From: jonb@Ingres.COM (Jon Berger)
Newsgroups: rec.music.makers
Subject: Re: Yes lyrics!
Date: 16 Oct 92 20:00:08 GMT
Reply-To: jonb@ingres.com
Organization: Ingres, an ASK Company

In article <Bw82u7.InA@undergrad.math.waterloo.edu>, elee@undergrad.math.waterloo.edu (Salty Freckles) writes:
>In article <a05NsB1w165w@midiline.la.ca.us> gpr@midiline.la.ca.us (Gary Richardi) writes:
>>since the bars basically pays roytalies anyway. As for lyrics on the net, 
>>I think it's an issue regarding the letter vs the spirit of the law. I'm 
>>no lawyer, but I'd venture to guess that the 'spirit' of the copyright is 
>>to guard against re-publishing for profit, eg. book of Led Zepplin lyrics 
>>(hey, didn't they rip those songs off from American bluesmen, anyway?). 
>>.flame on
>>That's a big problem with this country today. Everyone's so afraid of of 
>>getting sued, we're developing into a constipated society!
>>.flame off
>
>Agreed totally. It's just sad that whenever law or government comes into play,
>all life and humanity is squeezed from whatever's involved. A necessary evil
>I guess for being the way we are...

I find it interesting that every time this subject comes up, someone says,
in effect, "this is all the fault of those nasty manipulative lawyers and
sleazeball politicians; if us musicians ran things, the world would be a
beautiful place and we'd all share and everyone would be happy."

That's a very easy attitude to take, and anyone who takes it is going
to generate a huge following of yes-men, because it's so seductive to
say "All lawyers are slime, so therefore anything a lawyer tells me I
can't do must be a really good thing, so Right On Brother!"

What this argument conveniently overlooks is that there are a lot of
musicians who _don't_ feel flattered when you think enough of them to want
to use their music and lyrics for free.  Or, maybe they feel flattered
but they'd still prefer to make a few bucks.  You may not find too many
of this class of musician on Internet discussion groups, but they exist,
trust me.  Do their rights deserve protection, or do you feel that your
opinion that "music is meant to be shared" should take precedence?

Just for one example, my father made a good part of his living for many
years as a composer of choral music.  Publishers of choral music take the
very reasonable attitude that, since a choir has to buy lots of copies
of the sheet music (like approximately n/2 where n is the number of
singers), the individual copy price should be kept low.  Unfortunately,
there's this high-tech device called a Xerox machine which completely
screws up the pricing scheme, sort of like computer networks do nowadays.
It turns out that it's massively cheaper to buy a single copy of a choral
piece, for about $0.95, and make as many copies as you need, rather than
buy a number of copies which relates to the number of singers you have.
Choir directors -- even ones who work for churches -- do this.  A lot.

Now, I suppose my father could have taken the attitude that he was
delighted the choir directors thought enough of his work that they wanted
to share it with the world, but he didn't.  Other musicians also don't.
Maybe you care how they feel and maybe you don't.  If you don't -- if
you truly believe that it's somehow immoral to make a living by composing
music, or that the principle that "music is meant to be shared" is more
important than any individual's right to derive income from creating it
-- then go ahead, rip off whatever you want.  You'll get away with it.
As has been pointed out innumerable times, this is so widespread and
commonplace that it's inconceivable for any agency to catch everybody who
does it; for the most part, nobody even tries.  Whoever mentioned that it
would be silly for a publisher to sue Internet is absolutely correct; who
the hell _is_ Internet, anyway?  So, yeah, you can steal with impunity.
Does that make it ok?

Frankly, it isn't the stealing that bothers me so much as the attempts to
clothe it in high-flown moral arguments, like copyright infringement is
this noble act of civil disobedience or something.  It's not; it's just
stealing.  It may, in some cases, be the sort of stealing that's no big
deal, like when you eat an apple while you're shopping at Safeway: what
the hell, they can afford it, they're this huge faceless gazillion-dollar
corporation and it's just one little apple, right?  Right, but don't
try to convince me that you're somehow making the world a better place
by doing it.  That's a smokescreen.  Either say "Ok, it's stealing,
but I don't think it's a big deal", or stop doing it.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
   -__ __ /_   Jon Berger              "If you push something hard enough,
  //_// //_/   jonb@ingres.com          it will fall over."
_/ ---------                              - Fudd's First Law of Opposition