If you really want to know what puts musicians out of work more than everything else combined, I'll tell you. Television.

My mother-in-law was telling me than in her days, all they had was tinny sounding radio or black and white TV with even tinnier sounding audio.

To get quality entertainment, they actually had to get dressed and go somewhere. Tinny audio and B&W images just didn't make it.

Now we have
  • huge screen HDTV
  • with 7.1 surround sound and
  • a Cable or Satellite subscription that can easily run over $200.00 a month.
For most people, that's their entire entertainment budget. Plus the sound quality is good, and the picture is huge, clear and in color.

The result: People don't have the money left to go out, and they can get entertained at home.

So while the big stars and corporations are raking in huge bucks; the local musician, theater, and other entertainment providers are hurting.

Plus the TV is an addicting drug.
  1. it's addicting, try going "cold turkey" and see if you don't get withdrawal symptoms
  2. the drug users cannot tell the difference between the drug state and reality -- ask any actor/actress who plays an evil person on TV, when they go out in public, people call them names as if they were the character they are playing on TV
  3. like any drug, it requires more and more stimulation to get the rush - we've gone from "Leave It To Beaver" to "Sex In The City" - 'nuff said.


And if you stay home glued to the tube instead of going out to hear local, live entertainment, you are part of the problem.

I have no idea how to solve this problem. I haven't watched TV since the mid 1980s (and didn't watch much before that) and that hasn't made a dent in the viewership. How to get others to do the same is beyond me.

I apologize for the rant.

Back to the subject. Copyright laws.

Why is it that if I come up with a cure for cancer, I'll get a patent that will last less than 20 years but if a kid writes a one chord song with a total of 6 different words, the copyright will last 75 years after the kid dies. So if the kid is 15 and lives to be 90, the copyright can last 150 years. This tells me that the one chord, 6 word song is much more important than a cure for cancer.

IMHO the copyright laws are simply too excessive. I agree we need copyright laws, but not this severe. How to fix it? I have no idea. TV (the drug that is an advertising medium disguised as an entertainment medium) is owned by huge corporations that are interested in keeping you from drawing "Mickey Mouse" without paying a royalty (for example) so they are going to use their brainwashing power to resist any change to the contrary.

OK, so I'm still ranting ;-)

If anybody has any ideas on how to fix the broken system, let me know.

Insights and incites by Notes

Bob "Notes" Norton smile Norton Music
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