Tuesday, February 21, 2006

BGNews Thing #2: The Horrors of File Sharing

Oh the horror, the horror of file sharing!

Today, the BGNews featured a front-page news story abount some national student group's quest to make sure we all "Download Legal", as well as a staff editorial defending their claims.

The news story was kind enough to allow campus music-guru-type Alex Merced to give the opposing side of the story; that the labels are actively screwing us, and that's why we download.

Allow me to go further...

Here is a list of albums I have purchased in the past year or two:

Fiona Apple - Extraordinary Machine
Jenny Lewis with the Watson Twins - Rabbit Fur Coat
Metric - Live It Out
Metric - Old World Underground, Where Are You Know?
Sufjan Stevens - Illinois
Broken Social Scene - Broken Social Scene
Broken Social Scene - You Forgot It In People
The Arcade Fire - Funeral
Cat Power - The Greatest
Bright Eyes - I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning
Stars - Set Yourself On Fire
Feist - Let It Die
Green Day - American Idiot
Modest Mouse - Good News For People Who Love Bad News
Modest Mouse - The Moon and Antarctica
Spiritualized - Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space
The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots
The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots 5.1
The Flaming Lips - The Soft Bulletin
Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
The Postal Service - Give Up
The Decemberists - Picaresque
Rilo Kiley - More Adventurous
The Shins - Oh, Inverted World
Franz Ferdinand - Franz Ferdinand
Cake - Fashion Nugget
Cake - Comfort Eagle

That's 28 legitimate, legal CD purchases that would not have happened were it not for the fact that I had already heard (and loved) these albums through file sharing.

Were it not for file sharing, I probably would not have ever heard of half of those albums. I'm totally sure I would have never heard Feist, Stars, Cat Power, Broken Social Scene, Spiritualized, Jenny Lewis, and Sufjan Stevens (which is sad because that's some of the best music I've ever heard). I'm totally sure I would have dismissed American Idiot and Extraordinary Machine had I not heard the whole albums first.

And that's the point. File sharing is the best advertisement for music that's ever been invented. With file sharing you can listen to a greater variety of music than 99% of radio stations out there will ever provide you with. You can't explore music with traditional options. It simply isn't possible. Even with something like iTunes, you're limited to 30 second clips...I'm sorry, that's not good enough. How many people would have bought Dark Side of the Moon if they had just heard 30 second chunks of it? It's the brilliance of the whole package that matters.

The problem here is that I am not an idiot. I will not buy an album because I heard one good song on the radio or saw an artist on TV. I want brilliant albums with brilliant songs, and the only way to find things like that is to listen to whole albums (especially considering the assinine state of music reviews).

At the same time, consider the technical side of "Download Legal". They want you to buy DRMed garbage. I refuse to buy a whole album on a medium that has been purposely broken. Music is a shared social experience. If I can't send something I love to a friend, than there's no point in buying it. If I'm limited were I put it (such as what brand digital audio player I chose to buy), there's no point in buying it.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Damn you have good taste in music!!
-Bro

Anonymous said...

You are a great help to those of us who need to expand our narrow musical focus.

I'd never find some of those without you.

SMJ