Re: [LAU] An appeal to famous artists?

From: <pshirkey@email-addr-hidden>
Date: Fri Aug 05 2011 - 02:37:09 EEST

>> My question/answer:   "How much are you willing to do to make it
>> happen?"
>
> Well I'm not exactly sure anymore to be honest, I didn't think my
> message would start such a rant!
>
> But after reading all the answered, two things seem to stand out:
> 1. A lot of the FOSS music software are not for the general public. I
> wouldn't agree myself (I mean, Ardour, Hydrogen or Yoshimi are as
> straight forward as a music software can be)... And for that, nothing
> much I/we can do but participate to the code (which I do when I can),
> make donations (which I do every year), provide feedback, provide bug
> reports, etc, etc, etc...
> And obvisouly use the software and produce some tunes! Which I do too:
> http://soundcloud.com/a-violent-whisper
> (Although now I realise that nowhere I say that it's completely
> recorded/produced with only FOSS softwares!)
>
> 2. More interrestingly, the "appeal to famous artists" didn't seem to
> be well received... What seems to come out though is that although the
> FOSS community seems to be good to produce software, we don't seem to
> be good at advertising it :)
> - Ardour has...49 followers on facebook... Nothing on the wall...
> - Hydrogen...94...and one entry on the wall...
> - Couldn't find a # tag for any of these on Twitter...
>
> I know I know, we are not advertisers, we are developers!
> But what if a small group of us (and yeah, including me :)) would do that?
>
> How do we go about that? We have loads of website/tools to share code
> and software (sourceforge, svn, git, etc..), but none to organise
> ourself into a community to create some kind of organised campagn of
> advertisement on social networks (or other tools)!
>
> What I have in mind is what was done by ThisOneIsOnUs... what they did
> for their production is exacty what we do every day for FOSS
> software...
>
> Any ideas?
>

Send me the links and I will add them to http://lau.linuxaudio.org and
every other website I run that has any relevance.

>
>> -Mike Mazarick
>>
>> PS - sorry for the top posting, but I thought it better in this instance
>>
>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: Aurélien Leblond [mailto:blablack@email-addr-hidden]
>>> Sent: Monday, August 01, 2011 11:07 AM
>>> To: linux-audio-user@email-addr-hidden
>>> Subject: [LAU] An appeal to famous artists?
>>>
>>> I'm writing this post because of a few experiences I had over the
>>> years into world of amateur music production (but I'm sure it does
>>> applies to every artistic domains).
>>>
>>> I'm an amateur musician and a Linux enthusiast, and even though I work
>>> as a developer, my professional activity doesn't directly have
>>> anything to do with both these
>>> domains (although in the case of Linux this is quite a shame, but
>>> that's another subject). But one thing I am surrounded with at work is
>>> fellow musicians.
>>>
>>> I have setup a pretty nice home studio in my flat: electronic drumkit,
>>> alright USB sound-card, good quality speakers, electric guitar, pretty
>>> big guitar fx board, USB
>>> keyboard with a lot of knobs, few synthesizers and......a laptop
>>> running Ubuntu, Ardour, Hydrogen, AlsaModularSynth, Yoshimi, LV2, etc,
>>> etc and etc...
>>>
>>> A few of these colleagues came to my place to play music, and all of
>>> them were impressed by the level of investment, and invariably the
>>> first question that comes
>>> up is the price of all the hardware and software... So when I
>>> explained that I gathered the hardware over the last few years and
>>> that the software is free, I always get
>>> that little wink and smile:
>>> - “haaaa 'free'? Bittorent yeah?”
>>> - “no no no...not THAT free... I'm using Linux, and I'm trying to make
>>> a point of using only free software in my music production... Actually
>>> it's not free as you think it is,
>>> I do try to make some donations every year, blablabla...”
>>> And invariably, I get “the look” (you all know which one I'm talking
>>> about)...
>>>
>>> As the sessions go on and my colleagues see the different software in
>>> actions, they always start to make the comparison with what they use
>>> in other OS: “Wouah I
>>> can't do that with my drum machine! And this software Ardour is pretty
>>> cool, and I really like the sound of this synthesizer! What is it?
>>> AlsaModularMix you say?
>>> Well it looks weird but I like it!”...
>>>
>>> Then as the conversation goes on on gears and software, it generally
>>> goes like this “oh, I bought this synth because Trent Reznor from Nine
>>> Inch Nails is using it
>>> and I wanted to get that sound...”, “this guitar fx? Bought it because
>>> the guys in Slayer are using it and I love” (yes all my mates and
>>> myself are metal heads!).
>>>
>>> So I started to think... And I thought a little bit more... All the
>>> people I know in the music world, we always use references to known
>>> artist: “Trent Reznor uses this,
>>> The Edge uses that, Brian Eno has this synth, etc”. There is even a
>>> website that list the gears used by famous guitar players.
>>>
>>> I have a couple of friends back in my home country who are trying to
>>> build up a recording studio... They work 100 hours a week recording
>>> and promoting local bands,
>>> they eat pasta because the money is tight.......but they spent I don't
>>> know how much into brand new Macs and software licenses...
>>>
>>> I can hear you from here already “WHY DID YOU NOT TELL THEM ABOUT
>>> LINUX???”
>>>
>>> Well......I did:
>>> - “Yeah RIGHT! Every known musicians use Macs! They are designed for
>>> artists!”
>>> Really? Who decided that? Aaaaaaahhhhh yeah I forgot, Apple is very
>>> good at advertisement... See that little illuminated apple at the back
>>> of every of their laptops?
>>> That sticks out well when Trent Reznor posts pictures of his studio,
>>> or when you see pictures of ?uestLove on stage...
>>>
>>> - “Linux and stuff... It's for free... It must sucks... I mean you
>>> need loads of research and money to create the software to play
>>> music...”
>>> Really?
>>>
>>> - “It's not stable enough...”
>>> Ok, I give you that... But we have come a long way... And I bet that a
>>> good Ubuntu setup without alpha or beta versions of any software would
>>> be stable...
>>> And obviously the user base on proprietary software is bigger, so more
>>> testers, more feedbacks... But hey, look at my laptop, pretty stable
>>> no?
>>>
>>> - “It's too complicated... with these command lines and all...”
>>> Hmmm yes and no there... Yes setting up a Linux machine with a low
>>> latency kernel is quite complicated... But remind me how much did you
>>> spent to setup your
>>> Mac? And yeah you are right, we used command lines in Linux... But YOU
>>> don't have to! When was the last time you saw a Linux machine? Ah
>>> yeah, when I
>>> show you my Mandrake machine 10 years ago... Well we came a long way
>>> since that time, you should check it again! I mean playing, recording
>>> and producing
>>> music on a computer IS a complicated business, whatever OS you use.
>>>
>>> - “And when it doesn't work, who do I ask?”
>>> Hmmmm, when Cubase doesn't work, what do you do? Oh yeah, you google
>>> your issue and you browse around forums to find a solutions...
>>> Actually when you have an issue with your mac in general, is it Apple
>>> or a dude on some forums who gives you the solution?
>>>
>>> So I thought a little bit more... In the world of artists (I thinking
>>> here especially about music, but it is probably right in other
>>> artistic domains), brands are created
>>> because artists use them, no?
>>>
>>> And SERIOUSLY, in the world of music, the Open Source world certainly
>>> have brilliant tools! And the Open Source certainly has to speak to a
>>> lot of artist if they
>>> knew about it? The sense of freedom, the sense of sharing? Isn't it
>>> what Bob Marley or Rage Against the Machine were singing about?
>>>
>>> Trent Reznor (yes, I am a big fan) has been releasing music under
>>> Creative Common licenses... He let the people decide how much they
>>> wanted to pay for
>>> some of his albums (remind you of something? Donations?). He let fans
>>> record all the concerts of his last tour, let them mix it, cut it,
>>> produce it, package it and
>>> sale it (check out ThisOneIsOnUs). He even provided the tracks of some
>>> songs for the fan to have fun and mix them differently... Surely a guy
>>> like that would
>>> understand the value of Free Software. And where there is one, there
>>> might be others...
>>>
>>> (Sorry for the long introduction but) What I am getting at is this:
>>> Should we make an appeal to artists to produce something using only
>>> Open Source software?
>>> What do you guys think? Isn't it the best time to promulgate such a
>>> message, with the social media and all? And if yes, what would be the
>>> best way?
>>>
>>> Or am I completely wrong? And there is something in the big picture I
>>> didn't see?
>>
>>
>>
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Received on Fri Aug 5 04:15:02 2011

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