John Flansburgh on Music Piracy - PBS NewsHour - Sep 9, 2003

[@salange17]

8:41 "Uhhhh, record companies?" Bodied him. Bless you, John.

[@platypuspracticus2]

A big, unspoken assumption here is that every who downloaded a song or album could have purchased it. That is a very big assumption.

[@flansyburgh]

john don't care what the haters say fr

[@bortsbymcbort5350]

he's not : Singer, "They Might Be Giants" he's one of the guys from They Might Be Giants. show respect PBS

[@JunkyardBashSteve]

yeah TMBG were not the right people to talk to about this if you wanted someone on your side. they pioneered music streaming via Dial A Song and they never made cent off of it. They make music for the sake of making it and spreading it, money has never been their no.1

[@daisychannel2002]

Idc if people pirate music or not I just think John looks really pretty here /j

[@thequeenofnanobots]

every time i see you ina comment section ur just so real

[@daisychannel2002]

@@thequeenofnanobots man pretty what can I say

[@Persun_McPersonson]

@@daisychannel2002 What happened to it being /j (/j)

[@daisychannel2002]

@@Persun_McPersonson im not joking anymore ^_^ man prett y

[@HeadlineNews]

John and John should be cherished as Gifts from God.

[@Blurns]

"people are biting the hands that make the music"

[@miabullafaloni1312]

It's fun to steeeeal~

[@CapitalQ]

"Chuck Cannon" sounds like a Suoer Mario World enemy

[@Persun_McPersonson]

A shame it ended there, I wanted to hear John's response

[@peters-other-stuff]

see that door there? the one marked "pirate"? you think a pirate lives in there?

[@theforklord9463]

well now im picturing that scene as linnell and flans

[@Dulceria_La_Princesita]

Particle Man was the first song I illegally downloaded.

[@rattyeely]

This is so scary they put our goofy guy Flansy in a serious debate about intellectual property. He can't even be open about how much he loves piracy

[@TransCommieFromOuterSpace]

John Flansburgh is cool.

[@kennethnorman8079]

This is a prime example as to why it's important to have a news service on PBS. Two well informed points of view on a problem. There was no "You're from Nashville so you're an ignorant hillbilly" or "You're from NY so you're a liberal, commie" shite. Just 2 people talking about an issue and listening to each other without demagoguery. That said, Flans was amazingly prescient about the state of the recording industry of the future.

[@bluef00t86]

Actually, surprised by how much I understood the other guy's POV, since he's approaching this from a fundamentally different angle--a hired-gun songwriter who is not a singer or performer is definitely going to have a different relationship to the concept of intellectual property. He's effectively trapped in the safety restraints of an old industry as it goes down like a sinking ship. Even JF's argument is effectively "well, this isn't *good*, but there's no point bailing water now." Still quite funny to ask the Dial-A-Song guy if he thinks widespread music distribution at a loss is a world-ending idea. Don't blame me if the guy's a nut!

[@horridstank3330]

the other guy literally talks in circles for like 2 minutes straight and all he really says is "if you download a song the artist doesn't get paid. that's so bad oh no."

[@jessss27]

Smart man!!

[@d1nn3r_b3ll]

yesssssss!

[@The_GrumpyGills]

You sell the song to the artist. The artist uses the song to get people to go to their shows. Look, everyone got paid.