The lowly seer

Greedier still

Not content with fining grannies their entire life savings over their granddaughters downloads of innocuous pap or taking absurd amounts off hairdressers for playing a bit of music to their waiting customers, the music industry's now closing down guitar tab sites. BBC report. According to some corporate lawyer:

deprives the songwriter of the ability to make a living, and is no different than stealing.

Oh yeah, sure, like you're going to see Jagger and Richards in the queue when you're next at the Salvation Army soup kitchen. And of course, it's different to stealing, there's a world of difference between lifting a packet of fishfingers from a supermarket and writing down a description when you get outside.

If they're really that concerned about the moral and financial rights of the people who create our musical culture, how about a nice fat payout to the descendants of them old, dirt-poor blues players, who the guitar heroes of the 50- and 60- something generations copied?

How about quantifying the losses to the industry, genuinely doing it rather than a finger in the air estimate from a coked-up suit? What happens then if you compare that number, which in the case of guitar tab, may even run to a couple of thousand pounds, against the administrative and legal costs incurred in closing these sites down?

And of course, you can run a fair old bill defending IP. For a hilarious example, there's urban75 v. Barney the Dinosaur. A New York legal team, mind-bogglingly expensive. Giving them the run-around, a couple of hours of editor Mike's time. The resultant page I just linked to, priceless!

posted by Les the Spaceman @ 6:48 pm