I’ve really enjoyed the thought provoking blog posts about the future of music started when Bob Boilen, the host of NPRs All Songs Considered wroth this post about his experiment deleting all his digital music, and moving to cloud services. As a person who makes his joyful livelihood by accessing the latest in music, his endorsement of this new future norm means something.
In response, Emily White, one of Boilen’s college summer interns wrote a thought provoking piece about how music lovers of her generation have never ‘bought’ or ‘owned’ music. They’ve ripped it since they were young enough to do so. She called for the industry to meet the desire of her generation for access and convenience that also pays the artist.
Then, last night, I read this response by David Lawery at The Trichordist to Emily and her generation. David is a professor at The University of Georgia teaching about the music business. So he knows a thing or two on the total economic impact of today’s digital new norm. His argument is it is now extremely easy to buy digital music (you can have whole new album on your iPhone in 10 min wherever you have cellular access) so convenience is no longer an excuse. So he respectfully laid out the importance of the industry, and why everyone who is pirating music is truly stealing from the artist. It’s a really good read.
This led to evaluate my own moral code when it comes to piracy. Everyone I know has a line they will not cross. And we all have created a strong but false moral code they have weaved their actions to. Statements like, “I pay because I use a service like Spotify or Rhapsody, and I rip tracks to make my access more convenient,” or “I go to concerts to help support the artist,” are just excuses for us to pay less for what we want.
The good news is convenience is increasing tenfold quickly. Spotify, to me, is paving the way with their easy-to-use celestial jukebox. The big question is can this model actually support the artist?
I am not trying to get preachy with this to all my friends. Like I said, we all have a piracy line we justify. I obviously have one myself since I enjoy making mixtapes and getting them heard. And I’ve been making mixtapes and making copies for my friends for over 20 years in one form or another. I’ve never had a moral dilemma in doing so, and can’t imagine a world where I would. So I certainly can’t judge those like Emily that have tens of thousands of songs, but have only paid for 15 CDs in their life. But I do agree with David, that we all can work to make it better for the artist by do more to get our money in their hands.
Do you think technology can
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