Copyright law and the most famous 6 seconds of contemporary music

I'm working on some research regarding copyright laws in the music industry, with a focus on genres when they are emerging (i.e., considered underground). Copyright laws are all about providing incentives for creative development and productive research. One of the big questions about copyright laws, particularly in the arts, is whether they have any retroactive power regarding things created (and not copyrighted) in the past that are being currently adopted and used (often without remuneration).

One of the people I'm working with on this sent me the video below regarding what is likely the most famous 6 second drum break in contemporary music. Its originally by a band called the Winstons and was written in 1969. This 6 seconds made its way through rap and hip-hop, helped found drum & bass and jungle music, and has made its way into advertising.

Canada's Music Industry

According to a recent report by the Martin Prosperity Institute:

On a per capita basis, Canada’s music industry dramatically outperforms the US when it comes to the presence of music business establishments (this category includes record labels, distributors, recording studios, and music publishers). Canada has 5.9 recording industry establishments per 100,000 residents, about five times the US figure of 1.2.

However, this appears to really be only on a per capita basis:

Recording industry establishments in the US are slightly larger – they have an average of 5.9 employees each, compared to only 5.7 in Canada. But the difference is dramatically more pronounced when it comes to revenue. US establishments earn average receipts of $4.1 million per establishment, compared to only US$540,000 in Canada.

So Canada has considerably greater per capita musical activity than the United States in terms of record labels, recording studios, and licensing houses. But the data tell us that the United States has much higher-earning businesses that are more heavily clustered in fewer places – especially Nashville, Los Angeles, and to a lesser extent, New York.

While this research is preliminary, we can speculate about what drives these differences. Economic geographers, from Jane Jacobs to Allen Scott to the Martin Prosperity Institute’s own recent analysis, have long noted that growth in creative industries like music tends to be driven by clustering and economies of scope and scale. The concentration of the American music business in a few key cities likely encourages these forces. In Canada, the fact that the music business is more evenly distributed is certainly a positive thing for musicians looking for opportunities in smaller cities. But failure to cluster in a few key centres may be discouraging the Canadian music industry from growing larger and more internationally competitive.

Thirft Stores and the Recession

As people start grappling with the recession, they look for means of saving money. This usually means cutting back on purchases and holding on to items a bit longer than maybe one would in more abundant times. As a result of this behavior, thrift stores in Calgary (and elsewhere) are feeling a pinch. Paraphrasing from an article in the Calgary Herald (March 1 2009):

Calgary's social agencies are issuing calls for donations of household items as the recession begins to pinch city residents.

"We've noticed that people are not going out and buying new things; they're hanging onto what they have," said Sparrow. "We're also seeing new faces in our stores." At the same time, the agency has experienced a 20 per cent increase in demand for its Free Goods Referral program. Women in transition or coming out of a crisis are referred to the program by one of 60 community agencies and provided a voucher to obtain clothing and household items at a Women In Need thrift store. Sparrow's organization especially needs dishes, pots and pans, linens, flatware, as well as clothing and accessories, she said. Its Dover-area store also takes furniture. "We're hoping that when people start thinking about spring cleaning, they think about us and donate," said Sparrow.

It's an about-face from the boom, when thrift stores struggled to cope with a flood of donations. Some turned donors away and a few hired security guards to prevent people from dumping unwanted goods on their doorsteps.

Beth Heyd, operations manager of The Salvation Army's Thrift Stores, estimates donations of household goods have dropped by half. Normally, there'd be a dozen sofas in the furniture section of the Salvation Army's Horizon Heights stores at 36th Street and 32nd Avenue N. E., she said, but only one or two couches were available on Thursday. "My theory is that you'll give second thought to buying that new sofa if you're worried about getting laid off," said Heyd. Donations of used clothing remain strong, but she's noticed an increase in professionals, especially women, shopping for used business wear at the thrift stores.

Likewise, the Calgary Drop-In and Rehab Centre put out a call for donations of linens for the 2,000 homeless people who pass through its doors every day. "We are in desperate need of towels and blankets," said Louise Gallagher, director of public relations and volunteer services for the drop-in centre.

Personally, I get most of my gig clothes from thift stores. My wife and I did a big clean out of our closets today, taking several bags of clothing to a local thrift store. Next time you're struggling to get through your closet, think about doing the same.

Gilbert Kaplan and the NY Philhormonic

I recently came across this article in the NYT about the guest conducting of Mahler's 2nd by Gilbert Kaplan. I was quite surprised at the public nature of the criticism against Kaplan by members of the NY Phil, particularly the blog post by David Finlayson. The controversy is about Mr. Kaplan having created a reputation for conducting Mahler's 2nd with, in my opinion, only limited qualifications as a conductor. The deeper controversy is about funding for the arts. Should a patron like Mr. Kaplan (who donates around $10K per year to the Phil) be able to "buy" a shot at conducting for a night? I guess it depends on the priorities and resources available to the orchestra. However, I think this sets a bad precedent. While I'm in favor of trying to make classical music more accessible and attracting larger audiences, allowing an individual to "play conductor" at an actual performance seems a bit disrespectful to the musicians who have honed and rehearsed their parts. Who will the next donor/conductor be? What will the next major donor ask for in return for their monies? If I give some money will the NY Phil play one of my pieces?

Levitt in the Blogosphere

I follow, very loosely, several blogs regarding economics and economic research. Given my past run-in with Steve Levitt (editor of the Journal of Political Economy and co-author of Freakonomics) I found this article interesting (originally referenced here).

There is a common question about the abuse of editorial powers in the economics profession, with a lot of gossip and stories circulating right now. On my recent trip to Europe, I was taken aback by how many people had stories about editors at various journals abusing their power or holding grudges against certain groups of authors. These stories have always been out there, but on this trip I heard a lot of very recent (within the last year) stories of editors behaving badly. It seems like we might be hitting a critical mass. Maybe some checks and balances will finally get implemented.

Eric Wilson's Against Happiness

I've been reading Eric Wilson's book Against Happiness: In Praise of Melancholy. I picked it up because several of the people in the research group I of which I am a member conduct research on subjective well-being (i.e., happiness). There is no shortage of criticisms regarding the search on positive psychology and happiness (for example, read this and this), and I myself have my own criticisms of this approach to studying economic policy.

Wilson's book, I hoped, would offer some interesting insights. Personally, my concerns with happiness studies are in part motivated by a framing effect that seemed right along the lines in Wilson's book. I think framing people's lives in terms of how happy they are can get people to think about the normative concept of how happy they should be. As a result, many people will feel unhappy as an artifact of not begin as happy as they should be. Since the pursuit of happiness motivates behavior, we should be concerned about giving people the wrong frame of reference or making salient benchmarks that should be irrelevant to current decision making. It's one thing to look at the income distribution and learn that you fall below median, it may quite another to learn that you fall below median happiness. That said, I'm not against studying the data we have on subjective well-being, I just think the results need to be interpreted (and implemented into policy analysis) with a great deal of caution.

This is what I hoped Wilson's book would deliver. Unfortunately, from my perspective, Wilson's book is a discussion of the melancholy in literature, particularly romantic literature. He talks about the power of feeling melancholy and how this is motivated great artists from Beethoven (who suffered from a "melancholy almost as great an evil as the other elements;" page 123) to John Lennon (Wilson's discussion of Lennon's melancholy starts with Yoko Ono; page 135).

As a result of perhaps poor product placement, this book has received a lot of negative reviews. (Here's Garrison Keillor's from the NYT.) So many that Wilson has responded, pointing out that people are looking at his book as something that it is not. It is an analysis of the melancholy from a literary perspective; it is not an argument or a case against happiness in research, as a policy tool, of in everyday life. We'll leave those arguments to others (for example, here, here, and here).

Beethoven House

I'm in Bonn Germany for a few days, working at IZA. I got in today so only had a little of time in the office, but went for a walk later on. My goal is to stay up until 10pm tonight. (I haven't slept since 8am yesterday Mountain time.)

I went to the Beethoven Haus on my walk, a place I've gone to both times I've been in Bonn. Bonn is really a city of classical music. Beethoven lived here and his museum is really quite amazing. I'm always awed by the instruments and the original manuscripts here. Matt Heller recently wrote about Beethoven's "style" of writing and the "need" for corrections. I have to say that looking at his manuscripts, I have no idea how to read them. I assume they are drafts, hence the markings and edits throughout. It gives a great view into part of a real genius' creative process.

My favorite exhibits in the museum are the instruments which Beethoven used when he wrote his String Quartet op. 18. The museum sells CD's of Beethoven's works performed on his instruments. I picked up the string quartets.

Tomorrow is time for real work though. I'm hoping the owner of my hotel will help me identify a few music stores here in Bonn.

Defining Success

In a recent post Arnold Kling made the observation regarding how important it is to define success in an appropriate way for your preferences. I've seen this argument here (where there are benefits to having different people define success differently) and here (where the idea is applied to the underclass). Needless to say, I agree with Arnold's observations.

Man, Jenny McCarthy drives me nuts...

and not like she used to back in 1995.

I'm at the point now that I think she's doing a disservice to the autism community. Yesterday she was on CNN with three doctors for debate regarding vaccines and autism. (For those of you don't know, yesterday was World Autism Awareness Day. April is Autism Awareness Month.) While three doctors were calmly debating the relationship between vaccines and autism, she was freaking out, interrupting and talking about how vaccines contain mercury, aluminum, and ( I'm not sure about this one) antifreeze. She railed about when her son died. When Larry King questioned her about this, she said it was only for two minutes. (I guess her son has something in common now with Nikki Sixx and Dave Mustaine.) I think her main point is the following (slightly related to, but ten years than, the accompanying picture):

"In 1983, the vaccine schedule was 10. Ten vaccines given. Now, today, there are 36, and a lot of people don't know that. I do not believe that vaccines are the sole cause for autism. I do believe they are a trigger. There's something in the immune system that is weakened in these kids, they maybe can't process the vaccines. I don't think it's solely the vaccines. I think there's toxins in the environment, pesticides. It's kind of like a pile-up. If you can fill up a bucket of all this stuff going on with these kids, if they have a weak immune system, all that crap is going to overflow."

The main reason why she drives me crazy and I think she's doing a disservice is that she's pushing parents in a direction that leads them to pointing fingers rather than working with their children. I fear that her writings about how she cured autism to lead parents to scouring the Internet for the secret cure rather than spending time with their kids. I've seen too many parents get caught up on a diet which will supposedly cure autism but really only results in a child not eating what is put in front of them. If there was really a cure for autism, it wouldn’t be a pharmaceutical industry trade secret. It would be out there and available.

Second, I think Jenny McCarthy lacks a fundamental understanding the economics involved with making decisions. I'm not talking about the economics of the health-care industry and budgets and the like, but rather about the fact that every decision requires us to trade off costs and benefits. Although vaccines may be related to the increased incidence of autism, eliminating vaccines is not the alternative. While forgoing an MMR vaccination has the potential benefit of reducing the likelihood of the onset of autism, it also increases the likelihood of contracting mumps, measles, rubella (all of which can be fatal in small children). In turn, it increases the risk of an outbreak of these diseases.

That said, maybe Jenny McCarthy does understand these trade-offs and she did say in her CNN interview that she would rather her son have mumps and autism. I think this is kind of a crazy statement: I don't think I'd be capable of making any type a decision like that.

I think this autism debate just highlights another place in which individuals need understand some basic economics with regard to the fact that every decision we make, be it buying a house or deciding whether or not to vaccinate our children, involves trade-offs. Some of these trade-offs affect a small group of people; others that can affect a large group of people (as in the choice to forgo vaccines and risk an outbreak).

Note: My fundamental feeling on the issue is that there is a genetic component which determines your sensitivity to various compounds and chemicals, some of which are included in vaccines, some of which are included environment. Vaccines interact with these inherited sensitivities and sometimes results in the onset of autism. I don't mean to make light of the issue or the struggle that the parents of an autistic child face. I just think it's important to keep these trade-offs in mind.

Albertan Tar Sands

Calgary made the Democracy Now broadcast of April 2^nd. There’s an interesting discussion of Calgary in regards to the actions by U.S. oil companies regarding investments in clean(-er) energies and the availability of oil in Albertan tar-sands (which is about the dirtiest way to get oil). Much of this discussion came from Naomi Klein’s piece “Baghdad Burns, Calgary Booms.” Worth reading and listening too if you’re interested in Alberta’s oil reserves, the environment, and how the behavior of world markets and the lack of investment in alternate energies can make extraction from the tar sands actually economically feasible.

Keep the Buses Running on TIme!

I don't ask much from my city government. Fix the potholes, maybe a good recycling program, police and fire services. The other thing I want is buses that run on time. Or lease run predictably.

One concern of every municipality is public transit, particularly ridership. Cities want people to take the bus: it's good for traffic's good for the environment and maybe even good for social capital.

However, keeping public transit running on time never seems to be a priority for local politicians. I remember not so fondly when Willie Brown became mayor of San Francisco. In almost an instant the buses were running late or running inconsistently. It wasn't a surprise to see two or three number 39 buses backed up one right after the other.

Yesterday I experienced the same frustration. On my way home from work I wanted to take the number 20 bus. I called the scheduling line and was told of the next number 20 bus was in 16 minutes. So I decided to take another route via the number 72 bus. As soon as I climbed aboard the number 72 and the bus pulled away, a number 20 pulled in behind us. Being on the 72 I call to see when the number 4 bus was coming (I needed to transfer to this bus). I was told 19 minutes. Five minutes I got to my stop just in time to watch the number 4 bus pull in and out of its stop as there was nobody there. Had I known the number 4 bus would be there, I would have gotten off at a different stop and taken a back alley to get to the number 4. Even with all my waving and running, the bus driver didn't wait.

In the end, the experienced convinced me that the buses here are screwed up as well.

I don't think municipalities really realize how important public transit is to people. Local politicians tend to focus on the problem of traffic without ever really pushing for an efficient solution. Instead of talking about improving existing bus service, they talk about the need for light-rail train services or subway systems to be built. Here are my suggestions for improving public transit and, hence, reducing traffic.

1. Cut the price of the bus ticket from $2 and change to $1. One coin. One loonie. It's easy convenient and quick. Moreover, this price change should increase ridership. There are some estimates of fare elasticity (i.e., the extent to which a change in the price of a bus ticket affect ridership) and they all seem to fall around -.4. This means that a 50% decline in the price of a bus ticket will increase ridership by approximately 20%.
2. You can make up for the lost revenue by jacking up the cost of parking downtown. This will also encourage people to use public transit.
3. Gasoline taxes are also effective way to increase ridership. One study estimates the gas price elasticity of ridership to be 0.3, meaning that a 10% increase in the price of gasoline would result in a 3% increase in ridership.
4. Finally, and above all else, keep the buses running on time. Or at least predictably.

The issue for local governments when they consider public transit is how to pay for it. While providing public transit is costly, I believe they often forget that individuals make all sorts of trade-offs in their daily decision-making, and that riding the bus or taking a car is one of these trade-offs. An understanding of some basic economic ideas (like elasticity, like opportunity cost) should be introduced into these considerations regarding “keeping the buses running on time”.

In defense of chaotic practice

Whenever I sit down to practice I try to give myself at least five minutes of just making noise on my instrument. I'm not really just making noise, but I'm giving myself a little bit of time in which I can experiment and try new things. I usually do this after my warm-ups and largely just let my fingers, hands, arms move freely. Sometimes a little melody will emerge and I'll play variations of it. The point of this is really twofold. First it kind of fun after having engaged in a series of warm-ups that, in and of themselves, are not very exciting. Secondly, sometimes I discover a little fragment or short melody that I wouldn't have found otherwise. When this happens I play some variations over the melody and then take a moment write it down. This fragment usually sits in my notebook unattended to for some time. I then given another look and sometimes it gets transformed into the core of an actual piece of music.

The idea of giving myself this freedom to make noise comes from William Westney's The Perfect Wrong Note. When I first read this book, I enjoyed it as a good read. I've actually gone back and read it a few times now and have become more appreciative of its central ideas. Many books on practicing (and indeed many teachers) encourage you to have a plan for your practice. While this may be useful in preparing for a performance or audition, it oftentimes doesn't let you explore your creative ideas. What I like about Westney’s book is that it encourages you to let yourself play in an undirectied and unstructured manner. The idea here is to try to find that "perfect wrong note" or "divine mistake" which brings your ideas together and gives your music or performance that spark which makes it unique.

Beyond finding a perfect wrong note in music, there are plenty of cases of technological innovation which have been the result of "finding the perfect wrong" way of doing something. For example, sticky notes were discovered by 3M after a failed attempt to make an adhesive. (Similarly, the dust masks made by 3M were the result of their failed attempt to make disposable bras.) In terms of technology, I've been told that the manner in which glasses poured to obtain a flat surface was discovered by a son of the original Pilkington of Pilkington Glass. Apparently he knocked over several mold of molten glass. When the glass cooled, it was perfectly flat. His accident (although resulting in minor injuries and damage to equipment) led to a technological improvement.

Exceptional trivia

I've recently supervised my first graduate student in completing her Ph.D. Like most people who finish a doctoral degree, she went out on the academic market to find a job. In fact, in my opinion, she did quite well and got offers from some very good schools. In the end, she turned them all down.

I struggled with making sense of this. We always tell our graduate students to think hard about starting a Ph.D.: they have to be sure this is something they like and want to pursue because it requires an awful lot of work. And when we say "this is something they like it want to pursue" the "this" in that phrase is academia.

Before the job market got into full swing, my student mentioned that she wasn't sure if she wanted an academic job. I told her not to turn down the jobs she hadn’t been offered yet and encouraged her to go through the interviewing process. In the end, she wanted more to her life and what academia could give. This is not to say that academics have empty lives. I think of my life is quite full; I'm an academic, a father, a husband, a musician, and a lot of other things. In fact I think it's my job as an academic which permits me the freedom to pursue my other avocations.

That said, most academics are really, as a friend of mine once said, "purveyors of exceptional trivia." I don't see any of my colleagues making discoveries in their research the truly benefit the world. See, I'm in the "soft" sciences where a lot of what goes on as research is oftentimes clever model building in order to support an opinion. The research that does have an impact on people's daily lives is that research which, unfortunately, is looked down upon but most of us in the profession. These are the short policy briefs that point out in a straightforward way that, say, disability benefits have not kept up with inflation. These pieces are somewhat looked down upon because they don't involve a clever model or use sophisticated mathematics. Rather they use the simple tools of the trade to make a point.

These pieces make their point in such a clear way that they are actually read by policymakers who didn't realize that, say, disability benefits haven't kept up with inflation and therefore raise disability benefits. The end result of this research is that the well-being of people receiving disability benefits is improved. I have a hard time believing that the more "academic" research on the buffalo hunt, Canadian military history, or what were the reasons behind extending the franchise in the 19th century will have as important benefits. (And yes, I've researched one of those topics.)