(Ilegal) Internet music downloads ....

[silentk]

since growing up a bit and finally getting my self a job, there is no grater satisfaction, than browsing through juno or beatport of whatever, selecting some tunes i'm really feeling and PAYING for them. They are now mine, i own them, i have contributed in my own little way, to something i am hugely passionate about. and this changed my whole perspective on the matter. And i now pay for all the music i own.

but this still doesnt answer how they are going to determine the difference between legal and illegal ?

Well that is to with society as a whole, we live in a "all you can eat" culture. People just dont care, and they are quite happy to not care. Becuase most people are detached from the music they download, they dont see the impact of their actions. People here are so passionate about it because without the sales, they wouldn't be able to continue releasing the music. People choose to be ignorant, they just assume enough other people will buy the music for them to carry on downloading without having an impact. I think it's just the fact that most people aren't aware how much of a real and present danger there is of the music industry going tits up. they'd far sooner just rather bury there head in the sand and forget about it. and people will only realise once it's too late to do anything about it.

Basically there is no such thing as illegal any more, like i said, a new line needs to be drawn, and copyright as a whole needs to be dramatically reassessed, the copyright laws we have in place today bare no relevance to the world we live in, or the massive impact the internet has had on music.

[abZ]

since growing up a bit and finally getting my self a job, there is no grater satisfaction, than browsing through juno or beatport of whatever, selecting some tunes i'm really feeling and PAYING for them. They are now mine, i own them, i have contributed in my own little way, to something i am hugely passionate about. and this changed my whole perspective on the matter. And i now pay for all the music i own.

but this still doesnt answer how they are going to determine the difference between legal and illegal ?

Well that is to with society as a whole, we live in a "all you can eat" culture. People just dont care, and they are quite happy to not care. Becuase most people are detached from the music they download, they dont see the impact of their actions. People here are so passionate about it because without the sales, they wouldn't be able to continue releasing the music. People choose to be ignorant, they just assume enough other people will buy the music for them to carry on downloading without having an impact. I think it's just the fact that most people aren't aware how much of a real and present danger there is of the music industry going tits up. they'd far sooner just rather bury there head in the sand and forget about it. and people will only realise once it's too late to do anything about it.

I really don't mean to sound like I am condoning piracy but I don't necessarily think the music industry going belly up would be a bad thing. Something much better will be built from it's ashes and the best part I believe that the music that results from this will be amazing. We will just have to wait about 15/20 years to see if I am right

[silentk]

i completely agree with that. when anything collapses people always seem to come with a new system themselves, this new organic thing evolves outta nowhere.

Best/simplest example i can think of:
Traffic lights break, people just get on with it, let each go, everyone's happy, ends up running smoother than if the lights were working

bring on the next 20 years

[setspeed]

i completely agree with that. when anything collapses people always seem to come with a new system themselves, this new organic thing evolves outta nowhere.

Best/simplest example i can think of:
Traffic lights break, people just get on with it, let each go, everyone's happy, ends up running smoother than if the lights were working

you haven't seen my street

it's interesting though, we totally need a change of mentality. It's funny because people say stuff like "i don't want to pay for a digital file that's not worth anything, but i don't mind paying for a CD that you can hold in your hands and comes with a booklet".... etc etc.

The thing is, really all you're paying for is a small disc with an mp3 on it, and a colour booklet. I get bigger colour booklets through my letterbox everyday - usually with takeaway menus on, I throw them out cos they're worthless - and you can buy a blank CD for 20p. So how is it, that we think £10 for a CD is ok, when it's only 40p worth of raw materials, plus a digital file?

We have somehow built in a contribution to the artist, and an acknowledgement of the work/costs that went into creating the piece of art itself, into our assessment of the 'value' of the product. We know that we're not just paying £10 for a CD and a booklet and a file, we're also making a contribution to the people who made it, and we're cool with that, we think that's ok.

So I guess we're going to need a shift in thinking, away from the idea that an mp3 is 'just a file' and towards the idea that it's a small piece of 'art' into which time, effort, talent (hopefully) and costs (mastering etc) have gone into, and we're cool with contributing to that. How this works out is another matter though - I'm reckoning some kind of spotify type service, you pay a fiver a month and get all the music you can eat. this is a good 5 years down the line though...

[abZ]

i completely agree with that. when anything collapses people always seem to come with a new system themselves, this new organic thing evolves outta nowhere.

Best/simplest example i can think of:
Traffic lights break, people just get on with it, let each go, everyone's happy, ends up running smoother than if the lights were working

you haven't seen my street

it's interesting though, we totally need a change of mentality. It's funny because people say stuff like "i don't want to pay for a digital file that's not worth anything, but i don't mind paying for a CD that you can hold in your hands and comes with a booklet".... etc etc.

The thing is, really all you're paying for is a small disc with an mp3 on it, and a colour booklet. I get bigger colour booklets through my letterbox everyday - usually with takeaway menus on, I throw them out cos they're worthless - and you can buy a blank CD for 20p. So how is it, that we think £10 for a CD is ok, when it's only 40p worth of raw materials, plus a digital file?

We have somehow built in a contribution to the artist, and an acknowledgement of the work/costs that went into creating the piece of art itself, into our assessment of the 'value' of the product. We know that we're not just paying £10 for a CD and a booklet and a file, we're also making a contribution to the people who made it, and we're cool with that, we think that's ok.

So I guess we're going to need a shift in thinking, away from the idea that an mp3 is 'just a file' and towards the idea that it's a small piece of 'art' into which time, effort, talent (hopefully) and costs (mastering etc) have gone into, and we're cool with contributing to that. How this works out is another matter though - I'm reckoning some kind of spotify type service, you pay a fiver a month and get all the music you can eat. this is a good 5 years down the line though...

Ha I know man around here it is anarchy when the traffic lights go out.

To go with you said... if anyone wants to paypal me directly I will put whatever Savory Audio tunes you want on a cd and make a little booklet if you want. Whatever it takes.

[tripaddict]

Whatever it takes.

5 dolla! abz love u long time

[Mad_EP]

The thing is, really all you're paying for is a small disc with an mp3 on it, and a colour booklet. I get bigger colour booklets through my letterbox everyday - usually with takeaway menus on, I throw them out cos they're worthless - and you can buy a blank CD for 20p. So how is it, that we think £10 for a CD is ok, when it's only 40p worth of raw materials, plus a digital file?

Because of a few things....

First of all, as already mentioned... a CD is full-res audio, rather than mp3. To me, it is the difference between a steak & sawdust. But then again, some people find McDonald's to be 'fine dining', so I guess to each their own.... Go ahead and shove that dogshit in your mouth because you can't taste the difference. Sure the world will laugh at you, but whatever makes you happy....

Second of all, in terms of -- "I get bigger colour booklets through my letterbox everyday - usually with takeaway menus on, I throw them out cos they're worthless"... well of course!!! because you don't actually get the food on that flyer, do you? If that flyer fed you, you would feel differently ... probably cos the restaurant wouldn't shove it thru your letterbox (no matter what flavor of dogshit you like to smear across your face). If we were talking about the jpegs of the artwork of the music vs the actual music itself, you might have a point... but we're not... so you go back to square one with dogshit on your face.


Sorry... I just can't believe we are still debating this on a musicboard. Perhaps if it were some corporate website where they abhor any type of creativity... I could understand it , but I just love how people here talk about music being the key to the soul of life, their entire reason for being... but being unwilling to pay for it. The way I see it, if someone steals music, you don't get to count music as one of your loves... if you really love something that gives meaning to your life, why in the world would you not be willing to pay for it?

My wife likes flowers around the house - it is a simple pleasure that makes her happy... so I buy flowers a few times per month to make sure we have 'em around. Sure, nature is free... but does that give me the right to pick my neighbor's garden to appease her? Of course not. The fact is, it makes her life better so I am happy to spend a little bit here and there to make her happy. And sure, if I ignored the legality of sneaking into that same neighbor's garden when they weren't looking to take a few pictures of those same flowers... ("it isn't illegal" I tell myself, I have only taken a picture of those flowers....) I am still a schmuck with dogshit smeared all over my face... because I still encroached upon the rights of someone else to make me or someone else happy with a lesser quality version of the real thing.

There is no argument.

[zonetrooper5]

I think there needs to be more choice for the consumer, a much better service then that of Itunes amongst the other download sites.

what do you want to see that you can't get at the moment?

Maybe he is talking about music in general. For electronic music we have all the choices you could possibly ask for in fact iTunes is probably about the last place you would look for dubstep. You can get it on there. My label is on there but why would you?

yeah but it could also be, uh, some kind of fancy artwork or 24 bit wavs or whatever...

Something like fancy artwork, 24 bit wavs etc could also be added when buying a digital copy of a song. Again we need to make the digital copy have some value to that of vinyl and CD, incentives as it were to buy music instead of pirating it. I'm not really surprised that music industry is going tits up because of the mess over the last decade or so due to DRM, sony rootkits, RIAA not giving the money it got for suing Napster to the bands/artists/labels/managers etc. The fact that CD prices for many years were fixed and controlled so it would be pretty expensive for the consumer to buy it. The whole of the music industry has been a disservice to the consumer, the people who pay your wages and that in a way I'm kinda glad that the music industry will crumble, maybe a new and better system will come up from the ashes where it will benefit both the consumer and the industry and not just one nor the other.

[setspeed]

The thing is, really all you're paying for is a small disc with an mp3 on it, and a colour booklet. I get bigger colour booklets through my letterbox everyday - usually with takeaway menus on, I throw them out cos they're worthless - and you can buy a blank CD for 20p. So how is it, that we think £10 for a CD is ok, when it's only 40p worth of raw materials, plus a digital file?

Because of a few things....

First of all, as already mentioned... a CD is full-res audio, rather than mp3. To me, it is the difference between a steak & sawdust. But then again, some people find McDonald's to be 'fine dining', so I guess to each their own.... Go ahead and shove that dogshit in your mouth because you can't taste the difference. Sure the world will laugh at you, but whatever makes you happy....

Second of all, in terms of -- "I get bigger colour booklets through my letterbox everyday - usually with takeaway menus on, I throw them out cos they're worthless"... well of course!!! because you don't actually get the food on that flyer, do you? If that flyer fed you, you would feel differently ... probably cos the restaurant wouldn't shove it thru your letterbox (no matter what flavor of dogshit you like to smear across your face). If we were talking about the jpegs of the artwork of the music vs the actual music itself, you might have a point... but we're not... so you go back to square one with dogshit on your face.

dude, you're splitting hairs here re WAV vs mp3, that's not my point.

So, in your opinion, (if you care to offer one instead of talking about people putting dogshit on their faces)

- why do you think people are prepared to pay £10 for a disc with a WAV on it and a booklet, but nothing for a WAV file with an embedded jpg? And how can we change this? It's a genuine question.

I don't know if all that waffle was directed at me, but I've been working in music for years. I've released dozens of tracks on 31 different labels under numerous pseudonyms, I run a netlabel, I produce, engineer, blog, DJ, do PR, I'm involved at all levels. I genuinely think people should pay for the music they enjoy, but I also think that forcing people to pay for something they don't want is not the way to go about it; we need people to want to pay of their own accord, whether by changing their attitudes to it, or by providing something that makes them feel like they're getting good value.

Which is why I'm asking about the perceived values of CDs (a digital music format) and mp3s or WAVs or FLACs (also a digital format) etc etc. Sorry if this bothers you.

[Mad_EP]

dude, you're splitting hairs here re WAV vs mp3, that's not my point.

Not splitting hairs... you called it an mp3 on a CD, not me.

- why do you think people are prepared to pay £10 for a disc with a WAV on it and a booklet, but nothing for a WAV file with an embedded jpg?

Don't know... I pay for WAV's with no booklet. To be honest, I think I should get the WAV's plus a PDF at least... but if a jpg is what I get for just buying this track here and that track there (rather than the whole thing), than so be it.

I genuinely think people should pay for the music they enjoy, but I also think that forcing people to pay for something they don't want is not the way to go about it; we need people to want to pay of their own accord, whether by changing their attitudes to it, or by providing something that makes them feel like they're getting good value.

Fair enough, but that is like saying - "Sure, I'll eat this food, but I will only pay for it if I like it". Doesn't really work that way. Most labels, artists, or distributors have samples of the stuff they are selling... it might not have been that way 5 years ago, but it is now, so the whole "I only should pay for what I want" doesn't work as an argument anymore, because there is ample opportunity to find out whether or not you like something before you buy it. And if you don't like it, there is no reason to have downloaded it in the first place... (again, which is like saying... yeah, I stole all these photographs of amazing artwork, but I don't really like em well enough to look at them much, so it isn't a crime).

Which is why I'm asking about the perceived values of CDs (a digital music format) and mp3s or WAVs or FLACs (also a digital format) etc etc. Sorry if this bothers you.

None of this bothers me... because to be honest - 5-10 years ago, most of these arguments had some sort of validity.... but they just don't anymore. People can buy individual tracks instead of being forced to buy the whole release... they can hear ample clips (if not stream the whole damn thing!) before they buy... etc etc... I agree that the majors are still acting unscrupulously - but most indie labels and underground artists have bent over backwards to accommodate the complaints usually given for justifying illegal downloading.

[4bstr4ck3r]

Hey, many interesting points of view here. Mad Ep 's one is really making me think deeper and see things differently (thanks for it).
I often defend this point of view: Art should be free, let's download. My three main arguments are those: At first, art should be free (no property, no sell) in order to make it affordable to anyone (people who can't buy any CD, curious people, .....) and make it more understandable to masses : it's like a kind of democratization of arts. Then, this idea includes the fact that any artist can rework or remix any song or any sound in order to make it live or make it discover (see old cumbia or reggae classics that are remixed) : it's like modernizing sounds to not forget them, it's part of culture. At last, I like to see art like the model to be extended to all the domains of our society, this is the only activity that nowadays can prove how we can live for free without being a pure consumerist like we all are: it means that art create interactivities, exchanges, solidarity, and so on. For those (often seen as utopians) who works to live in a more autonomous world, here is the thing: play for free, make your sound free, and let people be sensitiv to your music and enjoy creation.
Well, I tried to make it short. Until now I always play for free or sometimes organize cheap parties in order to buy new material, and my sounds are almost all downloadable (anyway I often use samples from here or there and I can't sell something I did not entirely make), but I'm more and more wondering if I should sell good quality sounds via digital website in order to get materials and let me organize better parties. And here you all are making me think ....

I hope I wasn't off-topic but music download and music diffusion are close subjects ...

[sifres]

I often defend this point of view: Art should be free, let's download. My three main arguments are those: At first, art should be free (no property, no sell) in order to make it affordable to anyone (people who can't buy any CD, curious people, .....) and make it more understandable to masses : it's like a kind of democratization of arts. Then, this idea includes the fact that any artist can rework or remix any song or any sound in order to make it live or make it discover (see old cumbia or reggae classics that are remixed) : it's like modernizing sounds to not forget them, it's part of culture. At last, I like to see art like the model to be extended to all the domains of our society, this is the only activity that nowadays can prove how we can live for free without being a pure consumerist like we all are: it means that art create interactivities, exchanges, solidarity, and so on. For those (often seen as utopians) who works to live in a more autonomous world, here is the thing: play for free, make your sound free, and let people be sensitiv to your music and enjoy creation.

This is a very Utopian view. But I can relate. Do you know Tommie Sunshine? That american DJ?

His soundcloud has over 200 tracks on it, and about 85% is free to download. It contains old songs, edits for mixability, never released remixes, dubs, obscure b-sieds and more. All of the tracks had at least an edit by him. Only stuff that is not on there is stuff he doesn't have copyright over, although I suspect he's bending it on some places Being a fan of some of his stuff, I really see what he's doing here. And its great!

http://soundcloud.com/tommiesunshine/

BUT. Off course this is a really established dj. (Spinning for what... 20 years ) You got a bunch of kids here that throw around 320s and they actually devalue their work by it. People tend to go for higher valued stuff because it implies quality. So stealing it actually has more appeal to people then just getting it for free. The radiohead album that they gave away for free was pirated about 10 times more then downloaded from their site...

Doesn't really work does it? Deep in the core it's selfishness and lazyness (register, get credit card etc vs. click and download) to download. And it's a slippery moral slope. I still don't know my own stand in this, let alone how to change the industry.

[Mad_EP]

oh, and btw -

(if you care to offer one instead of talking about people putting dogshit on their faces)

I don't know if all that waffle was directed at me, but I've been working in music for years.

It wasn't all aimed at you, but I was a bit crass regardless. Usually I am a really nice guy, but sometimes I can be an ass. I try to keep the nice-to-jerk ratio in check, but sometimes it gets away from me. Apologies if you were offended.

[setspeed]

no worries dude, it's an emotive subject!

i do worry, though, that maybe the horse has already bolted on this one. we're already playing up to it, and I think everyone's gonna get swept along, to mix metaphors horribly:

what i mean is, 15 years ago if you wanted music you basically had to buy it. ok, you could copy something on a tape, but that was much harder - you had to know someone with the album and copy it off them etc etc. Then 10 years ago, people started putting DJ mixes online, and combined with the fact that you could already get good mixes on the cover of all the dance mags, everyone pretty much stopped buying compilations and official DJ mixes. Now, with the mp3 factor, it's practically de rigeur to give away a free tune whenever you release something - maybe a dub mix, a VIP, a tune that didn't make it onto the album, a remix that the label never put out for whatever reason, even a 128k version of the track - but anyway, you get loads of 'official' free tunes now.

So are we just confusing people? This tune is free, that tune is a quid? Labels and artists like to think we're doing something good, offering free stuff to make people like us and buy our shit, but are we just rushing into a time where no-one has a clue what's free and what they should really be paying for?

So that's kind of why I think we'll end up with a shift away from the 'pay X amount per tune downloaded' model, especially if streaming services like mixcloud, lastFM, spotify, MOG (in the US) continue to grow in popularity and no-one is downloading tunes anyway. but as for what replaces it... :nervous:

one thing seems certain though, which is that independent artists/labels/clubs will have to get by with a lot less money. heard some more alarming news about london clubland this week. erk.