These are the final slides for the new online course in goal setting (with tweaking). There will be a handbook and narration to accompany this.

Stuart P Green wrote a really interesting article on why illegal file sharing isn't theft. Read it here. I love the intention but I believe this needs a bit more clarification. 

So the argument against illegal filesharing not being theft is that theft means that the victim party goes without, for example my car gets stolen I now have no car  - the thief has my car. Easy right? Well, copyright just doesn't work like that. This argument doesn't take into account the copyright business model. It's copyright as in the right to copy... surely this much is self-explanatory?

If you buy a CD what you are buying is the permanent licence to play the music on said CD for personal use. In fact if you look at  CDs and vinyl over a decade in age you will see the following text around the edge of the CD or centre label saying:-

All rights of the producer and of the owner of the recordings reproduced reserved. Unauthorised copying, hiring, lending, public performance and broadcasting of the work is prohibited.

Anyone wanting to copy the recording is infringing the copyright. Anyone hiring their copy of the record out for money is infringing the copyright, you can't play the recording publicly because that in fact requires a different and more expensive type of licence and you most definitely cant broadcast it. So, you see the culture of the internet completely messes with copyright practices.In my opinion it is theft and here is why.If you buy a copy of a track the rights owner retains the original and the right to copy that original - that would be the point of copyright - copyright businesses wouldn't exist if it weren't for this premise. The reason it is classed as theft in this type of business is that if a person were to steal a CD the rights owner would be stripped of that revenue. There's no difference because when you purchase music you acquire a licence not the music - no one really owns the music the music belongs to everyone (if we were to look at the Marxist Theory on the subject.) or the artist because theoretically it is their intellectual property but this is a different discussion. 

So... It is the right to copy the music that is owned by recording owners and producers.  

So it is theft because any unauthorised copy be it a digital download, a shared stream on Facebook, a burnt CD or a cassette tape is a licence that has been acquired by illegal means. If no duplication technology was readily available en masse people would be forced to buy their licence in the form provided to them. 

Which was the point of copyright in the first place... you know so no one else could copy the artist's work for personal or commercial use without the artist being properly compensated and credited. 
I agree that copyright infringement is a type of theft because the person is obtaining the licence to play the music for free only because this is currently how the law sees it.  But to be honest I really think that all this is beside the point. We are experiencing a crucial paradigm shift in the music industry and in fact all copyright based business models. There is very little point in condemning the people who are illegally downloading and sharing mp3s. The new trend of streaming music is already mainstream because of YouTube the only reason to download music is so that the music is portable. When technology is strong enough to support mobile streaming I think downloads will be a thing of the past.There has never been a better time to transform the music industry into a proposition that truly serves its fans. If an industry does not contribute it disappears.

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I strongly suggest this book! It details some of the major deal in music business. Click here for more info.

Here are a few more slides from the new goal setting for music artists course I am currently working on. If you don't know SWOT, it is a useful too for planning your goals and decision making. 

Have you thought about using a SWOT analysis for your music projects? Check out the slide below.

SWOT stands for the terms in the diagram above and is a useful method of assessing a project and making it move forward. This is one of the many things I will be coaching as part of the new Music Business Builder programme.

www.musicbusinessbuilder.com

How many times have we heard the idea that music consumers or fans should be persuaded to always buy music? That by campaigning, shutting down P2P sites and making an example of a few people illegal downloaders will become more sympathetic to our music industry plight and start buying music like they did in the glory days. There was a time when people would queue all night to buy the latest hot release in music. It is a sign of the time however that this no longer happens for music online or offline, but guess what? It happens for Apple. Think on that one.....

P2P is being taken over by streaming as the playback method of choice and until we can stream from our mobile devices the only downloads we will be using are the ones we want to carry with us. I for one (and I'm sure I'm not alone here) have way to much data on my computers. I want to declutter. We are increasingly mobile, the world is getting smaller so it makes sense that we want to travel light.

Now, don't get me wrong I don't think that music should be given away for free but I do think that we should be giving the fans what they want. If someone doesn't want to buy something they just wont buy it. Full stop. There is no amount of persuasion, cajoling, convincing, imploring or nagging that will make them do it. That's what some of us like to call terrible sales technique. Fans are smart and educated and have abundant choice. They will go to their preferred service for music and if that doesn't satisfy they will click off and on to somewhere else. It's a bit like having a high street with music retailers all selling the same thing and half of them giving their stuff away for free. You can't compete on price here and I guarantee that appealing to their better nature isn't going to work because they have no sympathy for the fact that the music business is losing revenue.  Changing people is impossible, all they will do is resist you. If you want to see change, you must be the change. Create a new and different industry that contributes. 

You cannot control music fans and consumers. They are people. Trying to change their behaviour is like trying to cup ants in your hands. The ants will just crawl all around you. 


Find out more about my book "The Fan Experience" here

And more about me at www.leenasowambur.com