Nonsense, as usual. Basic ignorance of UNIX. This is all you needed to say. It's the essense of your worldview. It's pathetic, frankly. Most of us aren't living on a trust fund. If you were talented and broke you would expect to be paid for your work. Music and writing may be a game to you but it is real work for people who do it for a living. Amatuers sharing information is great. I love Wikipedia. But people who work professionally to sell their art and music are NOT giving it away. You like it, . . . you buy it or leave it. Thieves are lower than whale chit at the bottom of the ocean. You're living in your little dream world again, where nothing pactical need be considered. Are you going to daydream your life away, Mahtin? You can't possibly believe this tripe. You are just pulling our chains. Is it possible that you've never met a professional musician or writer? Thus the iTunes store is created. Evolving technology is not a license to steal. Like everything else outside your little dream world, you get what you pay for.
Professionals won't. Can you not see the difference between amateurs having fun and the business that is profesional music?
Very few and you know it. everybody in the world, except you apparently, have to make a living. Why do you deny a musicians right to do so? I know you are full of krap because I was once a professional musician. We didn't play a single gig that we weren't paid for. What do you do for a living, if anything, and why do you deserve to be paid for it? More nonsense. Musicians were commisioned to compose and were paid. Concerts were not free and the musicians were compensated. Before recordings, music was distributed on sheet music exclusively and copyrights were respected . . . and royalties were paid. So its OK to charge for a concert but not for a recording? You are just trying to justify being a thief. Name one anybody has heard of. Instead they despise you, as do those of use who pay our legal fees.
It is fine for sometone to decide to give music away. It is not fine for you to steal music that is being sold and is copyrighted. Your inability to undrestand this is appalling. This is a child's logic.
I saw a news article the other day that Universal, the largest distributor of music in the world, may not be renewing it's contract with iTunes. One of the sticking points is that Universal doesn't like that Apple charges a flat 99 cent rate for all of its songs and thinks they should charge different prices for different songs and albums. I don't understand the big deal here. Apple is providing a downloading service for people to legally obtain music and the record companies don't like it. It really doesn't make sense to me.
red, if we all steal music, musicians are still paid for gigs. maybe even more, because they are advertising by giving away free music. and who gets paid isnt determined by a record company, but by the merit of the music as judged by listers. professional musicians are always needed. but the record companies, who do not actually make music, but distribute and market the music, are no longer necessary. yes, i know, free things like firefox are terrific. superior to closed and copyrighted things like internet explorer. the arctic monkeys, ok go, tia tequila, these are all self created acts (there will be more examples as time passes). why is it necessary for a record company to exist when a band today can put themselves on myspace and go crazy? yes, in the same sense it is ok for you to tell me a joke you saw a stand-up comedian tell, even though you had no part in its creation. and because you told that joke, it doesnt mean the comedian will no longer have paid gigs. if the joke is really good, he will have more gigs and benefit from the publicity. a musician creates music. a comedian creates jokes. it should be ok to copy and share both. of course they are. who writes the wikipedia article on quasars? some professor, some physicist somehwere. they are more interested in spreading knowledge than hoarding it. apple knows the physical brick and mortar distribution system is no longer necessary, the record companies are a dying industry. i really do not think you shoud pay for oil if it were like information, and could be cloned endlessly for nothing. again, tangible goods are not like information. free exchange of information benefits humanity. times change. used to be, before the printing press, you had to hire a gang of monks to copy a book by hand. information was slow to get around. the printing press came out, the monks didnt need to do that work anymore. everyone benefits. same thing with the internet, a massive information distribution system. i am sure a company like encyclopedia brittanica is hurting, because we do not really need tham as much. if we want to know something, we can look it up online for free. and that is a good thing. some major college is putting their courses online for free, maybe MIT. are they ruining the education system? should caltech force them to stop so they have a monopoly on lectures by smart professors? the free exchange of information is not a bad thing. the old model worked, but times are changing.
On a related note the RIAA was threatening to sue Prince because he is going to be giving out his new CD free with every single copy of some British newspaper on July 24th (i think the 24th it may be another day). He also gives out free copies to everyone that buys a ticket to see him live.
prince is a genius. he knows that freely distributing his music only helps him become more popular and rich. it certainly seem couterintuitive, but prince has it figured out. so does michael moore.
The key difference, of course, between Wikipedia, Unix, Firefox and what martin is suggesting - is that these were all developed to be free. Martin is suggesting stealing music from musicians who don't want their music to be free.
At the end of the day musicians should be the ones deciding how the music they create is distributed. Many of the bands I listen to encourage the free download of material. Many other groups do not.
