p2pnet view Politics | Music | P2P:- Hi Ed. I hope you don’t mind me contacting you like this but recently you said:

“It’s sort of been forgotten in a way, over the years, that actually the key relationship is between the band and the people who like that band.

“We have a wonderful means to do that, to achieve communication, through the web, through the internet.”

Well, I like Radiohead. Always have. So I’m taking you at your word and using the net to contact you.

This is a bit long, but please bear with me.

Admit you were wrong

As I’m sure you’re very much aware, in Britain, there’s now a very serious disconnect between musicians and their fans.

But it’s not irreversible.

In fact, the Featured Artists’ Coalition, of which you’re a board member, could go a very long way towards fixing it —-

—- if you and your fellow members have the courage to admit that, contrary to all appearances, you do give a damn about the people who love and support you and your music. All of you.

All you have to do to prove it is admit you were wrong about a terrible decision you made last year.

Half a billion pounds

As you know, the Big 4 corporate record labels are primary drivers behind the international Three Strikes and you’re Off The Net business plan which, if implemented, would cost British taxpayers half a billion pounds, said the Times Online.

It’s being floated by Peter ‘Mandy’ Mandelson as part of the country’s Digital Economy plan, I said, going on >>>

But it’s a purely corporate effort.

Vivendi Universal (France), Sony (Japan), EMI (Britain), and Warner Music (US) repeatedly cite the welfare of musicians in their excuses for demanding the implementation of the scheme, and a major element in corporate PR efforts to popularise it in the UK has been, and still is, the support of the Featured Artists’ Coalition (FAC).

Last month I ran an open letter to the FAC and, as the end of 2009 approaches, I’m running it one more time with the added message >>>

If you want to retain the small amount of goodwill which remains after your betrayal of the people who buy your music, you’d better act. And fast.

We don’t depend on you. But you DO depend on us. 100%.

‘ … there is no technical solution’

Last year the FAC voted >>>

… overwhelmingly to support a three-strike sanction on those who persistently download illegal files, sanctions to consist of a warning letter, a stronger warning letter and a final sanction of the restriction of the infringer’s bandwidth to a level which would render file-sharing of media files impractical while leaving basic email and web access functional.

Your friend, and a2f2a.com co-founder Billy Bragg, is also a director and he told p2pnet back in October, “Despite evidence that technical sanctions will not work from several IT experts that we invited, the majority was clearly in favour of some kind of sanction.

“In order to try to stop disconnection, we opted for bandwidth squeezing as a compromise between all of our positions. Our task now is to convince our colleagues that there is no technical solution, but this will take time.”

But it wasn’t always like that.

‘Every generation has a different method’

“Blur and Radiohead are among a host of bands calling on the Government to abandon proposals to cut off the internet connections of people who illegally download music,” said the Telegraph in September, 2009, going on >>>

They said plans announced by Lord Mandelson, the Business Secretary, to suspend the internet accounts of those who engage in filesharing will criminalise a whole generation of their fans.

The Featured Artists Coalition (FAC), a new group set up to represent the interests of recording artists, which also includes musicians from Pink Floyd, argued that despite the damage that file sharing does to sales of their records, it can also encourage people to buy concert tickets and merchandise.

Ed O’Brien, the Radiohead guitarist, said: “My generation grew up with the point of view that you pay for your music. Every generation has a different method.

“File sharing is like a sampler, like taping your mate’s music. You go, ‘I like that, I’ll go and buy the album’. Or, ‘you know what, I’ll go and see them live’. What’s going on is a huge paradigm shift.”

Dave Rowntree, the drummer with Blur, added: “The fact that file sharing goes on, and is as popular as it is, is an incredibly positive thing for the music industry. The fact is that music is so popular that people are willing to break the law to get it.”

The musicians said they believed that file sharing is bringing their music to the internet generation who have not been brought up listening to the radio.

Nick Mason, drummer with Pink Floyd, said: “The last thing we want to be doing is going to war with our fan base. File sharing means a new generation of fans for us.”

Like you, Nick is a FAC director. So that’s at least three important big-name musician FAC board members who are on record as raising serious doubts about the Three Strikes scheme.

It’s OK for FAC to take the high moral ground. Many of its members have already made their money and achieved fame. But not all of them have. Meanwhile, to the average person, the FAC’s decision to reverse its original position, turning against the very people who keep you and the other members going, suggests you believe file sharers are indeed the scum the corporate music industry portrays them as being.

Criminals and thieves who care nothing about musicians.

And while you ponder, the labels are grinding relentlessly forward with their virtual Hollywood partners, turning the entertainment industry into a desolate wasteland where only hugely wealthy multinationals can hope to survive.

‘You’re building your tribe’

a2f2a.com was founded by myself and Billy Bragg around the concept that it’s vital for fans to work directly with the musicians whose art they buy, and for artists to work directly with the fans who support them.

“Artists need to be paid, and fans want to pay them,” says the mission statement.

With that in mind, the Midem website has a video interview with you and from it, despite the revised official FAC position, you don’t appear to have changed your mind about how you feel.

During the interview, “musicians have to interact with their fans,” you state unequivocally. “You’re building your tribe.”

Connecting with them “is as important as it’s ever been — probably more so when you’re a bigger band because you can lose touch with your fans,” you say.

And >>>

It’s really important and you have to remember what it was like when you were a teenager … when you were at those tender ages when music means so much to you.

You have to build up this trust.

And >>>

It’s sort of been forgotten in a way, over the years, that actually the key relationship is between the band and the people who like that band.

We have a wonderful means to do that, to achieve communication, through the web, through the internet.

File sharing

You continue >>>

File sharing is the hot potatoe of the moment …

There’s a part of me — a very strong part of me — that feels that that peer-to-peer illegal downloading – and this is my own personal view – is just a more complete, or sophisticated version, of what we did in the 80s,which was home taping.

Maybe that’s a bit naive, but I still believe that people … if they actually get into your music, that’s a huge thing.

What we used to do is, classicly, you know, someone would buy the album — and it was when this whole home taping is killing music, the skull and crossbones stuff which we all laughed at because we were listening to lots of music and if we really liked it we went out and bought the album.

[...] I think what happens [today] is very similar, that peer-to-peer illegal file sharing happens and if they really like it, some of them might go and buy the records, might buy the CD …

So is file sharing devastating the music industry, as it claims?

You apparently don’t believe so.

“I have a problem when people in the industry say ‘it’s killing the industry, it’s the thing that’s ripping us apart’,” you say. “I don’t actually believe it is … [file sharers] might not buy an album, but they’re spending their money buying concert tickets, a T-shirt, whatever.”

Selling music in the 21st digital century

To go forward, you stress in the video interview, there absolutely must be more websites selling more music.

“It’s got to happen,” you say emphatically, continuing >>>

You’ve got to make it slightly cheaper as well to get music, in order to compete with the peer-to-peers. But more people are consuming more music than ever before.

The web is a very utilitarian way of getting music. It’s deeply unsexy.

The Richard Branson of nowadays would be able to license and set up a really amazing website for like 14-to-24-year-olds that deals with their music, music that they want, and that has really good content.

I mean it’s all about content on the web.

It’s about the personal touch and doing something really, really innovative …

And make really easy for people to buy music, “and cheap,” you declare, because “a lot of 14-year-olds to 16-year-olds, whatever, 17-year-olds, don’t have credit cards. So how are they going to get music digitally?

“We haven’t addressed this. These are very, very very basic issues and I find it staggering that the industry seems to be really dragging its heels on this.”

This is “stuff you could do in one week,” you state, adding, “Move quicker. and that’s been the whole problem over the last 10 years.

“Why we are here now is because the recording industry dragged its feet over digital.”

If ‘they’ win, you lose …

Well, Ed, it’s not only the recording industry that’s dragging it’s feet. You and your fellow FAC board members are doing the same thing and while you prevaricate, the corporate music industry is driving its wedge ever more deeply between you and the fans you admit you can’t do without.

You, Bragg, Rowntree, Mason, and anyone else on the FAC board MUST convince it and other members to revert to the coalition’s original position.

When the FAC was formed at the beginning of 2009, “Downloads aren’t illegal, says a new and powerful lobby group of famous UK artists and performers including Blur drummer Dave Rowntree, Soul II Soul’s Jazzie B, Billy Bragg, Radiohead’s Ed O’Brien, Kate Nash, Marillion’s Mark Kelly and rapper Master Shortie,” I said in a p2pnet post, continuing >>>

“The inaugural meeting of the U.K.’s Featured Artists’ Coalition (FAC) in London resulted in a unanimous vote among its members against any measures that criminalize file-sharing,” says Billboard.

The 140-strong FAC was formed, “to give artists a collective voice to campaign for effective laws and regulations, as well as transparent and equitable business practices,” it says, going on »»»

As well as discussing the general aims and logistics of the new body, there was also a unanimous show of hands against the idea of criminalizing file-sharers, according to those present.

There was concern about any legal body taking action against fans who were involved in file-sharing and preventing them getting broadband access to be informed about the activities of their favorite acts.

But an update at the end of the story pointed to another post which said >>>

However, I’ve just learned from a fly-on-the-wall in the UK things aren’t as cut and dried as Billboard, and other, reports suggest.

At the meeting, not open to the public, there was a “show of hands”, not a formal vote, and it was by no means unanimous, I’m told.

The rest is, as they say, history.

So, Ed, it’s as simple now as it was then.

If ‘they’ win, you and everyone else, musicians and fans alike, loses.

But if we’re all on the same side, they can’t beat us.

Jon Newton - music fan

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Times Online – Broadband consumers to foot £500m bill to tackle online piracy, December 28, 2009
went on – Dear Featured Artists’ Coalition …, December 28, 2009
Telegraph – Blur and Radiohead join forces to battle Government over proposed piracy laws, September 10, 2009
p2pnet – Downloads aren’t illegal: UK music stars, March 19, 2009
Billboard – Featured Artists Opposed To Cutting Off File-Sharers, March 12, 2009
another post – Downloads aren’t illegal: update, March, 2009

January, 2010

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