Featured Artists Coalition: tuning in to a2f2a
p2pnet news view | P2P | Music:- a2f2a, the net’s first artist-to-fan-to-artist site, went online yesterday. Its first post, Bringing artsts and fans together, generated 23 comments, most of them on target (and none of them vitriolic 
) by 8:50 am Pacific.
Today, the big news is: members of the Featured Artists Coalition are to be officially invited to join a2f2a discussions.
Yesterday afternoon the group, founded earlier this year, held their board meeting in London.
One of the FAC’s directors is artist and activist Billy Bragg. Together with p2pnet’s Jon Newton, he founded a2f2a and at the meeting, layed out the new site’s mission to others on the FAC board.
They include Dave Rowntree of Blur, Nick Mason of Pink Floyd, Ed O’Brien of Radiohead, Kate Nash, Hal Ritson of The Young Punx, Howard Jones, Mark Kelly of Marillion, Sandie Shaw, Master Shortie, Lucy Pullin of The Fire Escapes, Ross Millard of The Futureheads, Fran Healy of Travis, and Annie Lennox.
Members include Tom Jones, Robbie Williams, Little Boots, Badly Drawn Boy, Sia, The Boxer Rebellion, Kevin Hewick, among many others.
Billy will now be circulating an invitation to all members to take part in the debate.
Bridging the gulf of misunderstanding
One of the first people to respond to the news of a2f2a’s arrival online was Glyn Moody, the well-known technology writer and author of Rebel Code: Linux and the Open Source Revolution.
“One of the sad things about the current mess in the music industry is that artists are too often pitted against fans, when in fact both want the same thing,” he wrote on his blog, Open, continuing, “good music in a convenient format at a fair price. Here’s a welcome initiative that’s trying to bridge that gulf of misunderstanding: Artists need to be paid, and fans want to pay them.”
He went on to cite a2f2a’s goals, to »»»
Help each community better understand the other;
Help find a practical and workable system which offers artists fair remuneration in exchange for access to material by fans; and
Help set the agenda for discussions about the role P2P can play within the emergent digital record industry.
Together, we can do it – artist to fan to artist.
“What I particularly like about this — aside from the dialogue — is that it starts from the premise that people *do* want to pay for stuff.,” says Moody, adding:
“I think that’s absolutely central: most people realise that artists need to be supported, and that if everyone pays, the overall price will be lower.
“But the music industry likes to portray the public as split in two: those who don’t want to pay anything, ever, and those who will meekly pay whatever exorbitant price the labels demand.
“It ain’t that Manichean, and if a2f2a can help to dispel that myth, that’s got to be good news.”
Stay tuned.
Jon Newton – a2f2a / p2pnet
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi
Open – Artists to Fans to Artists: Positive Feedback, October 22, 2009
Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. It’s really easy!
Subscribe to p2pnet.net | | rss feed: http://p2pnet.net/p2p.rss | | Mobile – http://p2pnet.net/index-wml.php
Net access blocked by government restrictions? Use Psiphon from the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto. Go here for details.
October 22nd, 2009 at 4:35 pm
a few potential problems:
1) must be based on choice, otherwise it is no different from current model (no choice for fans, you MUST pay or be sued, and you must pay what you are told to)
2) must be understood not everyone will pay, many will sample first and decide later if they want to pay or not, but still some won’t pay
3) monetary value assigned by artist and fans may differ, even amongst fans – this must be understood and must be part of the choice as explained by 1) — otherwise you’re just demanding and that isn’t different from now, except more money goes to the artist
4) reason to buy should be understood and employed, if you’re just going to demand to be paid for copies, then there’s really no difference from now (except more money goes to artists), a paying fanbase won’t grow unless you’re willing to market with some sort of free offerings, if you can’t do that you can’t get too upset if the fanbase doesn’t grow as no one wants to spend money to be disappointed, once they like what they hear/read/watch then they’ll pay
5) in addition to 4) the understanding of infinite goods and finite goods should be clear, digital copies are infinite and easy to acquire and produce and distribute, so demanding money for copies doesn’t deviate from the current situation and people won’t deviate either (meaning they won’t pay and people will feel the artists are simply taking over, holding the same stance as the labels currently do)
And finally
6) be open to trying new things and testing new waters, even if someone has been telling you “you’ll never make anything this way” for the last 30 years, remember those people have vested interest keeping you under their thumbs
Just a few points I hope are understood by FAC members, but we have to LISTEN to one another, not just P2P listening but FAC members too, try to really understand these points above, not just read and go “yeah that won’t work.” because people ARE making it work and you can too!
October 23rd, 2009 at 7:48 pm
To all
The Court of Amsterdam has received a letter from Reservella, supposedly the owner of the website ThePiratebay.org according to the founders.
In it Reservella makes clear that Reservella does not own the site. This contradicts statements made by Piratebay founder Peter Sunde. The result was that the judge in Amsterdam did not believe the founders of The Pirate Bay anymore and now they have lost this particular battle.
I am an IT lawyer and involved in cases such as BREIN vs FTD. I call on all file sharers to resist to those forces that are trying to impose restrictions on file sharing services.
However, I also want to urge everybody to play this game fairly, otherwise the damage to our community will be even worse.
Feel free to contact me if you have any questions.
Regards,
A. Engelfriet
The Netherlands
October 26th, 2009 at 8:06 am
That same exact post allegedly by “Arnoud Engelfriet” was posted in comments on The Inquirer under the title “Keep it real (honest)” and then denied a couple of posts later with “That comment above isn’t mine”.
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/comment/1559648/dutch-court-pirate-bay-delete-torrents