Lily Allen – a crusader for musicians’ rights????
The hard-pAArtying pop tart has started her own blog, It’s Not Alright, tackling the topic of digital music piracy.
Lils has written letters to many of her musical comrades, requesting them to voice their opinions on music file sharing.
Check out the letter in its entirety:
The debate on digital music piracy is reaching a critical point as Peter Mandelson and the government move to legislation that will tackle unlawful file sharing. The industry’s had a say, the ISPs have had a say and some artists – through the Featured Artists Coalition have had a say. But I don’t agree with them. Do you?
I feel really strongly about file sharing. I see it having a damaging effect on British music – especially on emerging artists. Overall the internet’s had a great effect on music and been crucial in helping people like me break through. But file sharing is different to legal streaming or making some music available as promotion. File sharing eats away at opportunity for new artists: by cutting off income at the most crucial, cash-strapped point in their careers and by limiting A&R’s ability to sign new acts outside of the mainstream.
The ISPs have got their message out there: they don’t want to be the internet police. Fine. The industry has got its message out there: they’re losing money and they want it back. No surprises there.
And now some artists have got their message out there: that file sharing is fine when you’re a successful artist with sell out tours and a back catalogue ready to be sold to a new audience. That might be fine for them, but it’s not fine for the acts that haven’t made it big yet.
What I’d like is for artists that don’t think file sharing is fine to get their message out there too. I want to make it clear that file sharing is not alright. And I want the industry and the artists that have made it, to look at how we can help those artists that are still struggling to break through in the file sharing age.
So obviously I’m writing you because I’d really like your help. You don’t have to like my music –you don’t even have to like me. But if you think file sharing’s not alright and reckon we should be doing more to ensure emerging artists aren’t cut off, then I’d love a hand.
I want to get everyone together – the artists, record companies, ISPs and government –to properly talk about this. So we can stop bickering and try and come to a solution. We can even see if we can come up with some new ideas too.
I want us to talk about how we support emerging artists. If we support emerging artists, we can ask our fans to support them too. And if we’re not going after piracy, we need to talk about how we are going to support new talent.
The majority of British artists are against file sharing, because it will harm British music. We can talk about all the legal means of accessing music out there and even come up with new ways to access music, but ultimately we need to establish that we think file sharing is wrong.
If you agree with what I’m saying and want to be involved with voicing our opinion, then get in touch.
Lily
So far, James Blunt, Tim Oxley of Keane and Matt Bellamy of Muse have all written Lils back.
Thoughts????
[Image via WENN.]