Tuesday, February 8, 2005

Why Wilco Is the Future of Music: Great things happen when a band and its audience find harmony. By Lawrence Lessig from Wired magazine. (Via Wired News.) A ray of hope in the copyright wars? "Music," he explained, "is different" from other intellectual property. Not Karl Marx different - this isn't latent communism. But neither is it just "a piece of plastic or a loaf of bread." The artist controls just part of the music-making process; the audience adds the rest. Fans' imagination makes it real. Their participation makes it live. "We are just troubadours," Tweedy told me. "The audience is our collaborator. We should be encouraging their collaboration, not treating them like thieves." I think this way about scientific writing too. I write to contribute to an ongoing conversation with other researchers. Their idea, their imagination, make my work better. Obstacles to this conversation impoverish us all. 9:40:02 PM