?
If you'd like to modify the challenge to creating 500 artists earning a minimum of $50,000 a year instead of 5 superstars, that's fine with me. Get 100 comic strip artists, 100 film directors, 100 actors, 100 writers, and 100 musicians each earning $50,000 per year via your open source business models and you've not only proved your point to me, but to the world.
But I'm not buying hypotheticals and it's going to be an amazingly hard battle for you to convince the world to change from a flawed system they know works to some extent to another system that only works better in hypothetical examples.
There is nothing legally stopping your system from being implemented as an alternative to copyright and giving people the choice of copyright or open source, both as creators or consumers.
So implement your business models. Show they work. Show me 500 artists earning a decent wage instead of 5 superstars reaching fame and fortune. Stop giving hypothetical examples and prove your points. There's nothing stopping you except the fear you can't actually do it.
The "100 artists" was to illustrate that the original challenge was pointless. By no means is 100 any magic number.
Instead of a challenge, here is a key point: How can we produce more and better content for less money?
I think that individual motivation of becoming a superstar is completely offset by the overhead of having copyrighed material owned and distributed by enormous media companies. Have a look at their budgets and see how little is actually paid to the artists. This is not a flawed system, it's broken.
With the Internet, marketing and distribution of music is free. The old business model is dying, like it or not, and new business models will appear without doing anything.
Copyright being a time-limited monopoly on an original work provides a framework for people to be compensated for their work and is, IMO, 'fair'.
I agree with you that the length of monopoly granted may be too long and this is one aspect where the right balance needs to be found.
Of course, IPR is not the only way it could work. Alternatives include scrapping copyright altogether and letting artists fend for themselves. They could suffer for their art, find wealthy patrons or, with the advent of the internet, be funded by donations from their fans. We may even see better and more varied art and music under this model.
Another model for art would be no IPR and artists being employed by the state. This would, IMO, create more varied and 'better' art as artists would not need to pander to popular tastes to be successful.
Of course, I cannot 'prove' these alternatives would work as they would require changes in law or government intervention. In that respect, your challenge is somewhat flawed, since some suggested alternatives would require the abolition of copyright to work, otherwise 'un-copyrighted artists' would face unfair competition from artists which are funded with the full framework of copyright protection. In that respect, you're challenge is not a level playing field.
PMB,
The new business models can be tried now. But instead of giving them the "old college try", the anti-copyright prosletyzers give excuses for why they shouldn't throw their time and energy behind them.
Even when the old media companies don't pay a large share of the revenues to the artists, the superstars still make millions. You may be altruistic and have modest dreams, but a lot of people dream of making millions, and it's that dream that drives them to make sacrifices. So show them that millions are possible without selling their souls and their rights to copyright-driven media companies and they'll come to you. Fail, and you remain marginalized, making some good points, but losing out to the monied interests because you're trying to appeal to people's public spirit instead of their self-interest.
Charles,
Artists being employed by the state? Are you kidding? That might work in France, where they have a much different attitude, but look at the shitstorm that happened when the NEA supported Mapplethorpe. Government funding for the arts has been influenced by religion and ideology for a long time now. Artists would have to be careful not to offend and would be judged on their worthiness for subsidy by political appointees.
Furthermore, when fiscal reformers come into office, looking for stuff to cut, what will fall by the wayside? Schools? Prisons? Military spending? No, it will be all the "lazy artists, suckling at the public teat" who are quickly scapegoated and have their funding cut or removed.
As for letting artists fend for themselves... that's what I'm proposing, but with a little help from the anti-copyright brain trust to help them with publicity, marketing, and execution so they have a fighting chance. But you'd rather cower in fear of the record companies and say it isn't possible to do it until the government abolishes copyright.
So you're just going to sit and whine while things get worse, eh? Rather than try to show all the things you propose are possible, you'll make excuses for why they can't be done under the current conditions? There is nothing legally or technologically stopping these business models. The only thing stopping them is a critical mass of artists and consumers who buy into them.
I'm challenging you to at least make a determined effort to create that critical mass. I'm asking you to risk failure, which is what REAL artists and REAL revolutionaries do all the time.
Instead, you tell me all the reasons why you're guaranteed to fail and thus won't try.
Wuss.