Downloading Music

[Guy]

First off let me say, I download music. Illegally. All of it. Haven't spent money on recorded music for 4 years now.

I know you all hate me for that, because I'm not supporting the bands. But from an economic perspective, isn't it hopeless to expect consumers to pay for something they don't have to? It seems like all people in the music industry are asking for the mercy of consumers, asking them to spend money on a product without giving a real good reason to do so. It's simply irrational thinking to expect music consumers as a group to respond to the music industry's appeal for help.

As long as music is available for free through IRC, Bittorrent, MyTunes, Limewire, and YouSendIt, is there really hope for any business plan which tries to get music fans to pay for recorded music, whether MP3 or CD?

You can try and say that labels will fold and that artists will stop making music, but that's a little silly and preposterous. When, in human history, have people stopped making art because they weren't getting paid for it?

[Mercy Medical]

Asking them to spend money on a product without giving a real good reason to do so? Hmmm, here's a real good reason. All those artists put time and money into creating that music, so shouldn't they get something back? Granted I do download a lot and everything, but I still go out there and buy the albums I've already downloaded. It's just that the rate in which I buy CDs will never match the rate in which I download music.

[getupkid53]

The inflation rate for our country is too ridiculous to pay for music. My fiance and I have 80,000 dollars of school debt. The cost for everything keeps going up and my paycheck isn't getting any bigger. It's really hard to justify spending money on new music. There are bands that I love and try to support, go to a show, maybe buy a tshirt, sticker, something, but in no way can I afford to buy even a quarter of the cds I want. If I download a cd and enjoy it, I will try to go to a show as support, touring is where bands make their money anyways. Most bands only pull a dollar or so from an album sale. I'd rather download the album and go give the band 3 dollars. Regardless, my Ipod is littered with 'stolen' music, but 99% of it, I wouldn't have been able to buy ever. It seems its harder to justify spending 14 bucks on a cd (after tax) than to download it anc a pay some bucks for a show.

[Guy]

The inflation rate for our country is too ridiculous to pay for music. My fiance and I have 80,000 dollars of school debt. The cost for everything keeps going up and my paycheck isn't getting any bigger. It's really hard to justify spending money on new music. There are bands that I love and try to support, go to a show, maybe buy a tshirt, sticker, something, but in no way can I afford to buy even a quarter of the cds I want. If I download a cd and enjoy it, I will try to go to a show as support, touring is where bands make their money anyways. Most bands only pull a dollar or so from an album sale. I'd rather download the album and go give the band 3 dollars. Regardless, my Ipod is littered with 'stolen' music, but 99% of it, I wouldn't have been able to buy ever. It seems its harder to justify spending 14 bucks on a cd (after tax) than to download it anc a pay some bucks for a show.
there we go. If musicians are going to get mad at their fans for downloading their music, they should also be getting mad at their labels for giving them shit-ass contracts. Blaming your target audience is a death sentence for your business (band)

[preppyak]

there we go. If musicians are going to get mad at their fans for downloading their music, they should also be getting mad at their labels for giving them shit-ass contracts. Blaming your target audience is a death sentence for your business (band)
Actually, what bands are going to start doing is blaming companies for copy-protecting, because I will never buy a copy-protected CD again. If it can't go into my Itunes, I won't buy it. If that means I have to download it, so be it. I'll apologize to the artist now, I'll support them at shows, but putting spyware and limiting my choice as to what I do with my music is bullshit.

And yeah, I download a bit too, I'd say my collection is more 50/50. But bands should get mad about downloading, especially if you are a band like Acceptance who got screwed over by it.

It seems its harder to justify spending 14 bucks on a cd (after tax) than to download it anc a pay some bucks for a show.
But try to remember that album sales affect the money bands get in the future. (See Acceptance getting no support because their sales are small.) Most CD's are 9.99 now, so its getting better, and I've seen 7.99 and lower for some CD's too.

[justsomenumber]

i like having the cd that i can touch. i value my cd collection and i rarely "steal" music off the internet. i hate people who use all of that shareware junk.

[aminorthreat55]

Ian MacKaye has it right:
http://www.downhillbattle.org/interviews/clips/ian/music_decline.mp3

HOLMES: So, you just said that you see networks like that as a library, as a resource, but other people, not all people, but some people see the music they make as their property and they're worried that if we don't lock it down, there won't be an incentive to create more music. And some folks in the music industry are actually saying that the music industry's decline means that music is in decline.

IAN: I don't agree with that at all, either one of those sentiments. If people lose their incentive to make music because they're not making money, they're not musicians. They're business people. Musicians don't have a choice in the matter, you gotta make music. There's no choice! It's not a fucking job description, there's no choice! You make music because it's what you do and the idea that it's sort of like saying that, "Well, this person is an artist, they're a painter, but because they can't sell their paintings they're going to quit." If they do, they're not artists! They're business people. I have to say that I feel like music, when I make music, the creation aspect of it, that may be my experience. I may have written the song, so I think, "I authored that song" but it's not property, it's not property for anybody! Now if I make a record, if I make a CD of that song, that's property because I paid to make it. And if I sell that property, the money that comes back is my money-- I'll take that money and I'll share it with the other people involved in making that CD. But this is my position: you can sell CDs, you can sell records and tapes, and you can sell mini-discs if you're foolhardy, and you can sell mp3s and digital downloads, you can sell all of these things, but you can't sell music because music is free. I'm serious about that. I really believe that. Music is like air, you can't sell it. I know that people have, not to fall back to my oft-used metaphors and analogies, but this is the way I process things, but I see music as a river, and the water in a river is there for everyone and anyone that wants to have a sip can have a sip and have some water. Now somewhere along the line someone came up with the idea of putting the river water in bottles and selling the bottles of water. That's the record industry. Music is a river, music is water, and the bottling company is the industry, and it's not inherently evil, because it's frankly, convenient to have water in a bottle, so if you're driving in your car and you're thirsty you don't have to drive to the nearest river and take a sip, you can just reach down and take a sip out of your bottle. The same way if I'm driving in my car and I want to hear a song, I don't have to drive over to the people's house and ask them to play it for me, I can put the CD in and listen to it, or turn on the radio. Where it gets ugly is that when the bottling company, since their aim is to make money-- at some point they may have thought like, "Let's bottle this water and that way we can share the healthful qualities of water with all the people." At some point it becomes, "This is our industry, we need to make money, and how can we increase profits?" Well, the way to increase profits is to try to discourage people from going to the river, and having to buy the bottled water. And they'll start with that but eventually what they're going to get into is they're going to start blocking the river or they're going to poison the river. But water is always moving, and it's very difficult to poison a river, very hard indeed. And that's the good news about music, it can't be stopped, it will always happen, people will always make music, and regardless of whether or not there's money to be made form it or not, it's still going to happen, it can't be stopped. So in my mind with the sales of records, the industry has done their best to claim ownership of music but they don't-- they only own the things that they sell, so when people who are songwriters say, "That's my property and if you give it away for free then I lose my incentive," then, well, good riddance.

[preppyak]

i like having the cd that i can touch. i value my cd collection and i rarely "steal" music off the internet. i hate people who use all of that shareware junk.

I love having the CD itself too, I love the artwork, but not being able to use is simply on my computer made me so mad. I got the Say Anything re-release, but I had to use their program or Windows Media Player (which I had almost deleted from my computer because I hated it) to play it. They have to realize at some point that their is always gonna be downloading, and that this protection is only going to end up pissing off loyal customers instead of stopping illegal actions. I mean, I'm weak with computer stuff, but it only took me a few hours to find a way around copy-protection so I could put it in Itunes.

I know that people have, not to fall back to my oft-used metaphors and analogies, but this is the way I process things, but I see music as a river, and the water in a river is there for everyone and anyone that wants to have a sip can have a sip and have some water. Now somewhere along the line someone came up with the idea of putting the river water in bottles and selling the bottles of water. That's the record industry. Music is a river, music is water, and the bottling company is the industry, and it's not inherently evil, because it's frankly, convenient to have water in a bottle, so if you're driving in your car and you're thirsty you don't have to drive to the nearest river and take a sip, you can just reach down and take a sip out of your bottle. The same way if I'm driving in my car and I want to hear a song, I don't have to drive over to the people's house and ask them to play it for me, I can put the CD in and listen to it, or turn on the radio. Where it gets ugly is that when the bottling company, since their aim is to make money-- at some point they may have thought like, "Let's bottle this water and that way we can share the healthful qualities of water with all the people." At some point it becomes, "This is our industry, we need to make money, and how can we increase profits?"

Wow, thats incredibly well put. Its a really interesting perspective on music that I wished more record exec's shared.

[Guy]

I love having the CD itself too, I love the artwork, but not being able to use is simply on my computer made me so mad. I got the Say Anything re-release, but I had to use their program or Windows Media Player (which I had almost deleted from my computer because I hated it) to play it. They have to realize at some point that their is always gonna be downloading, and that this protection is only going to end up pissing off loyal customers instead of stopping illegal actions. I mean, I'm weak with computer stuff, but it only took me a few hours to find a way around copy-protection so I could put it in Itunes.



Wow, thats incredibly well put. Its a really interesting perspective on music that I wished more record exec's shared.
I personally hate the CD, and can generally do without the artwork. I'm a travelin man so I like to have as few possessions as possible, and a hard drive takes up a lot less space than 800 CDs. Plus, downloading is probably better for the environment, it's one less liner note being printed and one less CD being doused in chemicals to eventually be crammed into a land fill. Yet another justification for downloading music

[aminorthreat55]

I personally hate the CD, and can generally do without the artwork. I'm a travelin man so I like to have as few possessions as possible, and a hard drive takes up a lot less space than 800 CDs. Plus, downloading is probably better for the environment, it's one less liner note being printed and one less CD being doused in chemicals to eventually be crammed into a land fill. Yet another justification for downloading music
Letting the ends justify the means is always a great way to live your life, that way you'll never be wrong.

Well that's not totally the case here, but still. You make it seem like you're looking for an excuse instead of logical reasoning.

Personally I think that the people to blame for downloading are the distributors of albums. Why would anyone in their right mind pay $19.99 for a cd on sale at Sam Goody? It's absurd. Dischord PPD is the way to go, $10 or $12, no shipping fees.

[TheOtherAndrew]

People may bitch about the internet causing slumping sales, but on the other hand you have to remember that it's allowed for extremely cheap promotion. Tons of albums that would have otherwise gone unnoticed have sold thousands more because of internet campaigns and mp3 sharing. I know that doesn't entirely balance it out, but nobody seems to be realizing that.

[leafsacc]

i really like having the artwork, but now that i'm broke and in college and get napster for free, i havn't bought much lately. I feel bad for not supporting the bands, but i just don't have the disposable income right now. However, i'm more likley to buy cd's in the futre becaue i can listen to new artists when they stream their entire albums before their released. I think doing that helps a lot of emerging bands.

[Mercy Medical]

Letting the ends justify the means is always a great way to live your life, that way you'll never be wrong.

Well that's not totally the case here, but still. You make it seem like you're looking for an excuse instead of logical reasoning.

Personally I think that the people to blame for downloading are the distributors of albums. Why would anyone in their right mind pay $19.99 for a cd on sale at Sam Goody? It's absurd. Dischord PPD is the way to go, $10 or $12, no shipping fees.
I refuse to pay more then $12 for a CD. I typically only buy CDs when they're $10, but if I like it enough I'll pay a little more.

[MakeshiftWings]

I refuse to pay more then $12 for a CD. I typically only buy CDs when they're $10, but if I like it enough I'll pay a little more.
And that's why I've started getting my music from America. Fucking rip-off this country.

Conversion

Typical CD:

£13 - $22

How much of a rip-off is that?

[niveK]

Here is my stance on downloading/buying cds. I download everythign i want/like as soon as i can. If i like it, I keep it. If i dont i delete it. I try to buy everything i like somewhere down the line, but often i wait untill i see the band live. The cds are usually cheaper at their shows and they money goes directly to the band. Depending on the level of success the band has reached, the # of crap sold at a show can determine if they get to eat dinner that night. So i try to give the band the money instead of a store. A lot of non-major label bands would perfer people to downlaod the music to help them get their name out there. I know a lot of bands i like i would nevet have heard of if it wasnt for random downloading of their music.

[open mind]

i only buy the albums that i like, i check out a band by downloading them, if they suck they get no money from me.

[DeadCityScars]

You should buy artists that you really really like. Especially those on indie labels and stuff. They have a hard time moving along a lot of times.

but yeah i've discovered a ton of music from illegal downloading. I prob wouldn't be here if it weren't for an illegal Thursday MP3.

[Guy]

You should buy artists that you really really like. Especially those on indie labels and stuff. They have a hard time moving along a lot of times.

but yeah i've discovered a ton of music from illegal downloading. I prob wouldn't be here if it weren't for an illegal Thursday MP3.


You guys are missing the point in that there are things you can tell me I "should" do, but you don't give any reasoning to explain how millions of illegal downloaders are suddenly going ot develop a conscience and stop using bittorrent, IRC, and yousendit to download full albums (even from indie artists).

[odnetnin]

I stopped downloading music this year as a New Years Resolution. I have actually been happier knowing that I purchase music now. I have more respect for myself. However, I download from musicians that don't mind having their music downloaded.

[USAFDave]

saying that downloading hurts all profits is just a lie... Wilco's "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot" anyone? Downloading made that a gold record.

[tragedyl0ve]

i download music, and i totally agree with you. i do buy cds also though... i mean if i think a cds good enough then im gonna buy it, for instance i bought alakaline trio yesterday.

[MakeshiftWings]

Mind you, there is a ton of free downloads you can get from record companies websites. I might stop downloading as my new year resolution. We'll see...

[noodledancer]

You guys are missing the point in that there are things you can tell me I "should" do, but you don't give any reasoning to explain how millions of illegal downloaders are suddenly going ot develop a conscience and stop using bittorrent, IRC, and yousendit to download full albums (even from indie artists).i don't think there's anything anyone can do or say that will get illegal downloaders to 'suddenly develop a conscience'- all people are doing is expressing why they choose to purchase music rather than download it. the whole issue is a matter for personal choice, because as long as people have a penchant for getting something for nothing, there will be illegal downloading.