Save the music, download illegally

[MrGrave]

The RIAA has, on several occasions, forced people into bankruptcy through their copyright infringement lawsuits. The only way to stop them is to stop funding them, stop buying your music. Let the music industry sink, and real music be reborn.

Why is the music industry bad for music? First of all, popular music doesn't get records and promotions, just whatever the A&R executives personally want. They're not looking for good music, they simply need to ship out a consistent product. They handle art like an assembly line, simply mass producing radio fitted songs that are scientifically proven to make hits. They pay radio stations to promote their shit music so all we get are shitty music in clubs and shitty music on the radio. They get the ads, and their crappy music gets all the reviews, and the art gets ignored. The greatest music this generation could ever listen to is categorized along with arctic drum circles and hour long gazuu solos as "indie."

And it's impossible to mix, to play with other songs for loops and whatnot, without paying out your asscheeks to get around copyright laws. Dangermouse got in trouble for that in his last album so he released a blank CD and put his music on the internet, intending for people to download his album and burn it onto the CD.

Think about where your money goes when you purchase an album legally. It goes to frivolous lawsuits, bribing radio stations, making bad decisions about new artists and huge salaries for executives. The artists making the music are lucky to get between 5 and 10%. They limit artistic freedom by putting red tape around every piece of material published, they treat music like a factory and manufacture it so nothing unique or interesting can get out into mainstream pop culture and they treat their artists like illegal immigrants cutting their grass.

Honestly, get utorrent, that is the best software I've ever seen for downloading music. You can look anything up on google and just include "torrent" in the search and you'll find shit. Stop paying for music, let the industry collapse, artists and the art will be better off for it.

[Volodnikov]

Agreed. We shouldn't be giving more money to the recording corporations. If people are going to spend money on music, they should spend it on albums pressed and distributed by small labels, mom and pop record stores, or the artists themselves. Those people make good stuff, while just trying to get by and make a living.

[MrGrave]

Yeah I try to purchase music from independent artists and labels when I can, the problem is it's just not available right now and it wont be available for purchase on a mainstream level until the major labels go under.

I wrote this article because I think people are very ambivalent about downloading music, they don't think it's right, they just don't think. Downloading music is just what you do now. My 9th grade social studies teacher said it was stealing and we shouldn't do it, but I don't see how you can steal something that is basically just information, just something recorded.

Besides, major labels brought this upon themselves by trying to scam us. You think anyone would care if Madoff got his identity stolen right now? Hell no, it's just deserts. We've watched our art turned into factory produced assembly line bullshit.

I mean, is it stealing if I borrow a textbook from somebody and copy the pages so I don't have to buy one myself? Some would say so, but to me it's just a clever way to avoid getting scammed. Is it stealing if someone tries to mug you and you whip out a can of pepper spray on them?

The only reasonable argument I've heard is that the artists are losing money for what they're creating, but that's like saying we should buy from Nike so we can make sure all those third world sweatshop kids get their full 2 cents per day. Just like companies like dole and nike, the music industry is standing in the way of the prosperity of the artists, not creating it.

So it's not only justified to download illegal music, it's our moral obligation for the health of our society. Just as we must boycott Walmart if our local economies are to survive, we must boycott major labels for the sake of our culture.

[M.C.Darkness]

Wow good article Motsky, Sorry it took me so long to get around to it.

You need to grab yourself a soapbox and preach to those Mormons in Utah..