Category: Art

A Conversation with Will Buckley, Founder of FarePlay (Podcast)

Beneath the roil of arguments about illegal downloading of digital media, there is an unmistakable social, dare I say ethical, implication to the idea that the next generation is growing up believing that it is normal to enjoy entertainment media without paying for it.  Perhaps the most counter-intuitive phenomenon is the fact that college students currently paying a premium to study and train for careers in the arts are among those using torrent sites and other means of file sharing to download movies and music in ways that never compensate the creators but do line the pockets of the site owners, ad servers, and advertisers.   All the while, the PR messages coming from the industries which benefit from this exploitation support the activities of these kids, who just may be selling out their own future careers.

The dialogue has to change, working artists are beginning to speak out again, and Will Buckley hopes to give creators of all size and type a means to share ideas and ultimately reach their fans on a peer-to-peer basis. The hope is to have intelligent dialogue about how the work really gets done, who really suffers from illegal downloading, and who gains.  In 2011, Buckley founded FarePlay, which has most recently joined forces with The Trichordist, co-founded by musician David Lowery, who has become very outspoken on these issues.

I spoke to Will Buckley via Skype at his home in Florida.

Going Memeless – Do civil rights abuses have to be hip to get attention?

I guess it comes down to the obvious answer that “sex sells,” but with the recent arrest of two Vietnamese songwriters, I can’t help but notice the overwhelming silence on social media in stark contrast to the outpouring of support for Pussy Riot.  Okay, I get it.  Mini-dresses on leggy, Russian girls wearing brightly colored balaclavas are hard to beat in the  attention-deficit theater of Facebook and Twitter, but surely the social justice issue is no different in this case.

Last week, the song writers Vo Minh Tri and Tran Vu Anh Binh were sentenced to four and six years in prison, respectively.  Uploading their songs to a website hosted by politically active Vietnamese outside the country, the two were charged with spreading propaganda against the state and faced possible sentences of up to 20 years.

Vo Min Tri, 34, wrote the song “Where is My Vietnam?” featured in the video above. The lyrics criticize the Chinese imperialist influence in his country, and according to some sources, the song was played over 700,000 times on YouTube.

Human Rights Watch has called for the songwriters’ immediate release, and their arrest comes in the wake of the Vietnamese government cracking down on political dissent in other forms. As quoted by AP, Phil Robertson of the  Asia division of Human Rights Watch stated, “First critics, then bloggers, then poets, and now musicians!” The international community can no longer stand by quietly as these free speech activists are picked off one by one by Vietnam’s security apparatus.”

If social media in America is any indication, it seems the international community is more than content to stand by quietly.  But why?  Almost every day, I encounter some proclamation that democratic governments are trying to stifle free speech, and the claim usually comes from some middle-class American or European whose rights are more than intact.  But it really does seem that when we have clear evidence of exactly this kind of oppression, there has to be a hook before it can get much attention.  Admittedly, it’s pretty tough to turn this case into a catchy tweet. #Freevominhtriandtranvuanhbinh doesn’t exactly pop off the stream, and there isn’t any available artwork that’s much better.  So, what’s a political prisoner to do these days, if he can’t be memed?

What’s the deal with the IRFA?

Photo by JGroup

Musician David Lowery, founder of Cracker and Camper Van Beethoven, has become one of the most vocal defendants of artists’ rights in the digital age. A co-founder of The Trichordist, Lowery and his colleagues write some very detailed, professional assessments of the state of the music industry since digital file sharing, streaming, and purchasing have become a reality.

Presently under fire by Lowery and others is a bill called the Internet Radio Fairness Act, which appears, for now, to benefit one company — Pandora.  I haven’t had a chance to read the bill yet, but analysis from a few sources sounds an awful lot like new-era business seeking a very old-school model for profitability — free labor.  To the generalist glancing at some post about the IRFA on social media, it sounds progressive and reasonable, namely the headline that states “the Internet Radio company wants to pay the same rates as terrestrial radio.”  No surprise, it ain’t that simple. In addition to Lowery’s piece, I would read some of the analysis by Chris Castle, who has been following the details fairly closely.

The most disconcerting criticisms I’ve read is that the bill is a union buster, designed to weaken or destroy the collective bargaining rights of artists. One paragraph in the bill is particularly troubling:

 “Nothing in this paragraph shall be construed to permit any copyright owners of sound recordings acting jointly, or any common agent or collective representing such copyright owners, to take any action that would prohibit, interfere with, or impede direct licensing by copyright owners of sound recordings [including artists who own their own sound recordings] in competition with licensing by any common agent or collective, and any such action that affects interstate commerce shall be deemed a contract, combination or conspiracy in restraint of trade in violation of section 1 of the Sherman Act (15 U.S.C. 1).’.  [For which there are both civil and criminal penalties.]”

Like I say, I haven’t had a chance to read the bill in full yet, and I’m not a lawyer.  What I do know is that Internet companies do not deserve a free pass when it comes to the question of influence peddling. If Pandora cannot turn a profit without a law that strips artists of collective bargaining rights, then so long Pandora.  It wasn’t that long ago when industrialists claimed they could not build important infrastructure without treating American workers like virtual slaves.  The right to bargain for the value of one’s work cannot be recast in this technological era as a barrier to the innovation of entertainment any more than it ought to have been claimed as a barrier to building a railroad over a century ago.  And considering how often the Internet industries cry foul every time a member of the creative community goes to Washington, this bill sounds more hypocritical and lopsided than it does “fair.”