[eu-gene] Psst...Wanna Buy an Algorithm? (Working Title)

[Paul Brown]

>I think this copyright issue boils down to one camp believing generative
>music to be encoded in the software, and therefore licenceable and
>copyrightable as music, and another camp believing generative music is
>authorless, conjured up from nowhere.

>I view the latter view, promoted by Brian Eno, to be false, offensive to
>the artists who make generative software.  It falsely places a dumb
end->user at the centre of the creative process, resulting in bizarre
>conclusions.  I believe this view that unrecorded generative music is
>uncopyrightable as music is one of these bizarre conclusions.

Hello Alex,

I think you must have slightly misunderstood me. I wasn't suggesting the
music was conjured up from nowhere. I was merely suggesting than more
emphasis should be placed on the system that was created to make the music
than the actual music itself. The law is, I think as we have agreed, pretty
clear on the ownership of the creator of the software that is part of the
music creation process. The recognition and the accolades should be focused
on the inspiration, perspiration, skill and expertise needed to create such
a system. The purpose of generative music systems, in my view, is to create
a unique piece of music each time the system (if and when)is reset and
therefore fixing the music in someway is irrelevant to the process as is,
therefore, the issue surrounding the ownership of that music. My argument is
that if you continue to hold onto conventional means and models to
disseminate music, because it has always been done like that and everybody
understands the process and where everybody sits in the process so let's not
change it, then you risk encumbering the development new musics. 

For example, did you consider the internet a tyranny, a means to erode your
rights, threaten the control you had over your recordings and cause the
sales of your CDs to plunge forcing you into financial hardship? Or did you
see the internet as a release from another, longer standing, ingrained,
corruption riddled tyranny that dictated how, when and why your music should
be distributed and to whom? Did you therefore see the internet as means to
allow you to regain your independence, have greater artistic control over
the music you created and its associated rights, enable you to reach a
greater audience, enable you to be pro-active rather than reactive by
finding ways to make the new technology work for you thereby enabling you to
sell more of your music and even make more money than you did before?

I also believe that it is arrogant, derogatory and aloof to believe that as
a creator of music you always know what is best for the "dumb end user". I
think that it is neither unreasonable nor objectionable that the end user
should play a part in the creation process in some way or another thereby
enhancing his or her experience of the music created. Perhaps I have too
much faith and am expecting too much of people but generative music systems
can, potentially, offer that ability. 

Paul


   

-----Original Message-----
From: eu-gene-bounces at generative.net [mailto:eu-gene-bounces at generative.net]
On Behalf Of alex
Sent: 18 October 2005 12:09
To: generative art
Subject: Re: [eu-gene] Psst...Wanna Buy an Algorithm? (Working Title)

On Mon, 2005-10-17 at 21:42 +0200, Pierre Proske wrote:
> I'm still reluctant to agree with the statement that "constantly 
> changing generative music" is flawed. Minimalism, whether
> generative or not, has always relied on very minimal, but constant 
> change. Evolutionary and complex systems also
> often display surprising behaviours which cannot be easily dismissed as 
> facile, and they too constantly change. Perhaps I'm
> straying outside of conventional music though.

Sure, but it was actually everlasting constantly changing music I was
talking about, and which Paul is referring to as "pure" generative
music.

> Perhaps this is a difference of perspectives, but to me the author of a 
> piece of "music" software produces a tool,
> as a smithy produces a hammer for a carpenter. Withough real creative 
> input, that tool is useless. I can choose which
> tools to use, and I set aside those I do not want. Is Max/Msp not a tool?

You could see it as a toolbox, although it might be more proper to call
it a language, or an environment.

> Of course, if the tool develops an element of autonomy, as opposed to 
> randomness, such that the control is wrested unwillingly away from the 
> artist, this becomes a little more dicey...

Yes, and this is exactly what generative music does.  Except it isn't
wrestled away from the artist!  The artist is merely choosing a starting
point provided by another artist...  A collaboration.

I think this copyright issue boils down to one camp believing generative
music to be encoded in the software, and therefore licenceable and
copyrightable as music, and another camp believing generative music is
authorless, conjured up from nowhere.

I view the latter view, promoted by Brian Eno, to be false, offensive to
the artists who make generative software.  It falsely places a dumb
end-user at the centre of the creative process, resulting in bizarre
conclusions.  I believe this view that unrecorded generative music is
uncopyrightable as music is one of these bizarre conclusions.

Maybe this article is useful here:
  http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2005/10/3/20856/7891


alex


-- 
'The world is actually pear shaped'
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