Casio CZ/ VZ/ FZ - Pro Series

Interesting text!

;)


2008/8/8, zebra <ezra.buchla@...>:
>
>   dunno even how necessary it is to add to such a bloated topic...
> particularly on a synth forum... oh well, here's some more thoughts:
>
> i sympathize with yr position and i do agree that the ethics are
> pretty grey these days.
>
> but i think you're deploying some highly selective logic.
>
> it's common sense that when buying a cd from a touring band becomes an
> act of charity (guilt drives you to "support the musicians"), rather
> than an act of self-interest ("i want to listen to this at home"), a
> big part of the economic mechanism is broken.
>
> it was scary when i started noticing that our band was selling more
> vinyl than cd's on our tours. vinyl is coveted by nerds (i'm a nerd),
> and partially for its scarcity, not by people who are casually
> attracted to the music but would like to have it in their car. the
> profit margin is much lower for vinyl and not every artist can manage
> to produce it in the first place.
>
> if you think cdbaby (which has paid out $14million TOTAL to artists
> over its ENTIRE existence) is an adequate substitute for being able to
> sell enough (audible) merchandise to support a tour, you've never
> tried to make a living as an independent musician. this was never an
> easy thing to do, and it is now accepted as basically impossible.
> everyone is a weekend warrior these days, or at the very least they're
> spending more time on their t-shirts and less time on their albums...
>
> of course, nine inch nails can afford to give away their music and
> rake in millions from touring. that's nice enough, but these
> high-profile "new economic structures" are only possible because the
> twentieth century already happened. we are spending our accumulated
> cultural capital, and despite the many many flimsy justifications i
> hear (like, i'm sorry, yours), the fact is everyone listens to music
> all the time now, and few people pay for it.
>
> that's not the worst thing in the world, maybe. art without commercial
> interest is certainly liberated in some way.
>
> for example, myspace lets everyone be heard, including a lot of great
> werid stuff and a tremendous amount of utterly lame and derivate
> stuff, and some stuff that's just weird and bad (eye of the beholder
> applies). one could argue that this is a needed injection of democracy
> to the system, and non-professional music is cool. i agree, but i hate
> spending time on myspace, and i hate the sound of their
> mega-compressed flash player, and i miss hearing albums that are
> produced with some care and craft because the band had time to
> practice and some cash to put into recording sessions, even though
> they're making quirky music that's never going to be licensed for car
> commericals or clearchannel radio.
>
> and this is because talented underground artists used to be able to
> make money touring, without sponsorships or movie tie-ins.
>
> now we have to go to europe where tradition demands we at least will
> be well fed and given a place to sleep. usually pays pretty good too,
> so you can go home with some money in your pocket despite the fact
> that you sold about 35 cd's to 35 enthusiastic crowds over the last
> month and a half. america? not even so kind.
>
> besides all that, most mp3's just sound bad... (oops...) i can't
> imagine hearing all my music on an iPod, with terrible cheap little
> earbuds, in 192kbit mp3's, "sound enhancer" -ed... on a train...
> what's the point? and yet this mode of listening appears to be
> tremendously popular. gah...
>
> call me a snob but i can't help thinking that these two forms of
> devaluation are related, somehow.
>
> maybe ubiquity isn't really the greatest goal for music. maybe you got
> more enjoyment from those CD's you paid for in the 90's than from any
> track that you'll download and trash after 30 seconds, because you can
> and because there's a billion more tracks to try and not enough time
> left in all your remaining days to hear them all.
>
> maybe a piece of music that could make the rest of your life more
> pleasurable is worth more than 99 cents... or nothing...
>
> sorry, i'm done
>
> /eb
>
> On Fri, Aug 8, 2008 at 1:29 PM, zoinky420 <zoinky420@...<zoinky420%40yahoo.com>>
> wrote:
> > --- In CZsynth@yahoogroups.com <CZsynth%40yahoogroups.com>,
> "synergeezer" <synergeezer@...> wrote:
> >>
> >> Ain't it great live in a post-ethical society! I wish I could join
> >> you there. Where can I go to steal your products?
> >>
> >
> > Pretty much any of the sites CDbaby allows to exploit my recorded
> > output. It's weird, they encode your CD and send mp3s to dozens of
> > different mp3 vendors, some of which turn around and give the mp3s
> > away, and some of which sell them for a dollar or so. For some
> > reason, even though they're available for free on some sites, people
> > still buy them for a dollar from others.
> >
> > Incidentally, I've never had an ethical problem downloading mp3s, and
> > I was a very early adopter. I was a little concerned about the
> > artists livelihood at first, but I've been downloading mp3s for over
> > 10 years now and recording artists seem to be making more money than
> > ever, including myself (though a 100% increase in almost nothing
> > still isn't much). Those mp3 sites CDBaby seeds have provided me
> > with the bulk of my CDBaby earnings, rather than the CDs that CDBaby
> > sells for me. Although, almost all of that revenue has come from a
> > single song I titled 'StunnaShades' because I've been wearing big
> > chunky ridiculous sunglasses since long before the Oakland 'hyphy'
> > movement popularized them. Anyway, now I get over 1000% more
> > downloads for that song than any other, probably because people are
> > expecting a rap song, which they don't get, but by then it's too late!
> >
> > Anyway, like I said I have no qualms about downloading mp3s, and
> > never have. I think the main reason for that is because any mp3 I
> > want will be from some artist who is fairly Big, and is already
> > making scads of money as a hot new trend. Any sad-sack act that
> > isn't a hot new trend can't give their mp3s or 'demos' away fast
> > enough. The CD shelves of those thrift stores I mentioned are filled
> > with CDs put out by local nobodies that nobody buys, and I suspect
> > every thrift store in North America is filled with similar local
> > fodder. Anyone who really 'cares about supporting music' would be
> > buying those up, or better yet, buying them before they wind up in
> > the thrift store. But they suck, and that's why nobody cares.
> >
> > Now, here's a case in point about a band that is currently considered
> > hot and trendy: A few days ago I was watching Tom Green's talk show
> > and his musical guest was Leslie and the Lys. I liked their
> > performance so I searched Google for their product. Turns out they
> > had released a few albums through CDBaby. But the CDBaby pages
> > representing those albums only had the mp3s for sale, not the
> > original CDs. You see, the band had become so hot and trendy, the
> > early birds got all the worms. Those CDs are now collectors items,
> > and worth a lot more than those people paid for them. So, you want
> > to support music? Scour CDBaby for new stuff that totally rocks,
> > that you're sure will be the next big thing, and buy their CD. Not
> > only will you be injecting cash into the bank accounts of artists who
> > not only need it the most, and also deserve it the most, you'll be
> > investing in an item that you may be able to resell at a later date
> > for several times what you paid for it. How many people do you think
> > actually do that? Not many, and even fewer who bother maintaining an
> > obsolete notion of morality regarding mp3 files.
> >
> > I would've bought one of those Leslie and the Lys CDs from CDbaby,
> > but I was too late. And that's not the only out-of-print album from
> > CDbaby I've wanted to buy. I wanted Spookey Rueben's CDbaby albums
> > too, but they're all sold out, too. See the pattern developing
> > here? If you're some cool underground artist people actually like,
> > you will have no problem selling your product, and those smart and
> > savvy enough to buy it (even if they only plan on flipping it on Ebay
> > next year) will have no problem shelling out for it, either.
> >
> > Fact is, if my music were good enough, I'd be selling out my CDs on
> > CDBaby. So rather than whine about nobody giving me a 'big break', I
> > decided to keep working on making my music better, so that someday it
> > will be worth buying.
> >
> >
>
> 
>



-- 
Patrick Wichrowski

tecladista e maluco de plantão
www.myspace.com/patrickwichrowski


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