As I observed last month in a comment on Rob Myer’s blog, if mass media didn’t have such an entrenched mindset that it was in the business of selling copies to the largest audience possible, it wouldn’t end up producing such ‘lowest common denominator’ pulp to meet such an objective.
But then this is what happens when you let mass producers determine what gets mass produced – instead of leaving things to peculiar artists in pure pursuit of art. Moreover, peculiar artists patronised by their peculiar audiences directly, rather than by populist publishers of copy-prohibited content via retail.
Now that the bottom is falling out of the market for copies, we are seeing the original market resume – the market for art. In this more natural market, copies are made by the audience – for why would they pay the artist for such an unimaginative task? The artist is rewarded for their irreproducible art, not the mass production of trivially reproducible copies.
This is not news to Vin Crosbie who has committed strikingly similar heresy that I wholeheartedly endorse. Read his keynote at the Second Annual Global Conference on Individuated Newspapers.
Plainly, for every artist and each of their works of art there is an audience (if only the artist themselves). But, whilst we are all artists and are all unique beings, our interests invariably overlap and we find ourselves members of many audiences. Indeed, there is a world of audiences, not just one – not just that like-minded planet the corporate publishers pretend to be serving. What’s more, the number of audiences in this world of audiences vastly outnumbers the population of individuals upon this Earth (see Metcalfe’s Law). Therefore, incredible as it may seem, there are many audiences out there for which no artist has yet produced art.
Big Buck Bunny is just a glimpse of the diversity of art that will prosper when the artist no longer pursues the greatest audience, but instead pursues the greatest art. All peculiar audiences then pursue their particular art and those peculiar artists who produce it – and this is the natural order of things.
At the end of our 300 year obsession with copies and their artificial sanctity, we now see the dawn of the second renaissance.
I think the main reason people are finding it hard to figure out how much to charge for MP3 files (variable? higher? lower?) is that they shouldn’t be charged for at all.
All such revenue is being extracted from the residual momentum of the copyright based business model as it slowly grinds to a halt – as that dwindling market of copy customers gradually realise how silly it is to pay for digital copies.
The pragmatic answer to pricing is that the price of MP3 files should gradually be reduced until it reaches zero or the purchase decision/hassle cost (thus maximising revenue extraction from a shrinking market). Unfortunately, those charging for MP3 files have an assumption that there is a sweet spot price that is non-zero.
The baby elephant in the room is the natural law that digital copies of published music shouldn’t and can’t be charged for – an elephant soon to reach adulthood. Ultimately, published music has to be free of charge – because it belongs to the public. Rather than the tragedy those brought up with copyright imagine this to be, it has its benefits to musicians in the digital domain. Freely copyable music provides free reproduction, free distribution, free promotion, and thus builds up the size of the paying audience.
“Eh? ‘Paying audience‘? I thought you said music had to be free?”
No, I said PUBLISHED music has to be free. After all, why should the public pay for what they already have? Such an unnatural notion only arises from the unnatural privilege of copyright.
A musician’s audience (their customers) pay the musician to produce music. After all, the musician is who they want to pay, and the music is what they want to pay for. The audience has no need to pay the musician (or their agents) for copies, given they have clearly demonstrated they can make those quite easily all by themselves1.
So, the musician’s new slogan is effectively “Get this one free, buy the next one”.
In more words: “The recordings currently freely downloadable from my website have been paid for by my keenest fans. I invite you to join them in commissioning future recordings.”
Don’t sell copies. Sell music. The market for copies has ended. The market for music continues unabated.
1 They can’t make vinyl pressings however, so there’s still a market for those, but the musician doesn’t warrant a cut (unless you still believe there’s a future for copyright).