[HANASHIR:14910] The Future of Music

[Sholom Simon <sholom...>]

>Just think for a moment how different our world would be if The Bible was
>protected by copyright.  Or the works of Mozart.

Those are unfair comparisons.  Even _if_ those works were copyrighted, the 
copyright would have been long long expired by now.

But while you are drawing extremes -- let me draw another extreme.  Suppose 
songwriter "A" writes a song.  He doesn't know anything about marketing, 
doesn't have connections, so, he just plunks in out on his guitar for his 
friends.  Suppose powerful produced "B" hears the song, gets famous 
rock-n-roll group "C" to record it, and B and C make millions.  A gets 
nothing.  Fair?

>Woody Guthrie was happy when others sang his songs.

I'm thrilled if people would play my songs!  But I'd be less than thrilled 
if someone made a ton of money off of it without me getting anything.

Don't get me wrong -- I'm a big fan of less restrictions and given more 
rights to the public.  Indeed, I have written articles in which I expressly 
give the right to copy those articles to anyone else who wants to use them 
in a not-for-profit arrangement.  And I am an admirer of the Chofetz Chaim 
who, to my understanding, gave the rights to all his written works to "the 
Jewish People."

But although I am a fan of less restrictions, I am not in favor of _no_ 
restrictions.

-- Sholom


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