Richard Stallman Still Doesn’t fscking Get It!

Richard Stallman, speaking at the SXSW conference on Friday, had this to say about copyright, filesharing, and the music industry:

“Another issue is Internet music sharing. We should simply legalize it now. The musicians and the public would be better off. Record labels treat musicians like dirt. The contracts that they impose on musicians are extremely cruel. When you buy a commercial CD, you fail to support the musicians. Concerts are how musicians make money. I want music that’s made by artisans, not in factories.”

Why does nobody with the power to change things politically take this genius seriously? Because for all his software smarts, he doesn’t understand that law can’t simply be patched and recompiled, and that the problems there-associated aren’t universal. Some labels treat their artists like dirt, and some don’t. Some artists get screwed copyrighting their music, and some don’t. And not all musicians make their money off of concerts. For a man who’s always worked on the fringe, the problems he’s combatting here are decidedly mainstream. While the record industry shouldn’t be able to use law as an effective bailout for their failing business model, artists should be free to copyright material as they see fit. Choice, not a sweeping revision of the last few hundred years of law, is the practical answer. But people keep wasting their energy listening to hardliners like Stallman because it makes for a better show. In my mind, that means the people who keep inviting Stallman and his ilk to speak would rather be entertained than change things.