The Internet Is Silencing Artists, According To An Artist On The Internet

from the criticizing-safe-harbors-from-within dept

We recently submitted our comments to the Copyright Office's ongoing study on DMCA safe harbors, but perhaps we should have been a bit more creative. At least that seems to be the plan of the Content Creators Coalition, which has made its submission in the form of a video starring producer T Bone Burnett doing his best Werner-Herzog-without-the-accent impression. It's... quite something. (Amusingly it's also hosted on Vimeo, a site which — like all sites hosting user content — relies heavily on DMCA safe harbors for its existence, and indeed prevailed in a major legal battle over that very thing last year.)

Probably the word most prominent in my mind after watching that is dramatic, with optional prefixes such as melo- and over-. It starts out like this:

In its early days, the Internet was hailed a panacea. A global community — unshackled from corporate, military, or government control ready to equalize and connect the world. One of its early false prophets named it a "Culture of the Mind" that "all may enter without privilege or prejudice". But that's not what we got.

Remember, this isn't a trailer for season three of Mr. Robot — it's a submission to the Copyright Office. There's a bit of a problem with that quote, too, but we'll get to that in a moment. T Bone drones on:

Instead of opening up minds, it has closed them down — becoming a restrictive, abusive place where women, people of color, and anyone marked different are shunned, attacked, and shouted down. 2016 laid bare how cyberspace hasn’t rationalized dialog. It's become a megaphone for propaganda and fake news where it’s easier to demagogue and divide than ever. Dreams of a stronger democracy have given way to foreign hackers and corporate manipulation — a shriveled politics indistinguishable from reality TV.

While some of those problems are certainly real, they are a lot more complicated and far from the primary characteristic of the internet as a whole — but more importantly, what does this have to do with musicians and the DMCA, exactly? (By the way, demagogue is not a verb.)

And for artists and creators, instead of amplifying our voices to lead the fight for change, it undermines and silences us. The Internet — with all its promise and beauty — threatens to destroy what it was supposed to save. We can’t let that happen.

This proceeding is focused on the legal safe harbors in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act – the law that was supposed to balance the Internet’s openness with creators’ ability to earn a living wage from their work. Those safe harbors have failed.

Wow, smooth transition. If I'm reading that correctly, he's saying that artists could have cured or at least mitigated all of society's woes if only they weren't being "silenced" by the internet. The idea that the internet is silencing anyone, much less artists, is frankly just silly — unless of course you're talking about the people who are directly and unambiguously censored by abuse of the DMCA. The safe harbors have failed, by having a very low bar to get content removed and failing to have any meaningful way of preventing or punishing abuse. And yet even despite this, the internet offers the biggest, most powerful and most accessible platform for artists in history.

(Also at this point, let's revisit that quote from an internet "false prophet". The line is actually a "civilization of the mind" and it comes from EFF founder John Perry Barlow's famous Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace in 1996. You'd think T Bone could have gotten the quote right, but you also have to wonder if he knows that Barlow is an artist himself who used to write lyrics for the Grateful Dead.)

The problems are familiar — they are well described in the record of these proceedings from the broken Sisyphus climb of "notice and takedown" to the gunpoint negotiations and pittance wages forced upon creators by the Google monopoly. The Big Tech ITOPIANS can track us across dozens of networks, devices, and profiles to bombard us with micro targeted ads, but they can’t even identify unauthorized copies of our work and keep them off their own servers and systems. Or they won’t.

Ah, Sisyphus — he who evaded his timely death and was sentenced to eternal fruitless toil. Not a bad metaphor for media gatekeepers and the DMCA, actually. Perhaps T Bone can imagine Sisyphus happy. Or maybe instead of wasting all this time pushing boulders up hills, the industry could have embraced digital distribution from the start and helped new platforms emerge instead of hindering them. As for detecting infringing works, ad tracking is just as flawed as any other "if they can do that, why not this" comparison on that front: the issue is not the technological ability to sort content, but the fuzzy definitions of what's legal and what isn't — especially since, despite T Bone's conflation of the two, "unauthorized" does not automatically mean "infringing". Besides, a mistargeted ad just gets ignored; a mistargeted copyright filter shuts down free expression.

(And by the way, I didn't capitalize "ITOPIANS" like that — that's how it was transcribed in the Coalition's press release. Apparently someone thought it was really, really clever and wanted to make sure you didn't miss it.)

The problem here isn’t technology – creators welcome the digital revolution and its power to connect, amplify, and inspire. A modern recording studio looks more like a cockpit than a honky tonk, and that’s just fine. The problem is business models — designed to scrape away value rather than fuel new creation, focused on taking rather than making. To restore technology’s place as the rightful partner of tomorrow’s creators, we need change.

Oh I see: he wants artists to enjoy all of the huge advantages created by digital technology, both in terms of distributing and creating their music, but not have to adapt to any of the new challenges created by the same technology. Sure, that sounds fair. He's right that the biggest challenge is business models, but to that I say: physician heal thyself.

The safe harbors must be restored — so only responsible actors earn their protection, not those who actively profit from the abuse and exploitation of creators' work.

People don't have to "earn" critical free speech protections by proving they aren't abusing them. That's exactly the opposite of how it works. But I'm impressed by the creativity and gall it took to describe dismantling safe harbors as restoring them.

The false prophets of the internet may have imagined an egalitarian open source creative wonderland – but what we got was a digital playground for a handful of mega corporations and web moguls living fat off the artistic, cultural, and economic value everyone else creates online. And if our democracy becomes stunted and diverse Americans are shut out, I guess these new Galtian Lords would say, "That’s business."

But artists and creators will never bow to that. We will never accept an Internet that turns its back on the vitality, optimism, and hope from which it was born. We will never allow our democracy to become a mere series of pseudo-events designed to manipulate people into spending money.

This, and the line that follows it, is the last quote I'm going to pick on, because it's where T Bone's bizarre attempt to treat art and democracy as more than related but practically synonyms finally coalesces. Because in the next line he commits to this blunt conflation whole-hog and coins a new term (emphasis mine):

Everyone with a stake in the Internet’s success and the health of our creative democracy must work together to make this right.

Well, coined it in this strange context anyway — though in fact "creative democracy" is originally the title of a 1939 essay that ended with a passionate assertion that "the task of democracy is forever that of creation of a freer and more humane experience in which all share and to which all contribute". Now you can twist words and concepts all day to pretend that the internet somehow stifles artists, but be honest: is there anything in the world that has pushed us closer to that democratic goal than the internet, and the communication and content platforms that rely so heavily on safe harbors to exist?

Maybe T Bone and the Content Creators Coalition think differently, but in that case they should at least take this little dramatic exercise off of Vimeo.

Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: copyright, copyright office, dmca, dmca 512, free speech, safe harbors, t bone burnett


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  1. icon
    That One Guy (profile), 1 Mar 2017 @ 8:13am

    What was that saying about rocks and glass houses again...?

    ... not those who actively profit from the abuse and exploitation of creators' work.

    ...

    The false prophets of the internet may have imagined an egalitarian open source creative wonderland – but what we got was a digital playground for a handful of mega corporations and web moguls living fat off the artistic, cultural, and economic value everyone else creates online. And if our democracy becomes stunted and diverse Americans are shut out, I guess these new Galtian Lords would say, "That’s business."

    Ignoring for a moment the fact that more is being created than ever before, including music, which rather nicely undercuts the whole 'scorched earth of creativity' thing he seems to have going, reading this I can't help but wonder about his stance towards the 'creative wonderland' that was the major labels before the internet came along and yanked the rug out from under them by offering creators a way to have their music heard and purchased without going through them.

    Because I don't know about anyone else, but 'handful of mega corporations ... living fat off the artistic, cultural, and economic value everyone else creates online' sounds like a dead ringer for the labels who demanded that if anyone wanted to be heard they went through them, paying and paying dearly for the privilege and leaving anyone they didn't grace with their benevolence in the dust.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. icon
    jupiterkansas (profile), 1 Mar 2017 @ 10:06am

    Script by Whatever!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. icon
    jupiterkansas (profile), 1 Mar 2017 @ 10:08am

    Why is Google to blame for all of this again?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 1 Mar 2017 @ 10:10am

    Why does Snape have Draco Malfoy's hair?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  5. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 1 Mar 2017 @ 10:16am

    another clown making himself look like exactly what he is, a freakin' idiot!!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  6. icon
    JoeCool (profile), 1 Mar 2017 @ 10:27am

    Re:

    Remember the old saying - better to keep your mouth shut and be thought the fool than to open it and remove all doubt.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  7. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 1 Mar 2017 @ 10:29am

    The hosting company I work for has approximately 1.3 million customers. In any given month, we get approximately 100 DMCA takedown notices, and most of those are NOT from musicians or movie studios.

    So where's all this infringement happening again?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  8. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 1 Mar 2017 @ 10:42am

    Re:

    yeah, but according to the *AA's and many artists your not 'the internet', google is cause they 'has all the $$' belonging to the artist***.



    *** - all money to first go to labels who will then disperse to artists their fair share.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  9. icon
    hij (profile), 1 Mar 2017 @ 10:42am

    What does this have to do with the internet

    This guy cut his teeth in a traveling revue playing on the road. He moved from playing small events to big time concerts. All of the issues he brought up have nothing to do with the internet. You can replace "internet" with any other venue. The problems he brings up are exactly the same whether or not it is a bunch of local bands playing down on the corner bar, big name productions at a nearby city's stadium, or some nebulous internet people.

    Then he explicitly says the problem is not technology it is the business models. If that is the case change the business model. The world does not owe him a chance to play in his studio. The world wants to see him on stage playing. It is not up to the government to provide a way for him to create a monopoly and force people to listen and pay for his music the way he wants it. It is a two way street, and he needs to listen to his fans. Both the fans and the artists need to adapt. Rigidly clinging to a way for him to control his fans will only result in him watching them walk away regardless of the technology.

    As for his disdain for the mega corporations getting fat off the backs of the poor artists, he is right that it is a problem. Trying to go back to a time where it was his buddies in the recording industry who were taking advantage of the artists is just a quest to go backwards to a time that is not so different than the present dystopia he insists we are living in. (We are not.)

    As for bemoaning the idea that the internet is turning into a corporate playground designed to take people's money away.... Sorry, but that happened 20 years ago. That train left the station a long long time ago. When T-bone Rip Van Winkle wakes up and realizes that it is 2017 he is going to be surprised.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  10. identicon
    I.T. Guy, 1 Mar 2017 @ 10:50am

    Re:

    Google = Internet

    link to this | view in thread ]

  11. identicon
    I.T. Guy, 1 Mar 2017 @ 10:55am

    T Bone and the Content Creators Coalition = Old men screaming "Get off my lawn" to the internet.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  12. icon
    Rapnel (profile), 1 Mar 2017 @ 11:00am

    Build your platform. The only ones holding you back are you. Stop expecting everyone else to protect your excuse for an Internet business model and stop trying to force your perception of what is fair. It's your Internet too. That makes it your responsibility to make it work for you. It has enabled you to create a platform.

    "But piracy, free-loaders, Google.." STFU and step up you twisted mental rob-the-patient fucks.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  13. identicon
    I.T. Guy, 1 Mar 2017 @ 11:06am

    gunpoint negotiations and pittance wages forced upon creators by the Google monopoly.

    Where is the outrage for the gunpoint negotiations and pittance wages forced upon creators by the AA monopoly?

    Artists have been getting ripped of far longer by the AA's than Google. If anything Google is following the precedent set by years of Slave Labor AKA signing a record deal.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  14. icon
    gigglehurtz (profile), 1 Mar 2017 @ 11:35am

    Re: What was that saying about rocks and glass houses again...?

    but 'handful of mega corporations ... living fat off the artistic, cultural, and economic value everyone else creates online' sounds like a dead ringer for the labels

    I honestly thought that's who he was talking about. Of course, with the melodramatic tone and overly creative language (for the apparent target audience) of the video it wasn't abundantly clear to me which side he was on. So at that point I thought "so he is talking about the labels vs the artists."

    Dude needs to stick to music. He's brilliant in that field.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  15. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 1 Mar 2017 @ 11:41am

    Re:

    Because Google rune YouTube, which allows many people to compete for attention, taking fans away from the big label artists. When your Income depends on a business model that only works when the market is controlled, and limited to a few artists, the self publishing revolution severely impacts your income, by taking potential paying customers elsewhere.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  16. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 1 Mar 2017 @ 11:49am

    Re: What was that saying about rocks and glass houses again...?

    The only difference between the old boss and the new boss is that the old boss paid better. He is part of the "wage according to work"-brigade. Or in other words: He sees artists as employees and the old boss as owning a monopoly on culture.

    Both of those realities were shortlived and I am surprised at how hard these people fight: "Those times are gone, move on."

    If they want to get a regular wage, they should look towards branding others. If they want to get famous they should look towards accepting that as a spare time activity. Having the old world with the gatekeeping and its tampered creativity is not a time outsiders look back at with much glee, anyway.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  17. icon
    Bamboo Harvester (profile), 1 Mar 2017 @ 12:15pm

    (By the way, demagogue is not a verb.)

    (Neither is Sisyphus.)

    It's a Sisyphean task to deal with these clowns...

    link to this | view in thread ]

  18. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 1 Mar 2017 @ 12:32pm

    Let's see...
    According to him

    1.- Artists want to express their feelings, thoughts, ideas, etc. via their art.
    2.- The internet instead of amplifying their voices to lead the fight for change, undermines and silences them (by sharing their work)
    3.- The artists want to prevent their voices to be silenced (by removing their art from the websites they, or the *IAAs don't approve)
    4.- We're supposed to believe He is not thinking with his wallet.

    I do believe artist's must be paid fairly for their work, but when I hear (or rather read) of someone being sued by the thousands (or more) by artist's and the illegal sharing of a couple of a couple of songs I find it difficult to side with them

    link to this | view in thread ]

  19. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 1 Mar 2017 @ 8:15pm

    Re: Re:

    LOL

    Google doesn't pay artists jackshit for streams; they're exponentially nastier to artists than any label ever was.


    You've seen HBO's Silicon Valley, right? You know you're being mocked and laughed at, right?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  20. icon
    That One Guy (profile), 2 Mar 2017 @ 12:19am

    Re: Re: Re:

    This again?

    This is not a difficult concept, if you expect a single stream to a single person to pay out even remotely the same as a one-time purchase, you are very confused as to how different business models work.

    In addition, last I knew neither Google nor YT required anyone using their services to hand over all the rights of anything posted to their service to them, so the idea that they're just so much worse rings hollow on that count as well.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  21. icon
    The Wanderer (profile), 2 Mar 2017 @ 3:56am

    Re: What does this have to do with the internet

    I'm pretty sure that, when he says the problem is the business models, he means the business models of the Internet companies which are protected by the DMCA safe harbors, not the business models of the artists and the labels.

    I.e., those companies are using business models which are bad for the creative 'industry' (for lack of a better word), and so they should be forbidden from using those models - whether explicitly, or (preferably) by making those models unprofitable.

    If you start from his premises, his conclusions aren't wrong, either. It's just that his premises have flaws.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  22. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 2 Mar 2017 @ 4:29am

    money for nothing

    this video has been demonitized

    link to this | view in thread ]

  23. icon
    jupiterkansas (profile), 2 Mar 2017 @ 8:08am

    Re: Re: Re:

    Google pays more than torrents.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  24. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 5 Mar 2017 @ 5:06pm

    Company Man

    Burnett is an RIAA record company man, through and through. This is the kind of stuff to be expected from him.

    link to this | view in thread ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.