Response to Neil Portnow's SJ Mercury Editorial

Neil Portnow, the president and CEO of the Recording Academy, wrote an editorial in today's San Jose Mercury news on page 16A called "Record industry, tech firms must forge common future." I wrote the following response and posted it in the comments of that article.

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While Mr. Portnow's attitude towards technology is an improvement over that of his predecessor Michael Greene (remember the 2002 Grammy Awards speech? [1]), he nevertheless seems to posses a tunnel vision regarding the current music industry's relation to
technology.

The problem with music today is not so-called 'piracy' (I prefer to call this activity 'sharing music with fellow music lovers') but a lack of creative thinking with regard to how modern computer and networking technology change the landscape of music creation and distribution. The record industry, in the old model, solved two problems of the artists -- paying for expensive studio time and distributing the music via CD or vinyl to the masses. Both of these activities can now be done by artists themselves for little cost: modern recording and mixing software is available for every computing platform and costs an iota of studio equipment, and artists can distribute their songs directly to fans over the Internet for virtually no cost. There is simply no need anymore for an artist to go through a record label to release music.

So how does the recording industry maintain its relevance (read: cash inflows) when it is essentially serves no useful purpose? One word: copyright. While looking at the Recording Academy's 'principles' web page, [2] you'll notice that principle #2 states the need for "[compensating] copyright owners." Well guess who owns all the copyrights to the vast majority of music recorded over the last century? The recording industry, of course. The members of the RIAA want to act as a tollbooth on the information superhighway,demanding a fee in order to allow anyone to listen to or share music. None, if any, of these fees go to the majority of artists --they only serve to line the pockets of industry executives who justify these payments with the battle cry of 'artists' rights.' It's a tried and true tactic of the industry: forward the 'starving artist' myth, collect cash via royalties.

In addition to paying the wrong person, the executive instead of the artist, American copyright law has a host of other problems which degrade the liberties of music-loving individuals. Music industry lobbyists often talk about these laws as if they were as absolute as the law of gravity, and they're not. They can be modified for the better, and certainly must be if we as a society hope to gain back some of the rights we've lost. This issue is far too complicated to go into detail about here, but I highly recommend reading Lessig's Free Culture (online for free -- as in freedom -- at [3]) as an introduction to the issue. Suffice it for now to say that the current system produces ugly results such as the ridiculously high damages the RIAA can demand in court from ordinary individuals like Jammie Thomas. [4]

Finally, Mr. Portnow's article contains some misleading statements that merit pointing out. He offers the example of legislation that would correct an 'anomaly' and make the broadcast industry pay similar fees to play content as Internet radio services. The absence of this legislation doesn't put Internet radio at a 'disadvantage' -- it still pays the same amount to the industry. The party most disadvantaged by this lack of legislation is the recording industry who stands to rake in another $20 billion if its lobbying efforts in Washington are successful (a lucrative tollbooth, indeed). Mr. Portnow also elevates George Lucas as a technology visionary, which makes his ranch the appropriate place to talk with Silicon Valley executives. All technology, however, is not created equal. While Mr. Lucas may have pioneered special effects and sophisticated audio, he certainly lags behind in file-sharing technology, which is,
of course, what the summit was all about. When Mr. Lucas releases all of his movies online for free, then I believe it will be appropriate to laud him for his technology savvy in more than one sense.

Mr. Portnow believes that the future of music hinges on the harmonious relations of the music industry and the technology industry. However, for artists and fans alike, the ideal future of music would be one that includes less of the music industry.

References:
[1] Michael Greene's 2002 Grammy Awards speech http://www.boycott-riaa.com/education/grammy_speech
[2] The Recording Academy's 'Principles' http://www.grammy.com/principles
[3] Lessig's 'Free Culture' http://www.free-culture.cc/freeculture.pdf
[4] Ars Technica article on Capitol Records v. Jammie Thomas http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20071004-verdict-is-in.html

Additional reading:
The Promise of a Post-Copyright World http://questioncopyright.org/promise
The EFF's The RIAA vs. The People http://w2.eff.org/IP/P2P/riaa-v-thepeople.php

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