Re: [rumori] gifts


From: Steev Hise (steevATdetritus.net)
Date: Wed May 01 2002 - 11:07:06 PDT


on Sat, 27 Apr 2002 Every Man told me:

>Does this mean no one has to PAY for the Steev Hise "Original" CD?

It means you have to pay double, Jay. ;-)

Seriously though, I'm aware of the contradictions. I'm working
all this out myself, as I speak. I don't have it all figured out.
Just because I bring up some ideas doesn't mean I'm able to live
by them immediately. If you want to call that hypocrisy, that's
your choice. (but you'd be wrong.)

But I can do this, I can offer:
http://detritus.net/steev/mp3s/original/

And I can say this: Beyond the need or desire to even "make a
living, not a killing," we live in a society where cultural
workers are validated by having a physical product for sale at a
non-zero price. People don't seem to respect stuff as much when
it's free. At least in the non-digital world. The funny thing is
that it's just the opposite on the Net: no one wants to pay for
anything.

Anyway, the point is that even those of us trying to fight for
new ways of looking at social interaction and cultural production
still must play by some rules of the market in order to get our
work out there at the level we'd like. And despite my distaste
for the fetishism of the physical object, it just doesn't feel as
"real" or as "done" until a project is pressed onto actual little
plastic silver circles and put in packages. And that costs money.

I'd also like to say that one reason I've been happy to work with
Illegal Art is that they share my feeling that most CDs are just
priced way too high, and they make a conscious effort to do
something about that by selling stuff for way less than the
average disc. I'd say that's a hybrid form of gift, but still a
gift.

The bottom line is, you do what you can.

While I'm at it I want to riff on Sal's post - lots of great
ideas, Sal, thank you. (Actually, thanx to everyone, this has
been a great thread, really really good ideas all around). I
wanted to comment on your last point about art for
leisure/pleasure - almost no one does it just for money, at least
when they're starting out, but pleasure is not the only
alternative reason. There's many different motivations to make
art. It is an interesting observation, though, that there's the
fear of being seen as a "hobbyist" unless you have a "good"
reason. ( for the record, I don't have any problem with art
being done just for pleasure, but that's not why I do it. to be
honest, there's a lot of things in my life I find much more fun
than doing the kind of art that I do. )

Related to that I've observed, and I think it's sort of funny,
that often in various art/music circles I've been part of people
shy away from mentioning their "day jobs" (or "work-work" as i
often call it). It's not a spoken rule, it's just something no
one talks about, like they want to all pretend to live in this
vacuum-sealed fantasy world where everyone is just doing art all
the time and never needing to pay any bills. Like maybe if
someone found out they have some dumb McJob, they wouldn't be
respected as an artist. That's a shame.

oh and btw, for me "day job" does not neccesarily mean 9-to-5,
fulltime, 5-days a week, etc. Seems like in this thread a lot of
people assumed that's what i meant. For me all it means is just
something you do to make a living that's not a result of your
art-making.

anyway, thanx again, everyone, it's great to hear all these
perspectives....

smh

Steev Hise, Automagickal Adept
steevATdetritus.net http://detritus.net/steev
*Recycled Culture: detritus.net
*Watching power flow: capitalletters.detritus.net
*Democratic sound collage generator: soundbakery.detritus.net
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