Let's take a breather from the technical stuff for a few days and contemplate something else. Taking risks.
An artist such as a musician, writer, actor, even a circuit designer take risks. They put their souls in the line of fire to make their art. It's a frightening proposition to hone your talents and skills then go public hoping for success. Yet most artists are on the short end of the stick, receiving less than 10% of the rewards if they are lucky. And the other 90%? It goes to those who distribute and market their work. Perhaps many years ago this arrangement made sense for they were the ones that stood to loose 'everything' should the artist's work be a failure. The artist, it was felt, could simply write another book or another song and try again. They had 'nothing' to lose. Only, I think the formula is now backwards and broken. It places our value system in the wrong corner. In a connected world such as ours, where distribution and marketing can be accomplished with a keyboard, mouse and an internet connection, doesn't it place a very different value on that that seems so rare today: original content?
I think it's high time we take a few steps in the direction of changing this age-old paradigm. Stay tuned.
