AT&T, official sponsor of the Lollapalooza tour, decided to edit out 20 seconds of Pearl Jam's cover of Pink Floyd's "The Wall" because of the anti-Bush message contained.
I can see both sides of the issue of course, ATT needs to protect its assets and lobby interests (as well as its fat NSA contracts selling customer databases to wiretap programs), but at the same time it shouldn't be selectively censoring a product it is selling, which the customer believes he is paying for a full musical performance and receives instead an edited version that fits the corporate interest and changes the very meaning of the message.
I can understand "explicit lyrics" being censored on the grounds to sell more music to a younger audience, but generally you don't change or override the message by changing "fucking" to "damn". The core meaning or expression of the artist doesn't change in this way.
Linky:
http://pearljam.com/news/index.php?what=News#195
So did AT&T have the right to censor just that particular snipped from its podcast, and what does that say about future corporate control of artistic license?Pearl Jam wrote:
In the main verse:
"George Bush, leave this world alone."
"George Bush find yourself another home."
I can see both sides of the issue of course, ATT needs to protect its assets and lobby interests (as well as its fat NSA contracts selling customer databases to wiretap programs), but at the same time it shouldn't be selectively censoring a product it is selling, which the customer believes he is paying for a full musical performance and receives instead an edited version that fits the corporate interest and changes the very meaning of the message.
I can understand "explicit lyrics" being censored on the grounds to sell more music to a younger audience, but generally you don't change or override the message by changing "fucking" to "damn". The core meaning or expression of the artist doesn't change in this way.
Linky:
http://pearljam.com/news/index.php?what=News#195
Last edited by GorillaTicTacs (2007-08-09 08:29:00)