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0 pointsspeedplane8y ago0 comments

You cite a single article, which goes against the past two decades of experience, where illegal downloads have decimated much of the entire music industry.

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Mediterraneo108y ago

When were these “two decades”? Illegal downloads in Western Europe and North America only flourished on a large scale for a decade or so, between the rise of Napster and the point when it began to feel more convenient to many people to pay on iTunes, use a streaming service, or just hear whatever you want to listen to free on YouTube. The traditional music industry was challenged by filesharing, but it has also been decimated by changing formats that diminish the importance of the whole album, and a glut of content where it’s hard to do promotion when you’re just a drop in the ocean.

People who torrent music – I am still one myself – can be passionate about it, but we are a shrinking minority.

pvaldes8y ago

Last month I bought another external harddisk as a second security copy for my photos (can sound like a cliche, but this was their sole purpose). They say me that I have to pay around 8 euro extra, because I could be a pirate. So I had been fined by a private company, not related with the maker of the hardware and with the complicity of the government. Not much different than if bankers would push and force the government to make everybody serve three months in jail; because "everybody could be a bank robber".

Law is based in the norm that you can't pay two times for the same crime. I had paid yet "for copying a few titles". I pay each time I buy a computer, a telephone or an SD target, so I feel morally vindicated to take a modest profit of my pre-crime also.

KozmoNau78y ago

The music industry decimated itself, by being stuck in their backwards ways. They stagnated instead of innovating, and ignored the vast array of new technologies that became available to them.

They shunned digital distribution and preferred to bet on ill-conceived retrofitted DRM on CDs. They attempted to instigate a migration to new DRM-laden formats (DVD-A and SACD) with false claims of better sound quality. They completely neglected streaming possibilities until Spotify et al. came and caught them with their pants down. Now they are trying to milk the streaming companies as hard as they possibly can, killing their Golden Goose in the process.

They are seeing record profits from streaming, but they continue to tighten the leash.

bornonline18y ago

Music had physical copies. But with the internet, all physicality was lost. That's what cost the decimation.

scrumption8y ago

lmao, you sure know what you're talking about, the music industry is just in tatters these days huh

speedplaneOP8y ago

Have you compared it today with what it was circa 1995? Yes, it is in tatters.

scrumption8y ago

look, i get that you've gotten yourself into a career where you're adjacent to the legal system so you have no ability to critically evaluate anything beyond "it is/isn't legal therefore it is/isn't good" but if you try talking to a young person you might realize the number of independent artists has been exploding every year for a decade and we now have more people creating quality music than ever before in the history of the world (more people per capita than ever before as well, I'd wager). the ability to share and expose others to these new artists faster and easier than ever before is what makes this possible. sorry that no one cares that the big record labels and top 40s that made all their money on CDs are losing ground to distribution methods that aren't utterly unable to adapt to the industry's current landscape

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Mediterraneo108y ago

People who torrent music – I am still one myself – can be passionate about it, but we are a shrinking minority.

pvaldes8y ago

KozmoNau78y ago

The music industry decimated itself, by being stuck in their backwards ways. They stagnated instead of innovating, and ignored the vast array of new technologies that became available to them.

They are seeing record profits from streaming, but they continue to tighten the leash.

bornonline18y ago

Music had physical copies. But with the internet, all physicality was lost. That's what cost the decimation.

scrumption8y ago

lmao, you sure know what you're talking about, the music industry is just in tatters these days huh

speedplaneOP8y ago

Have you compared it today with what it was circa 1995? Yes, it is in tatters.

scrumption8y ago

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