Fingers pointed in all directions, the music industry has been assessing its shortcomings again this week. Chart numbers are setting all time lows and the rise in digital sales is cooling.
Mar
17
Ideas Want To Be Free
The Internet has given platforms to a lot of pundits, many of whom have small points of view but big voices, to howl about the theft of ideas. Especially in the area of advertising – which occupies public, accessible space – a lot of people get attracted to the noise, cheerleading the trend to “out” copycat styles, imagery, lighting, themes, techniques, etc. This may be short-term fun, but it’s narrow thinking for the longer term. It’s regressive. Sadly, the misanthropic view is that individuals and societies tend to make the same mistakes over and over. In this case, just as the Internet has given us give the tools to set ourselves free, we clamor to constrain ourselves
Sep
08
Six Seconds of Sound
“Culture is impossible without a rich public domain – culture grows by accretion, with new forms building off the old,” is the compelling mantra of Nate Harrison in his modest-but-powerful video posted on You Tube about the ownership of sound samples. Harrison casts light on the issues and implications of copyright in music (specifically, musical samples)… Continue reading »
Aug
26
Selling the Metrics of Infringement
When I read in the Globe and Mail that Pirate Bay was being purchased for $9-million, I figured this could be a good example of how innovators, who often are branded as outsiders or scofflaws, eventually find their niche. Well, that still may be a path to success on the Internet, but apparently not in the… Continue reading »

