Emily White wrote an essay called “I Never Owned Any Music To Begin With”, where she expressed her point of view – people should not pay for the music they listen to. The woman considers that it has to be of free access, although she understands the reasons, why people are asked to pay for music. Her essay became popular at once, and she got a lot of responses to it. Two of them express the opposite points of view – they are the David Lowery`s and Dave Allen’s essays. The first man tries to show the reasons, why music has to be paid for, and the second man protects the woman`s opinion by noticing that the “Internet cannot be ethical” (Allen, 2012).
David Lowery provides a clear description of every side of promoting music and new musicians in his essay. He explains the reasons why the artists are often robbed by the record companies, and his arguments are really persuasive, so I take his side, because every kind of art should be valued at its true worth. Nowadays, more and more musicians try to move up the career ladder by their own, and I approve it, as it is better to control every aspect of the business, despite it taking a lot of time.
The principle of any record company is to get as much money as possible from their wards and clients, so it is accepted not to pay for music, because companies rip off artists, as David Lowery mentioned in his essay (Lowery, 2012). Ideally, each work must be paid, so the listeners should thank the artists for being able to enjoy their oeuvre.
I would propose Emily White to imagine her being a star, who does not receive any payment for her work. She is famous, but her fame is of free access, no one respects her doings and just uses them according to their needs. She has no money to organize a concert or to present her new material, although she has a lot of it. Something goes wrong, does it not? No matter how sad it is, it is a true situation for some musicians now. It even becomes the cause of alcoholism or suicide of an artist, who can do nothing with the Internet principles of getting information. There is no possibility to promote any kind of art without means of the Internet, as it is the main source for a person to become famous.
David Lowery compared costs of young people, who spend much money on upgrading their phones or netbooks in order to follow the fashion. In his list he noticed that it is easy to spend less money only for one month to buy music on saved money. The man understands the Emily`s expression that it is inconvenient to use music services (White, 2012), so he proposes her to buy the music right from the artists on their websites, as it is the best way to insure that money does not go to promoters or thieves.
I was surprised by the proposal of the writer to donate the money to some organizations, which help the artists. Lowery himself even proposed to match up every dollar from Emily`s donation up to $500 (Lowery, 2012). I think it is the best thing to support artists, but I have to admit that I never thought of it in such a way. This proposal is innovative and unique and it has to be developed in the best possible way!
References
Allen, Dave. (2012). The Internet could not care less about your mediocre band. North. Retrieved from www.north.com
Lowery, David. (2012, June 18). Letter to Emily White at NPR All Songs Considered. The Trichordist. Retrieved from https://thetrichordist.com/2012/06/18/letter-to-emily-white-at-npr-all-songs-considered/
White, Emily. (2012, June 16). I Never Owned Any Music To Begin With. All Songs Considered. Retrieved from http://www.npr.org/sections/allsongs/2012/06/16/154863819/i-never-owned-any-music-to-begin-with
