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> Yes, how positively odd that after giving you lots of money they want something specific in return. Sure. You could say precisely the same about a politician

by _ality 10y ago

> Yes, how positively odd that after giving you lots of money they want something specific in return. Sure. You could say precisely the same about a politician who accepts money from a mafia or large corporation. What you are saying is not a counterargument when the entire point of the article is a criticism of a system based around this exchange (in the same way I imagine you wouldn't defend political corruption).

Kalium 10y ago
Their criticism falls somewhat flat, in that their proposed alternative is centralization where exactly one entity controls all funding and has the power of controlling what to fund. Or to put it another way: if you object to people having power via controlling the flow of resources, don't propose a state monopoly as an alternative to a more distributed system.
TulliusCicero 10y ago
Yes, because corrupting politicians with bribes is obviously counter to the public interest and poisonous to democracy. The article does imply that artists making things for their 'patrons' is bad, but it doesn't actually say why. I mean yeah, it does say that what artists create is dictated by what people are willing to pay for, but that's true of basically any business. The argument they make later for why crowdfunding for paying for people's medical treatment is basically sound: most developed countries have universal healthcare, after all. One can intuitively understand the moral argument of "people shouldn't have to go around begging for donations because they got cancer". The article just doesn't say why that applies to artists, too. Unless you want to just make the hyper-general argument of, "like, you shouldn't have to work for money, maaaan." edit: basically it's hard to take critique of business behavior from marxists seriously because 90% of the time it seems to come down to "profit is immoral, full communism now", and unless you're willing to go for that, the arguments they present are completely useless.
bubuga 10y ago
> Sure. You could say precisely the same about a politician who accepts money from a mafia or large corporation. ...except that is illegal and an absurd example, and the "artist" explicitly sought patrons to provide him money in exchange for his product. If an "artist" opens a business and attracts clients then he needs to serve his clients with the business he advertised, even if you use strawman arguments to compare them to organized crime.

by _ality 10y ago

Kalium 10y ago

Their criticism falls somewhat flat, in that their proposed alternative is centralization where exactly one entity controls all funding and has the power of controlling what to fund. Or to put it another way: if you object to people having power via controlling the flow of resources, don't propose a state monopoly as an alternative to a more distributed system.

TulliusCicero 10y ago

Yes, because corrupting politicians with bribes is obviously counter to the public interest and poisonous to democracy. The article does imply that artists making things for their 'patrons' is bad, but it doesn't actually say why. I mean yeah, it does say that what artists create is dictated by what people are willing to pay for, but that's true of basically any business. The argument they make later for why crowdfunding for paying for people's medical treatment is basically sound: most developed countries have universal healthcare, after all. One can intuitively understand the moral argument of "people shouldn't have to go around begging for donations because they got cancer". The article just doesn't say why that applies to artists, too. Unless you want to just make the hyper-general argument of, "like, you shouldn't have to work for money, maaaan." edit: basically it's hard to take critique of business behavior from marxists seriously because 90% of the time it seems to come down to "profit is immoral, full communism now", and unless you're willing to go for that, the arguments they present are completely useless.

bubuga 10y ago

> Sure. You could say precisely the same about a politician who accepts money from a mafia or large corporation. ...except that is illegal and an absurd example, and the "artist" explicitly sought patrons to provide him money in exchange for his product. If an "artist" opens a business and attracts clients then he needs to serve his clients with the business he advertised, even if you use strawman arguments to compare them to organized crime.