copyright

The Meaning of Netlabel Day

I’m not sure what happened, but it seems like I took notes for a short essay that I wanted to write for Netlabel Day 2016, but never got to it. But the notes seem to be quite to the point. So I’m simply leaving this here. Enjoy.

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Netlabel Day means
– freedom from the middlemen
– low production costs for bedroom producers
– asking ourselves what does the value of music depend on
– asking ourselves what platforms do we use for distribution

This has nothing to do with the physical media and wonderful sound of the vinyl.
This is not against the right that musican should be able to earn a living with their music.

Netlabel Day means this: music being at the center stage with help of digital distribution networks embracing the idea that information and artistic expression wants to be freely distributed.

This is about re-evaluating platforms like iTunes, Spotify, Apple Music. This is about re-evaluating how much of a slave each and every musician is to the music industry, to commodification of music, to the capitalism and exploitation.

This is not about the idea that everything should be free and costless while still costing many hours of work. It’s about thinking about in what system do we work and create, how this system forces us to sell our own work and ourselves and how free online access to music bypasses such systems.

It’s also an opportunity to think about how democratisation of taste and free access to all cultural works at any time from everywhere is really beneficial and how it is hurting creators & musicians.

Netlabel Day offers us an opportunity to think about the world of musical creativity and its distribution, which is far from simple black or white, good or bad.

Rick Falkvinge: Creative Commons Torpedoes Copyright Industry Lies

The copyright industry has long repeated the claim to politicians that the copyright monopoly is necessary for any culture to be created at all, to the point where politicians actually believe this nonsense. Actually, their ‘lie’ is divided into two parts:

The first falsehood is that authors, makers, and inventors must be paid for anything to be created at all. This lie is actually rather obscene coming from an industry which has deliberately created structures that make sure 99.99% of musicians never see a single cent in royalties: 99% of good musicians are never signed by a label, and of those who are, 99% never see a cent in royalties. So it’s quite obscene arguing that culture must be paid for, when this very industry makes sure that less than one artist in ten thousand get any money for their art.

The second lie is that the only way for artists to make any money is to give the copyright industry an absolute private governmentally-sanctioned distribution monopoly, the copyright monopoly, that takes precedence over any kind of innovation, technology, and civil liberties. This is an equally obscene lie: all research shows that artists make more money than ever since the advent of file sharing, but the sales-per-copy is down the drain. The fact that the parasitic middlemen are hurting is the best news ever for artists, who get a much larger piece of the pie. Of course, the copyright industry – the parasitic middlemen in question – insist on pretending their interests are aligned with those of the artist, which they never were.

Therefore, in believing these two lies combined, politicians grant this private governmentally-sanctioned monopoly – the copyright monopoly – in the belief that such a harmful monopoly is necessary for culture to exist in society. (Just to illustrate what kind of blatant nonsense this is, all archeological digs have been rich in various expressions of culture. We create as a species because we can’t exist in a society and not express culture – it’s because of our fundamental wiring: not because of a harmful monopoly.)

So what could act as conclusive proof that these lies are, well, lies?

Creative Commons.

In the construct of Creative Commons, you have placed the power over this monopoly with the authors and makers themselves, rather with the parasitic middlemen. And the interesting observation is, that once you do, millions of creators renounce their already-awarded harmful monopolies for a number of reasons – because they make more money that way, because they prefer to create culture that way, or because it’s the moral thing to do.

Once you point out that the actual people who create are renouncing their already-awarded monopolies, and are doing so by the millions – actually, more than an estimated one billion works of art according to the Creative Commons organization – the entire web of lies falls apart.

The copyright monopoly isn’t necessary for culture to exist. It was always tailored to benefit the parasitic middlemen. And these middlemen have tried their damndest to prevent actual artists from seeing any of the money.

Now, you could argue that specific expressions of culture couldn’t exist. You’d be easily disproven – for example, most multimillion-dollar blockbusters make their investment back on opening weekend, far before any digital copy exists as a torrent. Besides, why would you prop up and lock in a specific form of culture with a harmful monopoly, when forms of culture have always evolved with humanity?


Rick Falkvinge is a regular columnist on TorrentFreak, sharing his thoughts every other week. He is the founder of the Swedish and first Pirate Party, a whisky aficionado, and a low-altitude motorcycle pilot. His blog at falkvinge.net focuses on information policy.

(via TorrentFreak)

Kiberpipa o sporazumu ACTA

ACTA je trgovinski sporazum za boj proti ponarejanju, ki je v nastajanju že več let in je v zadnjem času – predvsem pa po podpisu Slovenije – prejel veliko pozornosti predvsem zaradi strahu, da bo omejil svobodo govora na medmrežju. Gre za multilateralni sporazum, ki med drugim predlaga uvajanje novih mednarodnih kriterijev za uveljavljanje avtorskih pravic ter zaščite intelektualne lastnine.

Menimo, da gre pri sporazumu za več nedopustnih postavk, saj ACTA predstavlja ogrožanje zasebnosti, omejevanje inovacij in škodovanje mednarodni trgovini. Samo besedilo sporazuma je nejasno, dogovorjeno je bilo za zaprtimi vrati, večina držav v razvoju pa je bila izključena iz pogajanj.

Sporazum ACTA pomeni resno tveganje posledic zaradi neuravnoteženosti med varovanjem pravic, izhajajočih iz intelektualne lastnine in ohranjanja in varovanja temeljnih človekovih pravic, kot so svoboda izražanja, dostop do informacij in kulturnih dobrin ter pravice do zasebnosti.

Kiberpipa se zavzema za javno razpravo, predvsem pa za jasno zavrnitev sporazuma s strani Evropskega parlamenta. Kiberpipa se pridružuje mnenju La Quadrature du Net, da “je sporazum ACTA nastal skozi pogajanja za zaprtimi vrati namesto skozi demokratično razpravo in s tem zaobšel parlamente in mednarodne organizacije z namenom diktiranja represivne logike, ki jo vsiljujejo zabavne industrije. ACTA, podlaga za zakone kot so SOPA in PIPA, skozi kriminalizacijo prisiljuje medmrežne akterje k nadzoru in cenzuriranju komunikacije na spletu. S tem predstavlja grožnjo svobodi izražanja na medmrežju in ustvarja pravno negotovost za ponudnike interneta in ostala spletna podjetja. V imenu blagovnih znamk in patentov bo zagotovo ovirala dostop do generičnih zdravil v revnih deželah.

Na spletu in v javnosti na tak ali drugačen način že poteka javna razprava, specifično pa pozivamo:

– na javni protest 4. februarja ob 12h na Kongresni trg v Ljubljani
– na okroglo mizo v torek 7. februarja ob 19h v Kiberpipi
– na mednarodni dan protestov proti sporazumu ACTA 11.februarja
– da pišete našim poslancem v EP

pobuda za javno razpravo o sporazumu
http://pobuda-acta.si/

Informacijska pooblaščenka RS o sporazumu ACTA
https://www.ip-rs.si/novice/detajl/informacijski-pooblascenec-o-acta/

E-demokracija & Access Now o sporazumu acta
http://www.e-demokracija.si/no-acta/brosura-o-sporazumu-acta/

Helena Drnovšek Zorko: Zakaj sem podpisala sporazum ACTA
http://metinalista.si/zakaj-sem-podpisala-acta-o/

Analiza sporazuma na Slo-Tech
http://slo-tech.com/novice/t504699/0

Evropski poslanci:
http://www.europarl.si/view/sl/evropski_parlament/slovenski_poslanci_EP_2009_2014.html

Mednarodni protest 11/feb
https://www.accessnow.org/policy-activism/press-blog/acta-protest-feb-11