strathspey Archive: Paying for dance descriptions

Dear Iain,

Sending information around the world (like your message, this
message, dance collections and tunes) can nowadays be done instantly
and at no cost.

Nobody will begrudge an author or composer his due remuneration, but
when we buy the paper books nearly all the money goes to publishers,
printing companies, taxes and postal services. Why should we be
incited to pay for all of that, when we have no idea how much (if
anything) the author / composer gets, and also have to accept long
delays?

It is obvious that sending dances and music around the world on paper
is an outdated method of communication.

The SCD community needs to devise a method of distributing dances
(etc.) that gives proper remuneration to the artists who wrote them,
without incurring any extra costs. I see two possibilities which can
coexist.

1. If an author/composer wants to donate the proceeds to charity (as
many do), it should suffice to add a line to the description/tune
"If this dance/tune is used at any social event for which admission
is charged, we trust that you will donate the sum of XXX to a charity
in the field of YYY." That will surely raise more (and recurrent)
revenue than paying once for the publication.

2. For those authors/composers who want to collect the cash
themselves, could the Strathspey website (or the RSCDS) perhaps set
up a webshop where one can pay and then download?

Who has better ideas?

Happy dancing,

Eric

Quoting Iain Boyd <iain_boyd_scd@yahoo.co.nz>:

> Dear Chris,

> I get a little tired of dancers and teachers trying to get
> something for nothing.

> I admit that there are now so many books of dances available, but,
> a small investment every now and then over a period of time will
> ensure that even the meanest will end up with a sizable
> collection.

> Regards,

> Iain Boyd

--
Eric T. Ferguson,
van Reenenweg 3, 3702 SB ZEIST Netherlands
tel: +31 30-2673638

If you buy the booklet, music or whatever directly from the author, they will get full renumeration. Often the author will sell books to a vendor, at 40% off. Or to a wholesaler at 60% off. Just because you buy from a store doesn't mean that the author doesn't get anything. They just don't get as much as if you bought directly.
Sylvia Miskoe, Concord, NH USA

-----Original Message-----
From: Eric Ferguson <e.ferguson@antenna.nl>
To: strathspey <strathspey@strathspey.org>
Sent: Fri, Jun 29, 2012 5:29 pm
Subject: Paying for dance descriptions (was: Marie Boehmer dances)

Dear Iain,

Sending information around the world (like your message, this
message, dance collections and tunes) can nowadays be done instantly
and at no cost.

Nobody will begrudge an author or composer his due remuneration, but
when we buy the paper books nearly all the money goes to publishers,
printing companies, taxes and postal services. Why should we be
incited to pay for all of that, when we have no idea how much (if
anything) the author / composer gets, and also have to accept long
delays?

It is obvious that sending dances and music around the world on paper
is an outdated method of communication.

The SCD community needs to devise a method of distributing dances
(etc.) that gives proper remuneration to the artists who wrote them,
without incurring any extra costs. I see two possibilities which can
coexist.

1. If an author/composer wants to donate the proceeds to charity (as
many do), it should suffice to add a line to the description/tune
"If this dance/tune is used at any social event for which admission
is charged, we trust that you will donate the sum of XXX to a charity
in the field of YYY." That will surely raise more (and recurrent)
revenue than paying once for the publication.

2. For those authors/composers who want to collect the cash
themselves, could the Strathspey website (or the RSCDS) perhaps set
up a webshop where one can pay and then download?

Who has better ideas?

Happy dancing,

Eric

Quoting Iain Boyd <iain_boyd_scd@yahoo.co.nz>:

> Dear Chris,

> I get a little tired of dancers and teachers trying to get
> something for nothing.

> I admit that there are now so many books of dances available, but,
> a small investment every now and then over a period of time will
> ensure that even the meanest will end up with a sizable
> collection.

> Regards,

> Iain Boyd

--
Eric T. Ferguson,
van Reenenweg 3, 3702 SB ZEIST Netherlands
tel: +31 30-2673638

On Fri, Jun 29, 2012 at 2:45 PM, sylviasmiskoe@aol.com <
sylviasmiskoe@aol.com> wrote:

> If you buy the booklet, music or whatever directly from the author, they
> will get full renumeration. Often the author will sell books to a vendor,
> at 40% off. Or to a wholesaler at 60% off. Just because you buy from a
> store doesn't mean that the author doesn't get anything. They just don't
> get as much as if you bought directly.
> Sylvia Miskoe, Concord, NH USA
>

Many dance devisors and musicians around here self-publish. Purchasing
books or CDs is helping them recoup their up-front costs, and encouraging
them to publish more dances or make more recordings. I know one popular
choreographer and dance musician here who was chagrined to find recently
that all of his published dances were freely available on the internet,
either as full descriptions or as detailed cribs, all without his
permission. As a result he has made the decision not to produce any more
hard copies of his current and any future books and recordings; instead
he's working on building a website where customers will be able to download
individual dances and recordings. I guess that's progress... Personally I
still prefer physical copies of books and music but I'm probably behind the
times on this.
--
Steve Wyrick -- Walnut Creek, California

I've known musicians to ask firmly that ther tunes be removed from whatever list they were found on. Phil Cunningham is very particular about having his tunes published without permission.
Sylvia Miskoe, Concord, NH USA

-----Original Message-----
From: Steve Wyrick <sjwyrick@gmail.com>
To: strathspey <strathspey@strathspey.org>
Sent: Fri, Jun 29, 2012 6:06 pm
Subject: Re: Paying for dance descriptions (was: Marie Boehmer dances)

On Fri, Jun 29, 2012 at 2:45 PM, sylviasmiskoe@aol.com <
sylviasmiskoe@aol.com> wrote:

> If you buy the booklet, music or whatever directly from the author, they
> will get full renumeration. Often the author will sell books to a vendor,
> at 40% off. Or to a wholesaler at 60% off. Just because you buy from a
> store doesn't mean that the author doesn't get anything. They just don't
> get as much as if you bought directly.
> Sylvia Miskoe, Concord, NH USA
>

Many dance devisors and musicians around here self-publish. Purchasing
books or CDs is helping them recoup their up-front costs, and encouraging
them to publish more dances or make more recordings. I know one popular
choreographer and dance musician here who was chagrined to find recently
that all of his published dances were freely available on the internet,
either as full descriptions or as detailed cribs, all without his
permission. As a result he has made the decision not to produce any more
hard copies of his current and any future books and recordings; instead
he's working on building a website where customers will be able to download
individual dances and recordings. I guess that's progress... Personally I
still prefer physical copies of books and music but I'm probably behind the
times on this.
--
Steve Wyrick -- Walnut Creek, California

The situation is clearly different for musicians and dance authors.

For professional musicians composing and playing are their main
sources of income. It is obvious that they must get due
remuneration. That cannot be based on collecting "voluntary"
contributions.

Many dance authors write dances more as a pastime; I have yet to hear
of any author for whom selling dance descriptions is either a
significant part of his income or a fitting professional fee for the
time spent. Don't forget we must count only net profits; making the
publications and selling them entail significant costs.

I suggest that we restrict the question to dance descriptions only:
how can we use the modern free and instant technology, and also
ensure the authors receive the remuneration (or gifts to charity)
that they desire?

Eric

On 29 Jun 2012 at 18:10, sylviasmiskoe@aol.com wrote:

> I've known musicians to ask firmly that ther tunes be removed from
> whatever list they were found on. Phil Cunningham is very
> particular about having his tunes published without permission.

> Sylvia Miskoe, Concord, NH USA
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Steve Wyrick <sjwyrick@gmail.com>
> To: strathspey <strathspey@strathspey.org>
> Sent: Fri, Jun 29, 2012 6:06 pm
> Subject: Re: Paying for dance descriptions (was: Marie Boehmer dances)
>
>
> On Fri, Jun 29, 2012 at 2:45 PM, sylviasmiskoe@aol.com <
> sylviasmiskoe@aol.com> wrote:
>
> > If you buy the booklet, music or whatever directly from the author, they
> > will get full renumeration. Often the author will sell books to a vendor,
> > at 40% off. Or to a wholesaler at 60% off. Just because you buy from a
> > store doesn't mean that the author doesn't get anything. They just don't
> > get as much as if you bought directly.
> > Sylvia Miskoe, Concord, NH USA
> >
>
> Many dance devisors and musicians around here self-publish. Purchasing
> books or CDs is helping them recoup their up-front costs, and encouraging
> them to publish more dances or make more recordings. I know one popular
> choreographer and dance musician here who was chagrined to find recently
> that all of his published dances were freely available on the internet,
> either as full descriptions or as detailed cribs, all without his
> permission. As a result he has made the decision not to produce any more
> hard copies of his current and any future books and recordings; instead
> he's working on building a website where customers will be able to download
> individual dances and recordings. I guess that's progress... Personally I
> still prefer physical copies of books and music but I'm probably behind the
> times on this.
> --
> Steve Wyrick -- Walnut Creek, California
>
>
>
>
>

--
Eric T. Ferguson,
van Reenenweg 3, 3702 SB ZEIST Netherlands
tel: +31 30-2673638

Eric Ferguson wrote:

> I suggest that we restrict the question to dance descriptions only:
> how can we use the modern free and instant technology, and also
> ensure the authors receive the remuneration (or gifts to charity)
> that they desire?

I think in the first instance by honouring the authors' wishes as to how their
dances are to be distributed (or not distributed as the case may be).
Secondly, by educating them about the various options that are available so
they can make an informed choice about how to publish their stuff.

As a dance author myself, having put most of my works on the Internet for
free, I do enjoy hearing from people all over the world who try my dances, and
that is as much remuneration as I need or want. If I restricted myself to
selling leaflets and books on paper which I also do, at functions around here,
my dances would get a lot less exposure even though I would make more money –
but I'm still a ways away from making back what having the books printed cost
in the first place. I can sympathise with people who choose to just sell the
books although it's not how I think I want to publish my own dances.

These days it *is* fairly easy to publish a dance on the Internet. If you
don't have your own web page, places like »8 by 32« or the Strathspey server
will be happy to take it and put it up on your behalf. You might even use
something like PayPal to collect a price or donations. It turns out that our
main problem these days isn't really publishing dances, but finding which of
the dances that are already out there and reasonably accessible are in fact
worth the trouble. What we need is a way to generate feedback on existing
dances and make that accessible in a convenient way, and I have a few ideas
about this that I hope to find the time to implement eventually.

As far as the suggestion of introducing a Strathspey for-pay webshop for
dances is concerned, that is a non-starter because it would probably require
me to set up a proper business, deal with taxes, etc., and I have little
enough time to do the things with Strathspey that I do want to do that I'm not
exactly eager to take on more things that I'd rather not have to do.

Anselm
--
Anselm Lingnau, Mainz/Mayence, Germany ................. anselm@strathspey.org
I'd rather have a bottle in front of me, than a frontal lobotomy.
-- Dorothy Parker

On 30 Jun 2012 at 1:40, Anselm Lingnau wrote:

> <big snip> These days it *is* fairly easy to publish a dance on
> the Internet. If you don't have your own web page, places like »8
> by 32« or the Strathspey server will be happy to take it and put
> it up on your behalf. <big snip>

We all know "8x32", but "Strathspey" is the most logical place to
publish dance descriptions, right alongside the other dance
information.

How should we submit descriptions to "Strathspey" for publication?

Happy dancing all,

Eric

--
Eric T. Ferguson,
van Reenenweg 3, 3702 SB ZEIST Netherlands
tel: +31 30-2673638

Eric Ferguson wrote:

> How should we submit descriptions to "Strathspey" for publication?

There's no formal process. Until members get to maintain their own pages
(which is on the perennial to-do list), send a description to me (HTML or PDF
would be preferred, but I can probably handle most anything else, with no
guarantees given for 1:1 identical formatting) and I'll find a place for it,
either off the dance database or on a »member-submitted dances« page (which
would be easy to make) or both.

Anselm
--
Anselm Lingnau, Mainz/Mayence, Germany ................. anselm@strathspey.org
Learn to speak gibberish. It's easier than acquiring knowledge and it will put
you on the management fast track.
-- Scott Adams, _Dilbert's Guide to the Rest of your Life_

Sorry I do not see any difference at all.

Maybe, just maybe, we do not hear of "authors for whom selling dance
descriptions is either a significant part of his income or a fitting
professional fee for the time spent" because of all the requests for FREE
copies, seen as regular features on this email broadcast.

It should surely be up to the author if they wish to sell their dance or
not, not the dancing community. If the dancing community do not wish to
pay, so be it - don't buy the dance, but don't steal it either.

There are a large number of requests for dances via this forum of which a
number of reply's state "Private Reply Sent" and these are for dances which
are available in current print form. The other interesting thing is the
names of those who are willing to send copies of currently available dances
and breach the authors copyright, and ability to sell his or her work.

I applaud new ideas / systems to "sell" the published work of our authors /
devisors, so long as the income is solely that of the author / devisor.

Murray Corps

-----Original Message-----
From: Eric Ferguson [mailto:e.ferguson@antenna.nl]
Sent: Saturday, 30 June 2012 11:00 a.m.
To: strathspey@strathspey.org
Subject: Re: Paying for dance descriptions (was: Marie Boehmer dances)

The situation is clearly different for musicians and dance authors.

For professional musicians composing and playing are their main sources of
income. It is obvious that they must get due remuneration. That cannot be
based on collecting "voluntary"
contributions.

Many dance authors write dances more as a pastime; I have yet to hear of any
author for whom selling dance descriptions is either a significant part of
his income or a fitting professional fee for the time spent. Don't forget
we must count only net profits; making the publications and selling them
entail significant costs.

I suggest that we restrict the question to dance descriptions only:
how can we use the modern free and instant technology, and also ensure the
authors receive the remuneration (or gifts to charity) that they desire?

Eric

On 29 Jun 2012 at 18:10, sylviasmiskoe@aol.com wrote:

> I've known musicians to ask firmly that ther tunes be removed from
> whatever list they were found on. Phil Cunningham is very particular
> about having his tunes published without permission.

> Sylvia Miskoe, Concord, NH USA
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Steve Wyrick <sjwyrick@gmail.com>
> To: strathspey <strathspey@strathspey.org>
> Sent: Fri, Jun 29, 2012 6:06 pm
> Subject: Re: Paying for dance descriptions (was: Marie Boehmer dances)
>
>
> On Fri, Jun 29, 2012 at 2:45 PM, sylviasmiskoe@aol.com <
> sylviasmiskoe@aol.com> wrote:
>
> > If you buy the booklet, music or whatever directly from the author,
> > they will get full renumeration. Often the author will sell books
> > to a vendor, at 40% off. Or to a wholesaler at 60% off. Just
> > because you buy from a store doesn't mean that the author doesn't
> > get anything. They just don't get as much as if you bought directly.
> > Sylvia Miskoe, Concord, NH USA
> >
>
> Many dance devisors and musicians around here self-publish.
> Purchasing books or CDs is helping them recoup their up-front costs,
> and encouraging them to publish more dances or make more recordings.
> I know one popular choreographer and dance musician here who was
> chagrined to find recently that all of his published dances were
> freely available on the internet, either as full descriptions or as
> detailed cribs, all without his permission. As a result he has made
> the decision not to produce any more hard copies of his current and
> any future books and recordings; instead he's working on building a
> website where customers will be able to download individual dances and
> recordings. I guess that's progress... Personally I still prefer
> physical copies of books and music but I'm probably behind the times on
this.
> --
> Steve Wyrick -- Walnut Creek, California
>
>
>
>
>

--
Eric T. Ferguson,
van Reenenweg 3, 3702 SB ZEIST Netherlands
tel: +31 30-2673638

Murray Corps wrote:

> It should surely be up to the author if they wish to sell their dance or
> not, not the dancing community. If the dancing community do not wish to
> pay, so be it - don't buy the dance, but don't steal it either.

Makes sense to me.

> There are a large number of requests for dances via this forum of which a
> number of reply's state "Private Reply Sent" and these are for dances which
> are available in current print form. The other interesting thing is the
> names of those who are willing to send copies of currently available dances
> and breach the authors copyright, and ability to sell his or her work.

There is probably a difference between privately providing a copy of one dance
out of a book of ten upon request (which may, after all, entice the recipient
to get the full book from the author) and putting scanned copies of other
people's dance descriptions on the net wholesale for all and sundry to
download. The latter is something I wouldn't condone, but the former is more
of a grey area.

I do note with some trepidation that there are stretches where all of
Strathspey seems to consist of a sequence of short dialogues of the form »Can
anybody send me instructions for such-and-such? – Privately sent.« I have
availed myself of the friendliness of other Strathspey subscribers in the
past, too, but I wouldn't be overly happy to see this sort of thing become the
main purpose of the list.

On the other hand, with the recent demise of SNDC, the only places to actually
*get* original instructions are TACBooks (although it seems a bit silly for
somebody in Europe to order stuff from, say, UK authors, through a service on
the other side of the Atlantic) and the RSCDS (which carries only a small part
of the repertoire). Otherwise we need to hunt down the original authors, who
may after all live basically anywhere, and may expect to pay $10 in postage
and banking charges for a $2 booklet.

> I applaud new ideas / systems to "sell" the published work of our authors /
> devisors, so long as the income is solely that of the author / devisor.

It would be a great thing if somebody in the Old World would step up to become
the next SNDC or European TACBooks, just to make things easier for the people
around here who would be perfectly willing to pay good money for printed dance
books if only there was a convenient way of getting them. However, I'm not
holding my breath.

In the meantime, internet-based distribution would be more of an option if it
was less of a »niche« thing and if payment could be sorted out (something like
PayPal, for all its disadvantages, would probably do in a pinch). Anyone doing
that kind of work would, as far as I'm concerned, be perfectly justified in
taking a percentage off the actual price for their troubles.

One obvious way of improving the situation in the short term would be to
collect, for various publications, the e-mail addresses of people willing to
act as points of contact for others who want to obtain a copy of the
publication in question. This could be the authors themselves, or else people
in the area who wouldn't mind helping out, or even something like TACBooks.
One could get in touch with that person and arrange to have a copy of the book
sent, with payment through PayPal, or to do a »swap« with a book from the
buyer's area. The natural place for this would be the publication's page in
the dance database, and it might make sense to include a »currently for sale«
icon with publications when they show up in lists and so on – just to
encourage people to make the necessary arrangements. People listed as
»distributors« in the database could be polled on an annual basis to check
that their addresses still exist and that they are still willing to perform
this function.

Anselm
--
Anselm Lingnau, Mainz/Mayence, Germany ................. anselm@strathspey.org
A new idea is first condemned as ridiculous and then dismissed as trivial,
until it finally becomes what everybody knows. -- William James

Here in South Wales I run a small Branch shop. The main stock is of locally produced
books and CDs eg Dances devised by Alec Grey and John Rigby,
also CDs which include music by James Grey. I do have a few other items.
Unfortunately I'm not sure about selling World wide but can certainly
supply in UK.
The web address is www.rscds-southwales.org.uk/shop.html

Fran Smith (South Wales)

________________________________

From: Anselm Lingnau <anselm@strathspey.org>
To: strathspey@strathspey.org
Sent: Saturday, 30 June 2012, 14:46
Subject: Re: Paying for dance descriptions (was: Marie Boehmer dances)
 
(snip)
One obvious way of improving the situation in the short term would be to
collect, for various publications, the e-mail addresses of people willing to
act as points of contact for others who want to obtain a copy of the
publication in question. 

Anselm
--
Anselm Lingnau, Mainz/Mayence, Germany ................. anselm@strathspey.org
A new idea is first condemned as ridiculous and then dismissed as trivial,
until it finally becomes what everybody knows.                -- William James

Another good source to buy dance books within Europe is the Leeds Branch shop (http://www.rscdsleeds.org.uk/). If possible Christine also tries to get books published by other groups in the UK and sells used older books if offered to them, e.g. pocket books.

So before ordering those books from TACbooks to be sent back to Europe where they have been printed, it is a good place to check first.

Cheers,
Heiko

On Jun 30, 2012, at 22:25 , Fran Smith wrote:

> Here in South Wales I run a small Branch shop. The main stock is of locally produced
> books and CDs eg Dances devised by Alec Grey and John Rigby,
> also CDs which include music by James Grey. I do have a few other items.
> Unfortunately I'm not sure about selling World wide but can certainly
> supply in UK.
> The web address is www.rscds-southwales.org.uk/shop.html
>
> Fran Smith (South Wales)
>
>
>
> ________________________________
>
> From: Anselm Lingnau <anselm@strathspey.org>
> To: strathspey@strathspey.org
> Sent: Saturday, 30 June 2012, 14:46
> Subject: Re: Paying for dance descriptions (was: Marie Boehmer dances)
>
> (snip)
> One obvious way of improving the situation in the short term would be to
> collect, for various publications, the e-mail addresses of people willing to
> act as points of contact for others who want to obtain a copy of the
> publication in question.
>
> Anselm
> --
> Anselm Lingnau, Mainz/Mayence, Germany ................. anselm@strathspey.org
> A new idea is first condemned as ridiculous and then dismissed as trivial,
> until it finally becomes what everybody knows. -- William James

Hi all,

On 29 Jun 2012 at 15:05, Steve Wyrick wrote:

> <snip> I know one popular choreographer and dance musician here
> who was chagrined to find recently that all of his published dances
> were freely available on the internet, either as full descriptions
> or as detailed cribs, all without his permission. As a result he
> has made the decision not to produce any more hard copies of his
> current and any future books and recordings; instead he's working
> on building a website where customers will be able to download
> individual dances and recordings. I guess that's progress...

Indeed. Authors, composers and musicians merit due remuneration for
their efforts, but with present technology we don't need any
intermediaries.

It's quite a hassle to set up such a website and payment system.
Would it make sense to have a joint one, e.g. one per currency area
(to avoid currency exchange issues)?

You all know my dance cribs are distributed on request and also
posted on "strathspey" as a service to all dancers. But any crib
will immediately be removed if the author so wishes.

Eric

--
Eric T. Ferguson,
van Reenenweg 3, 3702 SB ZEIST Netherlands
tel: +31 30-2673638