Seriously, Connor? Is our potential fan that much of a moron? Where does
our potential fan buy his/her music? Bleep? You can listen to the entire
album there. Bandcamp? You can listen to entire albums there, AND they
don't even autopause you after a minute. Pretty much any other website on
the internet that sells music? You can listen to clips of every track on
the album there.
Let me see if I have this straight:
* Our potential fan is interested in Artist X.
* Artist X does not have any samples of their work anywhere on the internet.
* Artist X's works are only sold in a brick and mortar store that's on the
other side of the world from our potential fan.
* Our potential fan has no choice but to steal Artist X's work because
somehow it got leaked to an illegal piracy site but exists NOWHERE ELSE ON
THE INTERNET where our potential fan might be able to hear it.
A few other things we need to understand about our potential fan:
* Our potential fan can't make informed decisions about a potential
purchase without having an artist's entire discography on his hard drive.
* Our potential fan reads reviews of albums but still has to have an
artist's entire discography on his hard drive before making decisions
regarding purchase.
It almost sounds like you're trying to tell me that before YouTube,
Spotify, and tracker sites, no one actually bought any albums because you
couldn't necessarily have an entire artist's catalog on your hard drive (oh
wait, those used to not exist, either!). I know this is not the case,
because I bought plenty of music before the birth of the internet and
before I had a computer. There were times when I would go into a record
store, hear something playing on the overhead, and buy the entire album by
that artist just because I was so excited about the track I had just heard.
CAN YOU EVEN IMAGINE?!?!?
I stil buy lots of music. Lots of it without having heard it at all.
Something new by Mika Vainio? Hell yes, I'm going to buy that. The new
Aphex? I felt bad about listening to minipops before it was release because
I DIDN'T want to hear it before it came out.
Anyway, I think what you're really trying to say, or convince people of, is
that it's okay to steal. Some people are going to agree with you. Other
people aren't. A lot of people have grown up with the notion that stealing
is a crime, and a lot of people don't like having things stolen from them.
On Mon, Oct 20, 2014 at 4:48 PM, Connor Higgins <connor1higgins@gmail.com>
quoted 35 lines wrote:> wrote:
>
>> Why should I even bother having this conversation when folks like Jared
>> come in and smash the metaphorical house of cards we've already
>> established. Yes, Jared: Piracy is a criminal act. What I'm asking is if
>> piracy is currently aiding the promotion of new and upcoming artists.
>>
>> Someone above argued that youtube and spotify should be used instead of
>> trackers, but I think everyone is aware of the limited scope that these
>> services can provide. For one, they can barely attest to being better than
>> pirating, as artists tend to receive little to no compensation per view.
>> Furthermore, these services tend to omit certain groups, or only feature a
>> specific subset of an artist's work. Consider someone that's just stumbled
>> upon Autechre, but youtube or spotify only features Quaristice (Just a
>> hypothetical). Most fans would agree there are better starting points in
>> their discography, and having only found this one currently inaccessible
>> album, our potential fan has written the duo off for good.
>>
>> On the other hand, if our potential fan uses a private tracker of sorts,
>> he or she will find the duo's entire discography at their fingertips.
>> Having read the reviews posted of albums, he or she can make an informed
>> first-listening decision, which can potentially galvanize a long-term
>> fandom, and therefore a monetary investment, be it through concert tickets
>> or actually paying for the albums. The point is, a great deal of this
>> process stops because of how incomprehensive youtube and spotify are as
>> sources for musical exploration. And for the measly benefit of earning the
>> artist fractions of a penny.
>>
>> /rant
>>
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