[LAU] Pipe not working - or is it lame or oggdec

[david]

Simon Wise wrote:
> On 05/05/11 00:28, Daniel Worth wrote:
>> I think as long as people are aware at what point they need to license 
>> the
>> patent then they should be fine. If you are making $100,000+ a year 
>> from my
>> music a $2,000 per year fee isn't the end of the world. Likely if you are
>> generating that kind of income you can partner with a distributor who 
>> pays
>> this fee for you and so it isn't actually and issue either way.
> 
> Consider a fictional band working here in Australia, trying to get to 
> the point they may be able to actually pay themselves more than a bit of 
> beer money, or perhaps even interest the distributor mentioned above. 5 
> musicians, doing some live gigs, sometimes touring interstate, paying 
> for someone to mix and the travel costs from the fees they are paid 
> before they get to pay themselves. They rent a place to rehearse, 
> covering some of that rent by sharing it with other bands who pay them 
> when the need it. They have some merchandise and cds they are selling at 
> gigs etc, and are using that revenue to pay for studio time and someone 
> to record them. To make some live opportunities for themselves they 
> organise some events where they hire the venue and pay the technical 
> costs, as well as organising several other bands to play, they pay these 
> costs out of the door takings, and pay themselves and the other bands a 
> split of what is left.
> 
> The band will quite easily be over the $100,000 revenue while they are 
> just earning pocket money as actual income for themselves. That $2000 
> would be much more usefully spent paying an engineer to help get a 
> recording done than paying for the right to have mp3s on their laptop to 
> play (or send) to someone who may be interested in their work.
> 
> Mostly such a group chooses the 'pirate' path, but perhaps it's more in 
> their interests to use a format that isn't considered illegal here 
> without the $2000 payment to an organisation who are paying their 
> employees and shareholders much more than pocket money.

Way back when I was in high school, there was a 7-man local band in my 
home town that was regularly taking in about US$100000 per year playing 
clubs, appearing as opening acts for touring name bands, doing small 
local tours, etc. This was in the pre-digital days, so they had no CDs 
or downloads or even tapes for sale. Their live show was an entertaining 
blast, so wherever they played, they got a good crowd.

$100000 divided by 7 = about $14,286 per year per person. I don't know 
what their net (if any) was, but that wasn't much to live on even back 
in the early 70s.

There's a good Celtic band here in Hawaii, Celtic Wave. They play 3-5 
nights a week in local clubs, have a CD for sale, etc. To stay alive, 
they all do other things, too - teach music, work other jobs, etc. I 
have no idea how much they make. But present-day Hawaii is a LOT more 
expensive place to live than early 1970's northern California!

-- 
David
gnome at hawaii.rr.com
authenticity, honesty, community