Watching the Olympic games closing ceremony late at night.

I'm watching the rerun of the Olympic ceremony. As cool as it can be, I'm actually surprised how boring this is to me.
Actually I realized I'd rather spend one night at the Cornerstone Gallery stage this year and see a few bands there in 100 degree heat; than be in London under perfect weather watching the closing ceremonies at the Olympics games. I'm waiting for Adele to sing. I'm kind of bored with all the British Beatle, imagine, Pink Floyd stuff. I don't even know if I will be able to stay up and watch this show.
This evening I looked at some of the video clips out there on the Internet some Iona bootleg video from their video productions and some video promotional stuff that Kye Kye has out there. There's some really nice stuff out there, it's a lot better visually and from an excitement point of view than my simple Cornerstone video footage. It's amazing what people can do with enough editing time and today's equipment.
I'm kind of shocked that so much stuff gets out on YouTube. Someone mentioned to me at the festival that all the free bootleg stuff on YouTube is hurting the music business and I can believe that to some extent. I guess the small labels and artists don't have the time to worry about this stuff or keep looking to take down bootleg video. Most people don't have a clue about copyright law and since there is so much cheap technology out there, they just throw stuff out there on the net. I try to keep true to a different more conservative way of holding video assets, knowing the music and performance copyright is supposed to limit the use that others can do with music performances.
My own gut feeling might be against some of the more conservative and traditional worries about protecting the artist and label. I feel that if the bootleg stuff gets out there people are smart enough to know that some of this is not going to be very good and it's not necessarily a bad reflection on the band product. I understand and tend to side with the record labels logic on these arguments. Over time some older video may take on more of a historical record feel to it and may not be as threatening to the profits of the label and bands. I think when people see these things they end up getting excited and decide they want to buy music and become new fans. But I understand that copies of albums or production music is just like any blatant piracy and I'm actually shocked at the amount of that type of boot legging that is out there on the Internet and YouTube.
Because I'm was a computer programmer I understand copyright restrictions on software as well. So I haven't been one to push the piracy envelop in music, video or software copies. I tend to spend more or go without rather than get a free copy of someone's album or piece of software.
I wonder how many YouTube video clips are being taken down each day due to copyright violations. That would be and interesting piece of trivia.
Why do labels look down on bootlegs? There are actually some very good reasons. A lack of talent in the shooting of the video is one thing. A lack of getting a good image of the artist is another, perhaps the video would make the artist look bad. Perhaps they are afraid of bad performances. One friend said that the labels might be afraid you are doing their job and promoting the band when that is their job. I never thought of that as being their motive and suspect it's not really a prime reason they don't like bootlegging. A good free promotion could be like a scab worker trying to take the work of those who are really doing that or being paid for that. Also there is the inability of the label or management to review the stuff that is being put out there. So they often don't want to be bothered with a bunch of submissions and simply don't have the time to sort through this.
There are a lot of good reasons that traditional conservative labels want to protect the bands, their products from customer bootlegs. This may be changing somewhat due to the proliferation of smart phones and small cameras. I went to a free concert in Detroit of a band that was an outdoor concert. I was hoping to get a quick clip of one of their songs with a camcorder. I saw signs no cameras or video, so I left the camcorder in my car. Even though I followed the rules of the signs, other young kids didn't and they taped the band with their smart phones. I'm sure they put clips out on the net. That's the nature of all this new technology now. It was amazing to see how many people on the field at the Olympic games were using smart phones and tablets to record the opening ceremonies. I wonder how many people would be doing that had Apple not pushed out the iPhone and changed the nature of phone devices some years back.
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