A Week of Girl
Monday, October 8, 2007 at 11:12AM 
A lovely soul has contributed to my Girl problem...and now I own several of the albums in a digital format -- the quest for vinyl continues!
To celebrate this massive gift, I hereby declare this "Girl Week." Starting today and through Friday, I'll review the various Girl albums and talk about legendary performances and perhaps even venture into post-Girl spinoffs like Man Raze, Sheer Greed, L.A. Guns, and Def Leppard.
Albums that will be reviewed include Sheer Greed, Wasted Youth, Killing Time, and Live at the Marquee.
Not surprising, there are several good Girl clips on YouTube. Many are taken from the BBC program The Old Grey Whistle Test.
Let's kick off our week with some of these videos. Here's Girl performing "Take Me Dancing."
Now, Girl performing "Strawberries." While I was listening to this clip last night, Eric remarked that is sounded just like L.A. Guns. True, Phil Lewis' voice is incredibly unique and definitely a major part of the charm that is Girl.
Our final video on this Monday, a clip of "Do Ya Love Me."
Tomorrow, I'll review Sheer Greed.
Reader Comments (24)
Johnny was the guitarist for the Ramones. He died in 2004. Joey was the singer. He died in 2001.
I really can't thank you enough for the Girl albums.
--Allyson
They are not illegal MP3s. Chey owned the albums and made me copies. I burned my friend copies of Motley Crue to take on his drive to Washington D.C. Those are discs that I paid for and he's not passing out to anyone else. It's not like I went to Limewire or whatever and just randomly download crap. I don't steal music and I resent that assumption. I spend too much money on music to be accused of such nonesense and I won't stand for it.
Allyson
Personally, I would prefer that things be open and shared, but you made it clear that you don't agree. It's inconsistent of you to want to protect your work, but to take someone else's work without compensating them. I know you've spent more than your share on music, as have I, but you didn't spend a thing on your Girl MP3s. I don't thik you can have your cake and eat it too. If you want people to respect your unenforceable copyright, you have to respect theirs. You didn't do that in this case.
Legally, it makes absolutely no difference whether you download it from Limewire or a friend gives you the MP3s; at the point where you possess an unauthorized copy of music for which the copyright holder(s) did not receive payment, you are violating copyright law.
The good news is that your friend and co-conspirator will not be committing a felony until she gives out more than 10 copies of her Girl albums, so neither of you are facing criminal charges. Yet.
Yeah, it sucks when something is out of print, but if you buy an original used copy in the legitimate market, the copyright holder can at least track demand and determine whether the music should be re-issued. When out-of-print music is re-issued, the copyright holder makes money.
So you can rationalize and justify all you want, but you are violating both the spirit and the letter of copyright law.
Just so there's no question where I stand on the issue of copyrights and business in music, my opinion is best expressed by Woody Guthrie, "This song is Copyrighted in US, under Seal of Copyright # 154085, for a period of 28 years, and anybody caught singin' it without our permission, will be mighty good friends of ourn, 'cause we don't give a dern. Publish it. Write it. Sing it. Swing to it. Yodel it. We wrote it, that's all we wanted to do." Yeah, I'm with the good guys.
I agree that copying a Motley CD is obviously a copyright violation. Have you never copied music for a friend, to try and get then turned on to something you like ? The net result of such behaviour is either someone who doesn't like the band, or more sales for the band, another sitation where everyone wins.
Allyson is a blogger. There is no commercial interest in this blog. There's nothing to protect. Even if there was, it isn't practical to pursue. I think the idea of copyrighting your blog is silly and I tried to get some conversation going about it, but no one would bite. I take my blog seriously, but I also recognize that the freedom of it is what's cool. It's not a business. It's more like free-form radio before corporations got involved.
Now, it's another story, because she expects protection for her work that she won't afford to others. She's only getting singled out here, because she's the one who posted about it, but she's not the only one who engages in this self-important silliness. Until very recently, there was no copyright notice on my blog. In light of all this, I added one:
"Nothing I've written here has any kind of copyright that I could enforce even if I wanted to. If you want to steal from me, go ahead. Frankly, I'd be flattered. I'm just happy you're reading my stuff."
Of course I've "shared" and "borrowed" music, but I'm willing to share what I have in exchange. Even though I'm not under the delusion that people are likely to steal it, it's there for the taking.
You might not like me, but I am in fact one of the good guys. There's a big difference between good and nice. I never claimed to be the latter.
If you're known in your industry, then your rights extend beyond your code, your name is, in effect, a brand. Bring back glam is a brand. It's not Coke, but it's something that exists and has value, because of Allyson's efforts. If you print a 'bring back glam' t-shirt and sell it, or if you contact bands and ask for an interview posing as someone from 'Bring back glam', that is an infringement on the value that she has created. It's not just about people taking what she writes, it's the brand as a whole. I feel you've missed that, hence your embarking on this misguided crusade. I do a lot of contract work, so I get that, if someone posing as me asked a lot of clueless questions online, or got work and made a mess of it, I would suffer for it,
My sole point wrt you coding, is that as a professional in one area, you'd realise that you're unlikely to fully understand the issues in an area where you're not qualified, or even to think of what they are. I'm all for the web being open and free, to a point. We all need to eat. Woody Guthrie is a folk hero, but he didn't look well fed in any photo I ever saw of him, idealism only goes so far. The balance is simple in my book. Anyone who creates value, has the right to decide what others are free to do with it.
To me, you nailed it with your comment, "I maintain control, I decide what is free and what is not."
Allyson wants to decide what is and is not free on her site. This is as it should be, and the law completely supports her right, as the copyright owner, to make that decision.
The problem arises when Allyson also wants to choose what is and is not free from the Motley Crue and Girl catalogs. That is not her decision to make; those decisions belong solely to the copyright owners. Unless she has explicit, written consent from the owners of the respective copyrights, she does not have the legal right to choose what she does and does not share with fellow fans.
In a well-functioning society, we cannot only obey laws when it is convenient. We must either obey a law at all times (especially when it is inconvenient) or reject it completely and accept the consequences.
This is an interesting comment thread, and I'm enjoying seeing the conflicting interpretations of copyright law.
But, that's not what Allyson has done. Her intent on one side, is to make a new fan for a popular band. Her intent on the other is, as a fan, to get to hear some music she is trying to purchase second hand, and has so far failed to do. I think your point on bands judging the 2nd hand market to consider rereleases, is a good one, I'd not thought of it. As she has said, she is already trying to buy these albums on vinyl, she blogged about that.
The issue in my eyes is intent, and harm. Allyson is neither intending to hurt these bands, nor is she doing so. Worst case scenario is that this guy loves the one album she copied, but never buys it, or never buys another. I'm not about to argue that Motley being rich excuses this, but it seems unlikely. He's far more likely to either trash the CD, or like it and buy others. Fans have always made new fans this way.
The whole Girl discussion is just ridiculous. She is trying to buy the vinyl, she is intending to buy the CD rereleases that have already been announced. Her blogs may create interest which will sell more of those CDs ( she sure reminded me that I like them based on what I own ( a track in a NWOBHM compilation and a alive CD ), and I am looking forward to buying them as a result.
As far as my code goes, the company owns it for their own use. They don't sell it. It's used for patient care in a hospital and the hospital is non-profit, so the world of commercial software dev is actually pretty alien to me. I actually work pretty cheap just to work in a place where I feel like making money isn't the primary goal. That's my choice and it's fine that everyone doesn't feel that way. The point is, the software angle is a bit lost on me, partially because of where I work and partially because of the way I think. I don't really think in terms of "my" code. I think, "Wow, I'm lucky to do something I enjoy, make okay money and help people in the process. Lucky me."
I said before, you can have it one way or the other. I choose Woody's way, but it's fine that others don't. That's the kind of discussion I had hoped would come out of that other post.
I don't know if you realize this, but it doesn't take much to get promos and interviews and press passes. Go set up a blog, buy a domain name to point to it and in a month you'll have more promos than you could possibly review in a timely fashion. After you write the review, ask the band for an interview. Most will say sure. Then hit up their manager for tickets to the gig and you'll get a few of those too. The point is, there's nothing to protect here. Bloggers don't really have much of an industry reputation, because they are (as I was recently called, much to my amusement) ephemeral. Let's face it, none of us would be writing for anything better than a local zine (at the very, very best) five or ten years ago. Blogging has lowered the bar and allowed a lot of us to say whatever we want, answering only to ourselves. All in all, it's been a really good thing, because the constraints are no longer there. However, this new power to write and be read has a lot of people (and this isn't directed at Allyson in particular by a long shot) thinking they're "journalists." To me that tries to turn blogging against itself. The whole point is that we're NOT professionals. That doesn't mean we don't take the work seriously, but it does mean that there's a lot less of the business end of things for us. Write and be happy that someone's reading it, because it wasn't that many years ago that you wouldn't have had this opportunity.
All that aside though, we now have someone who wants to protect one copyright (whose commercial interest is negligible at best) and ignore another (whose interest might actually involve their livelihood). Yeah, we all have to eat, but I'm not asking anyone to starve. I'm not even asking anyone to do things Woody's way. I'm just pointing out that the two posts are inconsistent.
I agree that she isn't actually hurting the bands by "borrowing" and "sharing," but no one is hurting her either. Blogger's reputations aren't much to start with. It's enough to get a lot of free stuff, but it doesn't translate into a real job that puts food on the table.