If an artist is A) not super rich, B) on an indie or self-owned label, and C) his records are available where you live, is there any excuse for downloading them instead of buying them?

I agree that it isn't easy to make great art (decent art could be easy to do if you're inspired or talented), but I have no idea where you're coming from with the part of your statement after the semicolon. I said nothing about that.

believe me, if i believed I could somehow obliterate MIchael Bay's profit motive through incessant downloading, I'd do it.

we can change that

lol yes by doing it ourselves, the many excellent films available on youtube demonstrate that the tide is turning against crusty old hollywood

But J0hn's on the other end, as someone who did decide to pursue music as a profession and sees his livelihood endangered by social and economic pressures beyond his control - I don't really expect him to accept that lying down.

I want to stress again that I argue this question only out of interest in the question & enjoyment in the process. When I say "I have no complaints," I am 100% dead serious - I make a living at my job & am grateful. I am just really itchy when somebody suggests that it's anything other than real work for which the worker deserves compensation.

I get way more of my entertainment from youtube than from hollywood these days!

what are your top ten feature-length youtube movies of all time

1. the breakdancing guy who kicks the baby

I totally understand J0hn, I'm not trying to needle you or anything.

And yes, all work deserves compensation, in an ethical sense. But we all know that the economic realities of compensation are often vastly unethical, and that the market that determines the rate of compensation can often be quite callous and stingy.

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This thread title supposes that you have already heard the artist and like them enough to want to invest time/money into their music. I think the question should first read

If an artist is A) not super rich, B) you don't download music cos that is wrong, then how will you ever hear them in the first place?

until youtube can give hugh jackmam adamantium claws, it can suck it as far as i'm concerned

xp Adam the thread title was written by Tuomas.

I am just really itchy when somebody suggests that it's anything other than real work for which the worker deserves compensation.

(altho tbh I am similarly just really itchy when somebody suggests that work done without compensation cannot produce masterpieces - lol)

xp Adam: uh, there's college radio, internet radio, bands' websites and myspace pages?

1. the breakdancing guy who kicks the baby

yeah I'll take the "evil" outdated system thx

(altho tbh I am similarly just really itchy when somebody suggests that work done without compensation cannot produce masterpieces - lol)

you know that politically I feel you! but practically/historically...who can you name? Shakespeare wrote for money, wouldn't have bothered otherwise, and the same's true of most great artists I fear.

also, srsly tho, the hollywood model of spending 100 million dollars on a movie and then crossing your fingers - this is actually worse than the music biz's dysfunction.

xp Henry Darger haha

Exhibit A for the prosecution:
http://themixtapemonster.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/big-green.jpg

that may be iatee but are you stoked to see only movies that ppl paid for out of pocket?

(in re: Darger...I think actually that's OTM - the new art economy will be all "outsider" stuff. super-stoked for that.)

about as much as I am to see the latest $100 million dollar movie

you know that politically I feel you! but practically/historically...who can you name? Shakespeare wrote for money, wouldn't have bothered otherwise, and the same's true of most great artists I fear.

aha! See this is a trick question, because most of the people who created masterpieces without any compensation come from that most hallowed of anonymous traditions - the FOLK tradition. Exhibit A - any number of songs that AP Carter scrounged off of neighbors, acquaintances, itinerant musicians, etc. - many of which have gone on to become "standards", American classics, etc. ("Will the Circle Be Unbroken", anybody?)

but practically/historically...who can you name? Shakespeare wrote for money, wouldn't have bothered otherwise, and the same's true of most great artists I fear.

this isn't really fair...lots of masterpiece-producing artists started out having a day job until, you know, they became well-known enough to live off their art. they didn't all start out as professionals and then create great works (although some did of course).

which is why my hope is that the future of the music industry will be more towards one of the folk tradition and less of the American Idol/pro-sports variety - that music-making will become so commonplace it'll get down to something that people just DO, and the best stuff will circulate and rise to the top via its appeal as something that other people can play and participate in and enjoy.

i don't care what morbz says, star trek was way better than some dude getting kicked in the balls

john you keep bringing up examples of ppl who made a living w/ their art (shakespeare, the beatles) but that doesn't *prove* anything more than me bringing up examples of ppl who didn't make a living w/ their art (uh...dickinson, kafka, any of the thousands of artists who started out rich)

about as much as I am to see the latest $100 million dollar movie

oh you're being disingenuous, you know very well you're not even remotely interested in a zero-budget cinema.

Shakey Mo your deep lefty roots are showin'! :)

goin to a hootenanny in the holler tonight, should be good

this isn't really fair...lots of masterpiece-producing artists started out having a day job until, you know, they became well-known enough to live off their art. they didn't all start out as professionals and then create great works (although some did of course).

yep. one of the best sci-fi writers of the last couple decades - Gene Wolfe - had a day-job as an engineer and editor of trade magazine for the better part of his career.

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oh you're being disingenuous, you know very well you're not even remotely interested in a zero-budget cinema.

I admit I am kinda interested in this $40 zombie movie that's making the rounds

this isn't really fair...lots of masterpiece-producing artists started out having a day job until, you know, they became well-known enough to live off their art. they didn't all start out as professionals and then create great works (although some did of course).

no that is my point though - while some artists (Shakespeare mentions this a lot, in his sonnets) are happy to think of posterity, to argue that profit motive has somehow been bad for art (at any level) seems really silly to me. Pay people and they tend to work harder than when you don't. A good artist working hard is better than a good artist with no time to work. The exceptions are usually outsiders - Kafka, Dickinson, Darger if you're into it. If you really think the Beatles get to Sgt Pepper without a comfortable living to support their experimentation, then I'm open to hearing that argument, but I'm extremely suspicious.

I agree on that point, commerce and art are not naturally adversarial. However, I don't think anyone here is really saying the profit motive has been BAD, just that it hasn't been, strictly speaking, essential.

A profit motive that directly ties money coming in to the work that is being produced is definitely bad for art, as surely as paying journalists directly by how much their articles contribute to circulation would be bad for journalism. Fucking sudoku guy would drive solid gold Benz! (sorry will shortz, you still my homie)

shakey: the initial post with which I took exception was the argument that you "should" work for love, not money. I think a great deal of fantastic art has been made by people whose motivation was largely "holy shit, I can get paid to do this: fucking awesome"

If you really think the Beatles get to Sgt Pepper without a comfortable living to support their experimentation, then I'm open to hearing that argument, but I'm extremely suspicious.

this goes back to my theoretical situation earlier w/ the giving a million $ to our 100 favorite artists and them creating masterpieces. it sucks that this isn't gonna happen! but it isn't!

yes, sgt pepper wouldn't have been created. and there are works of genius that are currently not being created due to lack of infinite money.

shakey: side point, but i know you like hip hop and i don't know how you reconcile that with your point.

wait, which point?

also maybe poor-beatles would have spent their creative energy making some lo-fi sgt-the-white-album

that music will be better if you take away the profit motive

this isn't really fair...lots of masterpiece-producing artists started out having a day job until, you know, they became well-known enough to live off their art. they didn't all start out as professionals and then create great works (although some did of course).

but this doesn't contradict the idea that profit's a motive -- lots of people are motivated to work on the art between day shifts out of the hope that they can become a full-time artist, or get some other monetary benefit. (for instance, there is one artistic pursuit I would probably be working on much less quickly if I weren't interesting in trying to sell it and pay off some student loans.)

oh wait, that's actually in the quote --

started out having a day job until, you know, they became well-known enough to live off their art

the motivation to get from the beginning of that sentence to the end of it is definitely something

that music will be better if you take away the profit motive

umm I didn't say this and I don't agree with it.

I will say that in terms of hip hop its perhaps relevant to note that its roots aren't in making money - they're in entertaining your friends and family at a party when you have little to no money or resources. Now granted the genre didn't really start turning out masterpiece-level recorded material until big-time label financing started happening in the late 80s and that that in turn became a "get out the ghetto" strategy for a ton of artists who went on to make great stuff... but again, I'm not knocking artists getting paid or making the best possible work they can in the hopes of getting paid or whatever. That motivator exists and for some people it works. For other people they don't need that motivator, and they can produce great stuff too.

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there is one artistic pursuit I would probably be working on much less quickly if I weren't interesting in trying to sell it and pay off some student loans.

xp nabisco: Have you been reduced to sperm donor along with J0hn?

and of course for some people money's the sole motivator and they're ideas are shitty and those people make shitty music.

The way the profit motive impacts art is a spectrum, its not a dualistic, good/bad, either/or thing.

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otm

If you're not inspired and you don't have anything to say, i'm not going to feel bad that you are rushing to put out something to make a buck.

xp Shakey: but some people are motivated by the "love of the thing" and their ideas are shitty and those people make shitty music.

haha yeah that's true too.

the moral of the story is: some music is shitty and some music is great and sometimes that music makes money

The way the profit motive impacts art is a spectrum, its not a dualistic, good/bad, either/or thing.

exactly what I started out trying to say - that to argue that people working for profit is somehow a bad this is moronic

bad thing

I don't think anyone is arguing that it's inherently bad! it's maybe bad for those particular musicians...