Looking this cheap takes a lot of effort...

There was an interesting Op-Ed in the NY Times this weekend about writing, and getting paid for it (or more specifically, being asked to write something for free).

It reminded me of a guy who contacted me last summer, offering to send me a DVD of Kenneth Branagh's film version of The Magic Flute to review. I wrote back saying sure, send it, and it arrived about a week later. He soon contacted me, not once, but numerous times asking when the post would appear, hoping I would write about it before the film's US release. As I took it, what he was essentially asking in return for mailing me a free DVD of a seven year-old film was that I would pretty much drop everything, sit down and watch it (and pay close enough attention for more than two hours so that I could write about it intelligently), and then spend another two to three hours (at least) writing about it, so that his company might have some good reviews to use when the film came out in theaters. Tired of being hassled about it, I just decided I wasn't going to watch the damn thing at all.

The film came and went in theaters. Poof! Did you miss it?

Never mind that if the distributor was going to make any money on the film it would come over an extended period of time as people added it to their DVD collection based on online reviews or word of mouth, not from the box-office revenue of the theatrical release. Of course Joe Marketing dude didn't really seem to get that, either. He apparently just thought that getting a free copy of a DVD would motivate me to willingly be a cog in their machine. If he had at least taken the time to read this blog he would have known that I'm not even an especially huge fan of Mozart's operas, with the exception of Cosi Fan Tutte, which, by the way, is what Branagh should have spent someone's $27,000,000 on in the first place.

If I were so inclined, having read someone else's favorable review, I could now buy that DVD on Amazon for less than $15.00. If I remove the hoped-for pleasure of viewing and actually enjoying the film, based on the marketer's incentive, writing that post would have been worth about $5 an hour to me. If it didn't please me, the time spent watching would be added into the equation, lowering my hourly rate to somewhere between $2.50 and $3.00 an hour.

So.... yeah- I'll get right to that. Yep. Thanks for that opportunity?

"But what about the joy of writing it? You're a blogger, right? You don't get paid for what you write anyway!" Well yes, on both counts that it is for the most part true: I really do enjoy writing about the arts, but I enjoy it because I get to choose what I write about. I didn't start this for money, free tickets, or DVDs. I started it because I found myself frequently disagreeing with Josh Kosman's opera reviews and after discovering a few other local blogs, especially Patrick Vaz's, I was inspired to start my own.

There are only so many hours in a life, and at this point if I'm going to do something that is essentially for someone else's benefit, at least on a monetary level, and I really do want to stress that qualifier, it's because I believe in what the artist is doing, I have a genuine interest in their work, and I want other people to experience it. In other words, it interests me to see them succeed. For example this past weekend I received an email from a singer whom I've seen before and whose performances I've really admired. She wrote asking if I would be interested in a copy of her most recent CD. I replied that I would, though it may take me some time to review it, so the choice was really hers. She's an artist whose work I admire, so I'm interested in helping promote her, just like I want to promote going to hear the San Francisco Symphony, or seeing an opera or a play- I write about these things because I want you to go, with the old-fashioned hope you'll enjoy it as much as I do. I'm trying to sell you something I think you'll enjoy, or in some cases warn you against wasting your money.

So if you want me to write something for your interests, on your schedule, I'd be happy to do that, but you're going to have to pay me, bitches. 

Shake it now! Shake it like a Polaroid picture... Hey Ya!

I was cc'd on an unusual email this afternoon:

Dear Count de Monet,

Over at San Francisco Classical Voice, Janos Gereben has the most up-to-date information regarding the Symphony’s strike, including some information that will likely further solidify that portion of public opinion that thinks while it certainly would be nice to see  the musicians (and everyone else whose work we love, respect, and admire) make more money, they have it pretty good overall and should probably just shut the fuck up and continue to enjoy their 10 weeks of paid vacation, very generous pensions, fully-employer-funded medical insurance for themselves, salaries that allow them to live comfortably, if not well, while living in one of the world’s greatest cities and having a job most people could only dream about. Because you know what?  The alternative is not getting paid a few thousand dollars more a year like they do in LA or Chicago (and who the hell in their right mind and currently living in San Francisco would willingly trade living in this easiest of all cities for the traffic of the former and the winter of the latter?) Are you kidding me? You don’t even have to own a car here, which saves you easily $12,000 a year! No, the alternative, as we see it, is to live like the rest of us- your audience, who for the most part would love to have benefits like that, and know we never will, because  those days are long gone for us, and only remain available for special people with special skills, like classical musicians, and we don’t begrudge them this, because we know, we really do know, that very few people on Earth can do your job as well as you do and that’s why we come and listen to you in the first place. We love you guys- really we do. Until you start whining, that is. And you know what? Every company has a boss. And the boss makes a lot more money than the “talent.”  You think you have it bad? The CEO of the my company makes 275 times the amount that I do. That’s right- 275 times what I do. According to the management and board of my employer it would take 275 of me to do his job. Do you think I like that? Do you know how undervalued and unappreciated I feel when I think about that? Do you know how much that hurts me deep inside. Right here. No, right here. Thank you. More to the point, do you even care? No, of course you don’t, and I wouldn’t bother you with my complaints about it but now that you’ve brought up how unfair life is… Oh wait. Sorry. I’m being so self-absorbed right now I can hardly stand my David Herbert ass-self. So shut up and play some music already, ok? Because please, no one likes a sniveler. Who am I calling a sniveler? Hmm, maybe it’s that person, the whining complainer, the hole reeking of entitlement, who receives 60% more vacation time than his peers (that’s 16 weeks total), makes $214,000 a year for his trouble and claims that management doesn’t “value and support” him, even though it offered him a raise and a bonus to stay with the orchestra. Yes, I’m talking about you, Mr. Soon-to-be-Principal Timpani-of-the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Just go east already because you are annoying the piss out of me with your whining and the guy from Boston is better than you anyway and maybe we can get him to take your place. Yes, we can win the damn World Series without Buster Posey and what kind of fucked up analogy is that anyway and why the fuck are you guys wearing Dodgers caps? What the fuck does baseball have to do with classical music performance? This is real life, not some fucking Don DeLillo novel! Take off those fucking baseball caps- don’t you know Mark Inouye is the only one of you who doesn’t look completely ridiculous in one?

Sincerely yours,

"The P. Boy"