[Fmpro] Two Extremes

[Chris Alpiar]

Excellent post Bob! Some well made points, I hope to see some of this 
changed in the not so distant future. On a side note, my girlfriend was 
passing by as I read this and she saw the quote

"In the middle of these extremes we have the reasonable voice of Chris 
Alpiar
who simply wants to make a living doing what he does best."

and she said "What he does best... runnin his mouth!"

Ill be AFK for a while chasing her around the furniture ;-)


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Bob Safir" <bsafir at socal.rr.com>
To: <fmpro at nxport.com>
Sent: Saturday, July 26, 2008 1:06 PM
Subject: [Fmpro] Two Extremes


> It's extremely interesting to see two extreme perspectives in FMPRO 
> Digest,
> Vol 39, Issue 27.  On one hand we have the insightful, artistic 
> sensitivity
> of JohnB. (bipcress[at]Comcast.net, who really senses and respects the
> artistic/creative mind; and on the other hand we have the narrow, limited
> (and I will go so far as to say, dangerous) viewpoint of Gideon Black, a
> self-appointed expert on music libraries who is contributing to the
> downslide of value a composer has (or had) in our society.
>
>
>
> In is doubtful that Gideon Black has heard a sixteenth note of your music,
> as he is very busy reaching out to anyone who has the word 'composer'
> associated with their name or who has a Casio keyboard in their closet.
> This explains why, after an e-mail exchange with him in which I questioned
> why he was offering music for a buck-a-minute, he still managed to send a
> secondary form letter to me a day later asking me to join audiomicro.com.
> You too may have received this exciting offer in your inbox.
>
>
>
> Gideon Black (who cites himself as a successful songwriter/composer but 
> has
> no credits to speak of) uses his blog of June 6, 2008
> (http://www.audiomicro.com/royalty-free-music-blog/?p=20 ) to rationalize
> why it makes sense for composers to offer original music for near-nothing.
> (Which makes me wonder: why not offer it up for a penny instead of a
> dollar?)  He compares your music to laundry detergent; there is the brand
> name (which can make 'as much as' 30 dollars a pop) and there is the
> 'generic' brand; pricing your music for a buck.  He makes the huge leap in
> logic that the value of one does not affect the other.  We can push music
> down-market until it reaches practically zero (and we get that offer all 
> the
> time; give your music away for free) but he proposes that this will not 
> have
> any negative effect on the perceived value of music as a whole.  Nor does 
> he
> address how posting some of your music that's 'just lying around' will not
> have an effect on how people look at you as a composer.
>
>
>
> He uses stock photography as another analogy to cite how easy it is now to
> find quality photographs on the web.  He fails to mention the fact that
> hundreds of pro photographers can no longer make a living, including those
> who supplied stock photography for the web.
>
>
>
> In the middle of these extremes we have the reasonable voice of Chris 
> Alpiar
> who simply wants to make a living doing what he does best.  And we have a
> somewhat objective viewpoint (although I don't agree with each and every 
> one
> of her arguments) from Gael MacGregor in a previous post regarding
> audiomicro.com.  But it is the extreme viewpoint of the Gideon Blacks of
> this world that concern me.  No marketing experience.   No knowledge of
> trends.  No concerns beyond his immediate need for a paycheck, even if it
> requires the ultimate in the ability to rationalize.  And no insight into
> the downward spiral that must be stopped if anyone on this list is going 
> to
> make a decent wage for what they have to offer.
>
>
>
> If we can't be organized enough to form a guild or union or some sort of
> method to put some standards in place, then the least we can do is 'just 
> say
> no' to offers like those from audiomicro.com, and as Chris Alpiar pointed
> out, to say 'no' to working for free.  Enough is enough.
>
>
>
> -Bob Safir
>
> www.robertsafir.com <http://www.robertsafir.com/>
>
>
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