Do you shoot videos with a camera or camcorder?
One of the things I'm most bothered by in every discussion about the music industry is the way some people are too quick to justify violating copyright law because the industry is ripping off the musicians. I don't dispute many musicians are probably under-compensated for their efforts while laboring under contract with a major record label, but what they receive as compensation for their efforts has nothing to do with violating the law. My problem with this theory is two parts.
First, just because the industry may or may not be doing something wrong doesn't make it okay to something else currently held to be wrong in the eyes of several legal systems around the globe. Vote with your wallet and spend the money you would use for CDs on live music; bands are more fairly compensated at live shows. Only purchase music from musicians who aren't under contract with a major label. Does anyone really *need* the music produced by a major label artist? If there's a problem with the system, the system probably needs to be changed via some legal means.
My other problem with this argument is the signatures on the contract. The guys in the band who are supposedly slaving for the suits did put their signatures on the contract, right? Doesn't a signed contract mean they agreed to the terms, no matter how one-sided those terms may appear down the road? If I take a job for $25000 per year and my skills have a market value of $50000 per year, am I getting ripped off because I agreed to perform a job for less than my market value? It could be argued I made a bad decision, but no one is going to agree my employer is ripping me off. I didn't have to take the job.
How is this different in the music industry? Or the publishing industry? Or any industry taking a risk on creative talents? Those poor souls who signed the band side of the contract didn't know any better? They were young and foolish? These are excuses, nothing more. If I sign a business contract and don't review it carefully, when I later discover the terms aren't to my liking can I claim ignorance?
Bands have options. Self-producing an album, going on tour, and holding out for better terms may not be as glamorous, but the payoff may be bigger long term. Plenty of musicians go this route and are far more likely to have something in their pocket at the end of the day. Many musicians earn a respectable wage without ever signing their name to a contract with any label.
Quite frankly, the sooner bands realize the record label as we know it is obsolete, the better their bargaining position will become. They may not be on terrestrial radio, but satellite and Internet radio are slowly capturing more listeners and aren't programmed by two or three key individuals. There are still advantages to major label affiliation. Musicians have better access to product positioning in stores, PR opportunities, and key appearances in high profile events like award shows by being on a major label. Major label bands get songs added to console game and movie soundtracks. The little guy doesn't have a negotiator for these kinds of opportunities. Not yet anyway.
Until bands figure out they are running a business and start handling negotiations in a business-like manner, they will continue to get "ripped off." Who is really to blame for the poor choices made by musicians?
You're dead on when you say that musicians have only themselves to blame when they get roped into a lousy contract. However, the attitude of "I'm getting screwed by my employer" is the status quo throughout America. How many friends do you hear complaining about low pay & crappy jobs? My response is always two-fold: "You agreed to the salary when you took the job" & "If you don't like the job then work someplace else". Yeah, work can suck and life can suck; do something to make it better or shut up.
A couple notes about satellite radio...
I know it's not hip to defend commercial terrestrial radio because "the corporations control everything and a handful of people program every radio station in the country"... but that simply isn't true. In the past few years, the general public has suddenly awakened and realized that they hear a lot of the same songs on radio stations up and down the dial. What the dozing masses fail to remember is that the concept of "Top 40" (playing the 40 most popular songs repeatedly) is a format that has existed in the pop realm for nearly 50 years. That formula was applied to the adult contemporary format in the 70's, country and rock in the 80s and alternative in the 90s.
The concept of a "radio consultant"... a supposedly learned programmer who told stations what to play... began in the 60s and consumed radio in the 70s and 80s. Today's corporate-level programmers are simply in-house consultants rather than out-sourced hired guns. Granted, the corporate suits have access to a greater number of stations than the consultants of 20 years ago but the concept is exactly the same.
In other words, cookie-cutter radio formats have existed for a long long time. The rise of corporate radio has exacerbated the situation but, until the public stops listening to "Top 40 formats" (be it pop or country or rock), you can't blame radio stations for trying to make money.
In fact, there seems to be a direct parallel between people who constantly and loudly complain "commercial radio sucks" and those musicians who complain "my record label is screwing me". If you don't like the situation, get out of it: get out of the job, turn off the radio station. Don't buy products from the record label, don't buy the products from the station advertisers.
And despite the common belief that all corporate radio stations are programmed by 5 people, many (in fact most) local stations have local control. The corporate suits may put the squeeze on you to play "the right song" but a GOOD local programmer knows his audience & his competition and his market... and the suits defer to the local programmer.
Satellite radio, on the other hand, IS programmed by a handful of people. When you have a radio station that can reach 80% of the face of the earth... with a potential audience of billions... and that radio station is programmed by ONE person (as is the case with each satellite station)...well, a 50K watt corporate radio station in the middle of Iowa doesn't seem quite as Orwellian by comparison.
(From a former corporate radio program director who got out a year ago because he was getting screwed)