For thousands of years, nearly every human culture created music. These songs belonged to their village. The villagers passed these songs down from generation to generation, lest they sink into obscurity. These songs immortalized then-current events, histories, hopes for the future, and collective beliefs shared throughout the civilization. They later provided historians and anthropologists with a treasure chest such information.
Eventually, a wonderful series of inventions permitted humans to record their music, thus better insuring its survival. We then created radio stations, allowing people all over the world to express their emotions and ideologies through music that could long outlive its creators. Listeners learned to record these songs onto “mixed tapes,” and share them with friends. It has provided humanity with magnificent opportunities for creative exchanges.
The trouble came when music-makers grew too busy making music to bother with making sure anyone heard it. Singers and songwriters needed name recognition, but how could they obtain it? Enter the record companies.
The agreements between music-makers and record labels proved simple. The record companies would “own” the music in exchange for playing their clients’ music on the radio and distributing copies of said music. Listeners would pay for these copies, and the labels would keep almost all of this profit for themselves. Despite this pimp-prostitute relationship, the label companies did get name recognition for their clients, recognition that until recently, music-makers couldn’t obtain any other reasonable way.
The labels made lots of money. The bands sometimes made money (via concerts and merchandise), but the latter also enjoyed the thrill of knowing they had listeners. Now, record labels have decided that too many people are listening to their music for free. Now, the labels are trying to pass bills such as SOPA, the Stop Online Piracy Act. This bill, if passed, will give our government the ability to shut down any website, in its entirety, if it plays even a single note of “unpaid for music.” This means that if you make a home video and post it on Youtube, and there’s music playing, even if only in the background, the government will have to threaten to—and possibly carry out this threat—shut down Youtube. This actually cost the music-makers an opportunity for recognition and for being heard—the exact services for which they surrender their rights to the label companies.
This is absurd for a variety of reasons. I’ll tackle just a few.
First off, no one making these home videos can afford to pay royalties. Therefore, the labels aren’t actually losing anything by allowing these petty infringements upon their copyrights.
Secondly, the world looks down upon Americans for many reasons. Our creativity is not one of those reasons. People all over the world—our “enemies” included—love our music and films. In countries such as Afghanistan, people literally risked their lives to watch the banned, American movie Titanic. We mustn’t erect anything that obstructs our abilities to create, certainly not for the sake of appeasing corporate greed.
Here’s the third problem. Online sources of creative output such as Youtube have provided people with opportunities to break through the label’s barriers. You see, without such channels as Youtube, a potential music-maker must sign up with a label or face little chance of being heard. Singers such as Justin Bieber received their start by making home videos on Youtube. So did the new lead singer for the legendary rock group, Journey. Their new singer recorded himself singing along to one of Journey’s songs. That landed him his new career.
More than any other reason, we should reject SOPA because it holds the potential to shut down every online. Prior to these online programs, misbehaving politicians could get away with far more than they can today. When Mitt Romney made one promise to one state during his ongoing, presidential run, only to turn around and make the opposite promise to another state, online sources such as Youtube broadcasted both of his speeches, side-by-side, for the entire world to witness. If SOPA passes, that can’t happen, because the footage from those speeches didn’t belong to the people who broadcasted them. When Bill O’Reilly claims to have never made a statement, and someone can dig up footage of him having made that exact statement, you can bet that footage will end up on Youtube—but not if SOPA passes.
By passing SOPA, we threaten our creative outputs. We threaten avenues for expressing new ideas. We lose a powerful tool in keeping politicians (and those in their pocket) honest, or at least exposing them when they’re not.
The claim that SOPA protects musicians is irrational, as almost any musician, who is not a member of Metallica, will tell you. Musicians don’t make their money off royalties, and most musicians just what their music heard. As the internet lessens every entertainer’s need of a record labels, Hollywood producers, or publishing company, these companies get scared. SOPA is a means for them to maintain their grip over their audience. The only reason our government is considering SOPA is because 1) the labels are paying them to care, and 2) crooked politicians don’t want to get caught lying, and this proves difficult in a world where everyone with a cell phone (which is everyone) also has a video camera.
George Orwell wrote of a horrifying world where Big Brother (the government) watches everything you do, searching for your every infraction of the rules. While 1984 proves a great read, it also proves a backwards prophecy. We are Big Brother, and we’re now able to watch the government. Unsurprisingly, our government isn’t too happy about this. Why do you suppose the Chinese government so strongly regulates their internet?
In the end, what’s the worst that happens by not passing SOPA? That we might enjoy music without the labels receiving their cut? A cut they never would have received anyways? If these record companies need to pass laws to prevent recognition and audiences for music-makers, then why do those music-makers still need them? The labels’ very fear of losing control over their markets speaks volumes of the industry’s vanishing need to work with them at all, and if you really consider the aim of music, movies, and other art forms, that’s not a bad thing at all.
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