Illegal downloading, file-sharing and what i think- what do you think?

[Mr. Foxen]

I think a bunch more effort goes into live shows, at the commercial end, now than it did 30 years ago.

[discreet]

[quote name='Mr. Foxen' timestamp='1361306268' post='1984367']
I think a bunch more effort goes into live shows, at the commercial end, now than it did 30 years ago.
[/quote]

+1 It is amusing to see recordings of gigs from that time and before where there is essentially NO light show whatsoever and the musicians casually tune up and adjust their gear on stage beforehand.

[heminder]

[quote name='Mr. Foxen' timestamp='1361295444' post='1984116']
A copy lasts for more than a single listen, unlike a streamed listen.
[/quote]

A stream is the same as a copy. When you stream a file, a copy is downloaded and played as the bits are received (with or without DRM).

[Mr. Foxen]

Radio.

[heminder]

Yes, even analogue radio.

[TimR]

[quote name='SteveK' timestamp='1361278242' post='1983719']

...

Some bold assertions here...

1. As do the majority of professional musicians today. Composers, quite rightly receive the greater rewards.
2. There are many examples of people having to pay to walk in to a building. Whether the architect is part of the profit sharing would be something for him to negotiate.
3. Then, don't work for Heinz. If you create your own sauce and work to get it in the stores, then you will most likely be paid for every jar sold. That's how it works.
4. Simply, not true!
[/quote]

1. Yes nothing has changed there.
2. Why? He was paid a huge amount up front for his expertise and people will employ him in future to design buildings for them.
3. That's not the way it works. You're paid to design something and the manufacturer does all the advertising, testing, cooking, bottling, distribution, etc etc. You couldn't do it on the same scale without some serious backing.
4. Name one industry outside of art that does?

[Mr. Foxen]

[quote name='heminder' timestamp='1361308794' post='1984434']
Yes, even analogue radio.
[/quote]

So your suggestion is that is a copy, or a copy is comparable to listening to radio. Legally, that is basically it, if you receive a file, you aren't copying it.

[heminder]

[quote name='Mr. Foxen' timestamp='1361319591' post='1984675']
So your suggestion is that is a copy, or a copy is comparable to listening to radio. Legally, that is basically it, if you receive a file, you aren't copying it.
[/quote]

Yes, precisely.

With analogue radio a copy of the music is broadcast by a station and transmitted to your radio receiver. Your radio in most cases won't have any medium to save the stream (unless it has a cassette deck built in). With digital medium streams [i]must[/i] be saved in memory in order to be decoded and played, and the architecture of the internet makes everyone a "broadcaster" as well as a "receiver" (as well as a "buffer amplifier" in cases where packets are forwarded).

From a technical standpoint a digital stream and a download are the same. The lawmakers are behind the times in many aspects.

[bigjohn]

The way I look at it. "downloading" a "copy" of a track sometimes isn't worth paying for. However, buying a track from iTunes sometimes is.

If it's a track I want perennial use of. I don't [i]have [/i]to back it up, I can download it to multiple devices and the metadata is correct on each. It's more the distribution I'm buying than the track. Much like when I bought vinyl I was buying the object rather than the music, when more often than not I could obtain a cassette copy of whatever I wanted from somewhere, I still bought albums like I do now.

[TimR]

[quote name='Mr. Foxen' timestamp='1361319591' post='1984675']


So your suggestion is that is a copy, or a copy is comparable to listening to radio. Legally, that is basically it, if you receive a file, you aren't copying it.
[/quote]

The radio station pay on your behalf everytime they send you the music.

[flyfisher]

[quote name='heminder' timestamp='1361321936' post='1984695']

From a technical standpoint a digital stream and a download are the same. The lawmakers are behind the times in many aspects.
[/quote]

Technically, yes, but there's a big difference with what is done with the received data. Streamed data is converted to audio and then discarded whereas 'downloaded' data is generally saved and can be locally replayed many times without further downloading.

A technicality perhaps, but important when it comes to considering royalty payments by the service providing the data. As TimR points out, a radio station pays royalties every time something is broadcast, which is analogous to streaming.

The law is indeed behind the times. We don't even need a TV licence to watch iPlayer content, which I suspect is not really the original intention of the licence.

[TimR]

[quote name='flyfisher' timestamp='1361349483' post='1984782']


...

The law is indeed behind the times. We don't even need a TV licence to watch iPlayer content, which I suspect is not really the original intention of the licence.
[/quote]

But it is restricted to territories where you are likely to have paid for it.

I suspect that if you can receive TV programs, you should pay the license, whether anyone has been prosocuted yet is probably only a matter of time.

[flyfisher]

I don't think it's a question of if you CAN receive LIVE TV broadcasts, it's a case of if you DO then you need a TV licence.

It's quite legal to watch recorded programmes via iPlayer without a TV licence but TVL don't like to admit it.

The following clearly states:

[i]You do not need a television licence to catch-up on television programmes in BBC iPlayer, only when you watch or record at the same time (or virtually the same time) as it is being broadcast or otherwise distributed to the public.[/i]
http://iplayerhelp.external.bbc.co.uk/help/playing_tv_progs/tvlicence

That is quite clear and unambiguous.

But then they try to fudge things by later stating:

[i]It is a criminal offence to watch 'live' television without a TV licence or to possess or control a device which you know or reasonably believe will be used to watch 'live' TV without a TV licence.[/i]

That is far more dubious, in my view, because I don't see how anyone can prove that you "know or reasonably believe" something. Surely proof of watching live television would be required in any criminal prosecution? Otherwise we'd all be prosecuted for owning vehicles that we "know or believe" will be used to break a speed limit at sometime.

It's typical of the scare tactics used by TVL to intimidate law-abiding people who don't happen to have a TV licence.

[Mr. Foxen]

[quote name='TimR' timestamp='1361348637' post='1984766']
The radio station pay on your behalf everytime they send you the music.
[/quote]

Not on your behalf, they pay for broadcast rights, nothing to do with who receives it or what they do with it.

[SteveK]

[quote name='TimR' timestamp='1361144923' post='1981956']
1. So. Before recorded music, musicians got paid for their time in the same way that practically every single other profession does.

2. If I was an architect I wouldn't get paid everytime someone walked into a building I designed.

3. If I worked for Heinz and formulated a new ketchup recipie I wouldn't get paid everytime someone bought ketchup.

4. Musicians essentially struck a deal with the distributors that everytime they sold a unit then the musician should get a share. No other industry works in this way.
[/quote]

[quote name='TimR' timestamp='1361317535' post='1984656']
1. Yes nothing has changed there.
2. Why? He was paid a huge amount up front for his expertise and people will employ him in future to design buildings for them.
3. That's not the way it works. You're paid to design something and the manufacturer does all the advertising, testing, cooking, bottling, distribution, etc etc. You couldn't do it on the same scale without some serious backing.
4. Name one industry outside of art that does?
[/quote]

1. So, we are agreed

2. Rather like a "session fee"

3. Paul Newman did rather well for his sauces and salad dressings.

4. Take a look in your local hardware/DIY store. If you invent something or create something unique, get it manufactured and get it on the shelves, as the licensor you will receive a payment for each unit sold.

It's all about negotiation.

Edited February 20, 2013 by SteveK

[heminder]

[quote name='flyfisher' timestamp='1361349483' post='1984782']
Technically, yes, but there's a big difference with what is done with the received data.  Streamed data is converted to audio and then discarded whereas 'downloaded' data is generally saved and can be locally replayed many times without further downloading.
[/quote]

It's not up to a radio station to decide on their whim what you can or cannot do with a broadcast that you receive. They cannot stop you from recording it on a cassette (although they certainly did try). As I pointed out in my previous post, digital streams must be stored before they can be decoded and played (whether in your chosen location or not) - it's the nature of the technology.

[flyfisher]

[quote name='Mr. Foxen' timestamp='1361375209' post='1984957']
Not on your behalf, they pay for broadcast rights, nothing to do with who receives it or what they do with it.
[/quote]

That's not strictly correct is it? (which is the worst form of pedantry ).

It may not be to do with who in particular receives the broadcast, but it has quite a lot to do with the number of people in the audience - which is why radio station ratings are so important and why Radio 1 will pay a larger fee than a hospital radio station.

[flyfisher]

[quote name='heminder' timestamp='1361377460' post='1984999']
It's not up to a radio station to decide on their whim what you can or cannot do with a broadcast that you receive. They cannot stop you from recording it on a cassette (although they certainly did try). As I pointed out in my previous post, digital streams must be stored before they can be decoded and played (whether in your chosen location or not) - it's the nature of the technology.
[/quote]

But a digital stream stored only in a small buffer for a few milliseconds purely for the purpose of decoding is a rather different process than the download of a self-contained file intended to be stored in its entirety and able to be replayed independently of any internet connection.

I doubt that anyone listening to digital radio or watching television these days considers themselves to be 'downloading'. In fact, it's the very reason we use the terms 'downloading' and 'streaming' in the first place.

Try arguing with TVL that you don't need a TV licence because you're not watching 'live' television anymore because of the few seconds of delay incurred within the transmission chain (during which data is being stored) because of the 'nature of the technology'. Let us know how you get on.

Edited February 20, 2013 by flyfisher

[Mr. Foxen]

[quote name='flyfisher' timestamp='1361377663' post='1985009']
That's not strictly correct is it? (which is the worst form of pedantry ).

It may not be to do with who in particular receives the broadcast, but it has quite a lot to do with the number of people in the audience - which is why radio station ratings are so important and why Radio 1 will pay a larger fee than a hospital radio station.
[/quote]

Already said before about scaling. Its to do with the people as a whole, rather than any individually, they have no responsibility or link to each individuals, the customers of a commercial radio station aren't the listeners, they are the advertisers. The listeners are a resource to be exploited. BBC radio is another oddity, because it isn't in the same line of business as its competitors.

[heminder]

Streams are self-contained files, they are just played as they are received. The definition of "stream" is to specify to the protocol in which order the bits of the file must be downloaded in order to allow playback as the download occurs. When you download streamed media a self-contained file is being downloaded and stored on your machine as you watch it. Unless the download is locked in a DRM mechanism you can rename the file and copy it to your portable player or phone if you so wished to do so. Only technophobes and conservatives see digital streaming as fundamentally different from downloading.

Television and radio are highly centralised and authoritarian forms of broadcasting information, so they obviously have a power over us to charge for a "TV License". My discussion isn't about latency in transmissions.

[oggiesnr]

There are many examples of where someone who designed/created an article receives money on an ongoing basis. At it's most mundane level Disney make money every time a toy is sold which features one of their characters, whether or not they made it or sold it. Half the jigsaws I sell make money for the original artist. In the gift business overall copyright management is a huge issue, in business generally it's an even bigger issue. All those disputes between Apple and Samsung? They're all about on-going royalties for parts of products that one company designed and the other company may or may not be using without paying for them.

In the great scheme of things the rights/wrongs of copying music is just the public froth on a much bigger issue.

On the issue of paying for something which has already been created, why not pay? It's one model by which stuff gets made and relies on sales to generate the income, not just for the record companies in this case but also for the artists involved. Artists are not salaried employees, if their music doesn't sell (for whatever reason) then they don't get paid (or even end up in debt after taking the advance into account).

Steve

[ThomBassmonkey]

This topic comes up fairly often and I'm always surprised that people are happy to pirate music (or any other products) when they're obviously interested enough in producing it to be on an entheusiast forum.

I'm in the process of booking a gig for my band in Manchester. We won't get petrol (why would they pay us petrol when they have plenty of local bands?) but if there's a decent crowd there (which I'm assured there will be) it's not a problem because we can make money on our CDs to pay for petrol.

If people copy our CDs instead of buying, we won't make any money and we won't be playing Manchester again. We lose out on a potential fanbase and potential fans lose out on a band they might like.

I'm sure big bands don't need petrol money but why are they any less deserving of the money their art is making?

[MiltyG565]

[quote name='ThomBassmonkey' timestamp='1361385105' post='1985159']
This topic comes up fairly often and I'm always surprised that people are happy to pirate music (or any other products) when they're obviously interested enough in producing it to be on an entheusiast forum.
[/quote]

Yes, me too. I was talking to a friend this morning, and we agreed, it's the morals an principles of it. Just because you are smart enough to justify not paying for it and then illegally downloading it, still does not mean that you should. I did mention that the 3 most basic laws are injury, loss and harm, and if anything you do falls under one of those categories, then it's a crime. Taking something which has a price tag without paying for it would fall under the "Loss" heading, making it a crime. That's it black and white.

I'm smart enough to justify allowing myself to drive faster than 70 on the motorway. I'll get to my destination faster, i have the driving skill to control a car above 70mph. does that mean that i should? no. Does that mean it's any less illegal? no, of course it doesn't.

Of course, i realised a while ago that no matter what i say, the people who have justified illegally downloading music are still smarter than me, can make better arguments than me, and will therefore always justify it as an OK thing to do.

[Mr. Foxen]

Downloading music isn't illegal. So every reference you make to 'illegally downloading' renders the accompanying statement meaningless. The whole of the point of copying is that there is no loss.

[GarethFlatlands]

Used to do it but don't anymore. Back in the pre youtube/soundcloud/myspace days it was a good way of discovering music and I got into more than one band through downloading a few songs to try them out. There just seems less point these days with instant access to pretty much any song I want to hear, added to the fact I'm getting fussy about what I'm willing to install on my computer means I just don't bother any more.