Open and shut doors

Opportunities

As a kid - among peers - it's very easy to look at the rambunctious ones, and conclude definitely that they are the problem. And in one sense, it'd be the truth, and in another sense, it is utterly reversed from the truth.

With every skill and trade under the sun... there was a time when it was new. Computer programming is that way, today. Visual art was that way, writing was that way... oral language was that way once.

And for a very short time in history, it is miraculously easy to make a living with that skill. Also, in that short time in history, there are insidious power grabs by dirty hands looking to use that technology for selfish, or evil purposes.

The bible illustrates this with writing. All the plans the neoconservatives have for controlling the internet and the computer shows this with computer programming.

I imagine it would have been the same thing with photography - that's why there was a fear of photographs being taken around the turn of the 1800s-1900s.

But, people of the trade, remembering the heyday when making money was easy, oftentimes want to turn back the clock and try to shut the door. They want to make the field only for a few professionals.

And so those at the top, wherever they are, decide to conspire to lock the door -and prevent novices from having an opportunity in the industry.

With music, this was done by the manufacturers of keyboard instruments. It would have been very easy to make a hard switch on keyboard instruments, even hundreds of years ago, which would shift the key to one of the 12 which european music uses... It would have been easy to design alternate forms of music notation which use a more concretely distinct symbology for different notes in the musical chord.

With publishing, for those who invented all of the big technology to mass produce this and that - it would have been easy to make it possible for individual writers to own their own printing equipment... and give them an equal opportunity - without them having to go to the London Stationers for that service.

However, doors are locked... and it's really a form of child abuse. Those with the power, lord it over the rest, they pull the reigns, and abuse those in their care. What happens is that over time every skill becomes more and more common to humankind. You can never turn back the clock on that effect. And, if the economic opportunities are not there, those people who are there in abundance, waiting in the wings, ready to dive in and answer their call in life cannot do so. And they rot, instead.

Novice musicians today, foolishly sign over their rights to their songs in return for peanuts - less than a dollar per CD sold in the stores. Novice writers do the same thing with their novels. And they, of course, can never make ends meet. They are never able to make a living with their trade.

If musicians can't understand the circle of fifths - they'll just start a rap music tradition... they'll do rock music with scratchy voices... and the novices will clutter the world with the volume of the scream of their pathos, because they are unable to pay the rent or the mortgage.

One field which is doing very well today, is visual art/graphic design/photography. The modern art riddle is what really stands out, in the whole scheme of things. They have done this for their guild. They exhibit their studio excercises, and parade them as if they were the pinnacle of art. In one sense this is false, but in a more important sense, it's the only truth. Poetry was once to writing, what modern art is to the visual arts. Back in the day when not many people were literate - everyone admired someone who could write a poem, and say it aloud to them.

Even with the oldest trade - oral speech.... people still today, can, if they want to, make a good living as a public speaker, an actor, or a singer... Some make millions.

Trades will always become general knowledge... more tools will arrive which make the creation of a good easier, and quicker... but through it all... there is something which is called "inspiration" or "wisdom." All of these things: music, visual art, writing, film.. speech... even computer software... are vehicles for conveying ideas which you want to share with the world. So, the secret for success in all these trades, is being a thoughtful person - being a person who thinks about the world logically, and understands issues clearly. This is the common demoninator.