Graphomania, Copyright And Who Should Get Paid
Graphomania –
“A morbid mental condition characterized by the writing of long successions of unconnected meaningless words”.
Graphomaniacs – those responsible for a web filled with words best kept in a diary and music best played only in the creater's bedroom – are among the most vocal critics of copyright, suggests Krzysztof Wiszniewski (aka Fava) on his Cynical Musician blog. Why? Because graphomaniacs get no benefit from copyright.
"One of the big questions facing us today is whether the practical erosion of copyright is a threat to future creativity and if so, how big a threat." writes Fava. "Those in the copyright industries and a fair number of creators are saying: yes, it is a problem – just as we’d expect them to. However, there are also many people from the other side of the barricade who are saying this is nonsense. In their view, creators will always create, because of a deep-seated drive that forces them to do so…"
Graphomania Gone Wild
"The creator who’ll work for free has, in all likelihood, already learnt that nobody cares about what he has to offer enough to actually reach into their pockets," he continues. "He doesn’t expect payment and may go as far as saying that he doesn’t care about payment, because true art is its own reward."
"The first creator is connecting with the audience and thus reaps his reward. The second doesn’t, but persists nevertheless. The second creator is a graphomaniac."
What do you think?
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Given the sheer length of his comments at Music Think Tank, I find it pretty funny that Krzysztof would be diagnosing graphomania in others.
Just the same, it’s a very interesting point and he’s been on a good riff recently with his blog — I liked his essay about how an “Episodic Music” approach was best modeled after porn sites…
Quote: “However, there are also many people from the other side of the barricade who are saying this is nonsense. In their view, creators will always create, because of a deep-seated drive that forces them to do so…”
It was Michelle Shocked, one of the pioneers of the trend of licensing one’s music to a label instead of selling copyright, who titled one of her own indie albums “Artists Make Lousy Slaves”.
Hence, the view of things quoted above doesn’t really hold up. After all, Chuck Berry has probably made more money by suing promoters for contract infringements post 1979 when his final album came out than by the records sold under his name.
As for the data driven song: people who just want to dance may not care to listen to the lyrics at all, so a song of trendy gibberish might just sell millions, but this would be a sure way in which the power of the word would be lost to the power of the dollar. Nobody remembers the era of evolution when human beings still had to learn how to communicate with language, long before the stone age. So I’d like to ask: is it really a desirable perspective that the power of money might soon eat up the market share of the power of the word? In the end, it’s not money that talks, but those who spend it.
Not so sure…While my releases are on sale, I grew up almost never paying for music and getting 99.5% from p2p/torrents and copied tapes. It’s just weird to expect that anyone else might really pay just for the songs…definitely not outside the US! I don’t know a single person who buys music besides DJ’s who also mostly play free promos.
@Justin:
The reason for my verbosity on MTT and elsewhere is simple: I try to explain myself fully, so there will be less chance of me being misunderstood.
Fat load of good that does me.
@Bruce:
Since you’re offering rewards in the contest, isn’t it fair to say you’re incentivising creation in a material sense? As a graphomaniacal purist I must object to any suggestion that a true graphomaniac would stoop to accepting compensation!
Oh, and it’s Faza. I thought that I’d be getting fewer misspelings with that than with Krzysztof.
Got that one wrong too. Copy/paste, anyone?
hi.
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