said by sbrook :

The problem is that take an album of say 10 tracks. The typical mix out of the industry today is a couple good, a few mediocre and the rest spacefiller trash. People are sharing the good and some of the mediocre tracks because they don't want to pay the overpriced amount for under half an album.

People are also sharing as a try before you buy mechanism.

said by Nightfall :

Bands should just be selling singles of the best stuff.

said by major marco :

Which is part & parcel of why the music industry is on the decline. The head cheesedicks at the RIAA absolutely refuse to see that reality and instead cling to the album concept because that's what's made them truckloads of money. It is a textbook 101 example of an industry refusing to accept consumer demand and now they're paying for it and desperately searching for someone (the consumers who else) to blame.

said by bolt :

Personally, I bought more CDs while Napster was alive than at any other time. I could count the number of CD's I've bought since Napster was closed down on one hand.

said by Nightfall :

2 wrongs don't make a right. The rampant copyright infringement going on is not the answer. A boycott of the product is.

said by SilverSurfer :

Which is a beautiful theory, but this is the market we're talking about, and, the market has ways of correcting itself. We are seing that consumers will choose convenience and risk alleged copyright infringment if necessary in order to satisfy demand. Boycotting never resolves anything. Companies laugh at boycotts. There is no leverage whatSOever over them to change their outdated business model.

said by Nightfall :

Customers choose convenience [...]

said by SilverSurfer :

I would agree with you on this count because it is about convenience, a demand the record companies have been ignoring since 1999. As to your allegations of two faced liars saying one thing and doing something completely different, I would also add freedom from DRM. The P2P clients are just filling consumer demands -convenience + DRM-free music- two items the RIAA has chosen and continues to ignore to its own financial peril.

said by Nightfall :

Imagine what would have happened if they would have embraced Shawn Fanning and Napster. What if they made Napster a pay service, charged everyone .25 cents a song (no DRM and various bitrates to choose from) for the entire RIAA catalog with no DRM. IMHO, music copyright infringement wouldn't be a big issue. Instead, they fought it tooth and nail.

said by sivran :

quote:

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Sharing as a try before you buy mechanism is fine. Sharing to avoid paying the cost of the album, single, or download is not. A majority of people sharing, over 70% of them in a recent survey, do it to save money.

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Exactly. Try it. Decide it sucks. Don't buy it.

This is exactly the model I use for software (not just games, apps too) and anime, and indirectly, music. Anime music videos are infringing too, but I would never have bought a Nightwish CD if it weren't for a couple AMVs featuring their music. I never would've bought Need for Speed Most Wanted if I hadn't pirated it first (heck later I even bought a wheel for it).

Unfortunately, the vast majority of stuff that I try in such a manner, sucks. Pacific Storm could've been such a great game, but had several fatal flaws. Far Cry, whose demo was great, turned out to suck in the full game (I loved the parts where you actually fight human enemies. The mutants totally killed it for me. Make a Far Cry with no mutants, and I'd buy it). Sure glad I didn't waste my money on it.