I confess I'm a Napster user. I probably spend about the same amount
of money on music as I did before Napster, but I definitely have more
music than I would have. A lot of people get pretty cynical when
they hear stuff like this, but I feel very guilty about the music I
have that I haven't paid for.
MP3s work for me. I'm willing to settle for MP3 sound quality to
stretch the budget, I'll forego cover art, don't need marketing, and
I have little patience for paying someone to burn music onto plastic
and ship it all the way to me in a jewel case simply because they
aren't prepared to sell it to me in the format I would prefer.
So I'm in a situation where I have two choices: pretend Napster
doesn't exist, or "steal" some music.
I credit Napster with allowing me to expand my musical horizons a
great deal over the last year or so, and I'm sure I'll spend more on
music over the long run as a result. I was desperately hoping that
Napster would manage to strike a deal with the RIAA to convert to a
fee-based service and I could start paying the artists and production
teams for music I was dowloading. I'm still holding out for paid
downloads.
All this Napster talk reminded me of an article I read a few months
ago. The author was Allan Gregg, who heads up "Canada's largest
independent" label (Songcorp). He argues that the recording
industry unwittingly conspires to shrink their own industry by
blocking Napster.
hope this link works for those interested:
http://news.globetechnology.com/servlet/GAMArticleHTMLTemplate?
tf=globetechnology/TGAM/NewsFullStory.html&cf=globetechnology/tech-
config-neutral&slug=COGREGG&date=20000619
Derek.
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