[Editor Charlie sez: An excellent post debunking the “Luddite” moniker that Big Tech likes to hang around the neck of anyone who disagrees with them. Neil Turkewitz rejects that criticism through a review of commentary by artist rights advocates Maria Schneider, David Lowery, Miranda Mulholland and East Bay Ray. No, it’s not 1999 anymore….]
As advocacy by artists for the digital future of the arts becomes more and more common and articulate, making it somewhat more difficult for copyright skeptics to play artists and labels against each other (although not for want of trying), I see more and more suggestions that these artists are somehow anti-technology and that they are trying to turn back the clocks to the “good old days” rather than to embrace the opportunities of the present and future. I am in constant communication with artists, and must observe that I don’t hear too many artists romanticizing the past. One, it wasn’t that great. But more importantly, they tend to be less concerned about themselves and more focused on creating the conditions for the next generation of artists to prosper and to own their own futures. No one wants to return to the past. They are not ruing the intersection of commerce and culture — they are railing against a framework that denies them the right to determine the contours of their careers.
Artist Rights Watch--News for the Artist Rights Advocacy Community 