Derek Sivers has requested that I disable the link to the 2003 Moses Avalon article, and I have reluctantly agreed to do so.
Before I explain why, I'd like to offer a little about my own background and my reasons for starting this blog. Although I have nearly 30 years behind me as a professional musician, these days I consider myself to be more of a semi-retired indie performer who is currently much more involved in music education. I have been a CD Baby artist since 2004 with just a couple discs on its pages, but have had only modest sales there, and until July 2009 I've had only the most tangential interest in CD Baby and its connection to the rapidly changing music industry. All I've really known is that CD Baby was a great company, and I was proud to be on its roster.
So I come to this debate with a remarkable amount of ignorance. I have spent many hours the past five or so years reading current books about e-commerce, the internet, and the music industry, but have to admit to still being pretty much stuck back in the last century. Although I hate to admit it, I don't own a computer, and I don't have easy access to the internet, but even if I did, I don't really have the time to do thorough internet research about the many issues that pop up in the course of this, or any other, internet debate.
So when an anonymous reader of this blog provides a link to an article, my tendency is to link to it first and foremost because I know that even if I'm the most ignorant person out there,I can be sure that there are others who may be just as ignorant, and who would be interested in any information that comes up.
I want to note, too, that my research on an item is necessarily a kind of playing catch-up: I can do so only when I can get access to a borrowed computer, or one at the library or at a cybercafe.
Accordingly, I have done some belated research on the Josh Melville/Moses Avalon vs Derek Sivers internet spat. And I came to the conclusion that any reasonable person could read about both sides of that debate (which was about CD Baby's deal with Apple iTunes) and come to their own conclusions--as many people did on several threads that I found over many internet forums. This is why I was reluctant to de-link to the Avalon piece. The reason I did so is because one of my anonymous posters provided what I felt was an apropos quote from the piece plus its url. For those, like me, who wish to read entire piece, I refer you to the first July thread in this blog and the recent comment by the poster.
I have zero interest in internet catfights, and I don't consider myself to be an internet "journalist," muckraking or otherwise. But the reason I started this blog is partly because of my own ignorance about the current state of the indie music industry. Although Derek may be right when he says the Avalon piece has nothing to do with the disastrous CD Baby relaunch, I believe that anything from the historical record may be germane to the discussion. For people who are worried that the new CD Baby is going the way of MP3.com, and for those like me who are only now learning about what's been happening the past half dozen years, the Avalon piece is highly relevant. Again, reasonable people can make their own judgements. And some people might not kneejerk react: "Avalon--scumbag! Derek--God!" Reasonable people know that Derek's not a god and Melville/Avalon probably isn't a total scumbag either.
I started this blog only because I saw a need for a central clearing house of sorts for information. Several posters to this blog have posted bits and pieces of info, and it seems that most of them have done their homework. For that I am grateful because my homework is necessarily tardy.
But I don't detect, in the few readers/posters of this blog, much sign of ax-grinding or internet sniping. So I will continue to post anything people here provide, including Derek's rebuttal to "Avalon", if it ever comes.
The technology addiction trope
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Rupert Murdoch’s media have been a key source of moral panic about the
internet and technology — see, for example, this from his Times declaring
that pho...
2 weeks ago
Uh hello. That article is from like 2004 when CD Baby first started working with iTunes.
ReplyDeleteYeah, admins, could you please delete this? That Josh Melville (aka "Moses Avalon") article is from 2003, filled with jealous nonsense, widely proven wrong, and was only written because I wouldn't hire him. (See #2 here: http://sivers.org/villain)
ReplyDeleteIt has nothing to do with the 2009 CD Baby relaunch that this blog is about.
Derek, I appreciate your comment, but I don't see how the link to sivers.org/villain contributes to this debate. I would have much appreciated a link to something which proves "Avalon" to be "jealous" and "wrong." When you ask me to censor this blog, it makes me believe that you're not interested in the freedom of info for its own sake, and it makes me suspect that the spat with "Avalon" was much more personal for you.
ReplyDeleteAh, sorry I didn't mean to make it a lot of work or a big deal.
ReplyDeleteIt's just that this blog seemed to be a place to get objective up-to-date news relating to the CD Baby relaunch of 2009.
Since I'm not in touch with the CD Baby people, even *I* get my updates on what's going on here!
The only reason I thought that old 2003 article was inappropriate here was because of the date! I wasn't trying to censor.
I would have suggested the same thing if someone had posted a link to an article from 2001 saying, "CD Baby signs deal with GarageBand". It would have just been misleading because this is a site for the newest news, and the original article had no date to make it clear someone was looking at old history.
As for Josh's article itself, I really don't care anymore. There's plenty of freedom of info on that. It's reprinted 1000 places. I still get an email every month from someone just reading it for the first time, not knowing it's 6 years old, and asking if I'm somehow stealing their rights.
I was just trying to help because I thought you wanted this site to be news about the 2009 relaunch.
If this was "cdbabysucks.blogspot.com" I would have had no complaint at all. :-)
I'm curious now about all this Moses stuff and what you have delinked from ?Where do you find this?
ReplyDeleteRichy, check out the reference in the anonymous post of Sept 8 toward the end of the July 30 thread on this blog, titled "CDBaby Relaunch Debate." Also I've linked to the "Moses Avalon" website under "other resources." Additionally there are lots of comments in many other sites which you can find by googling "Josh Melville/Moses Avalon."
ReplyDeleteDerek, thanks for the comments. I had no idea that by referencing the "Moses" thing I was entering such a controversial minefield, at least for a few vocal posters/CDBaby artists who comment here. And I have to concede that the 2003 Moses piece was a digression from the stated purpose of this blog.
The negative comments I've received have made me realize that even a semi-anonymous blogger such as myself has to maintain his own credibility. Certainly it is my wish to keep this blog on an even keel and stay away from tabloidism--much as it may be tempting territory to stray into at times!
So, someone else can start the CDBabySucks blog. :-) (And I'll be sure to link to it!)
Even after reading what I could of "this Moses fellah," I'm still in the dark about why he rubs so many people the wrong way. I mean, even if I grant that he's a shady, shameless, pretentious arrogant self-promoter (and I'm still not certain one way or the other), it also seems clear that he has a lot to say about today's music industry. That alone would seem to qualify it as a topic for this blog.
In any case, I intend to learn as much as I can on the subject, as time and resources permit. Meanwhile, I welcome everyone else's comments and opinions on the matter.
Since you are an experienced musician, you can make a post with tools for a beginner like this buyer's guide https://musirank.com/
ReplyDelete