Download This

[rainbowdemon]

Download This

Whether you knew it or not, the biggest person in the music business this year was you. You rocked. You were it. You were the man, the one that everybody wanted and the Recording Industry Association of America hated. You were like some mad business guru, with the weight and success of multinational corporations resting on your back—no golden parachute required. You held the key to thousands of jobs. You kept an industry afloat while launching a new way of thinking. You dominated everyone like a pissed-off, latex-clad chick named Helga.

You even made a few dreams come true. You transformed a group of scruffy Australian kids into airbrushed post-garage gods (Jet), gave a fat gay Danish guy a chance to play George Michael (Junior Senior), scrawny British dudes a reason to prance in cat suits (The Darkness), even welcomed a goth chick into rock’s boys-only sandbox (Evanescence). You watched Beyonce flaunt her ass solo—as long as Jay-Z said it was cool—and got hot as two Russian teens pretended to be lesbians (Tatu). You were omnipresent this year, picking trends before they were mainstreamed, calling out liars named Fred and giving props to lovelorn rappers who take Polaroids. You were amazing, even if your compilations were a bit weak.

The record industry didn’t want you to know this, of course. They wanted you to think you were just a simple-minded consumer like always, buying up their preconceived “hits” more out of peer pressure than because they’re actually good. And sometimes you fell for it. (Please, tell me that’s your little sister’s Clay Aiken CD.) Even if you did, it’s OK. We all slip up sometimes. I might have bought the new Britney disc hoping there were more photos of her giving Madonna a tongue bath. I might have been sadly disappointed.

There was plenty to be proud of, too. You stood up and gave those bastards the finger on more than one occasion, telling them to stuff generic shit like Sugar Ray and Smash Mouth, not to mention totally ignoring Korn—I’m so happy (sniff). Sure, you might have been pumpin’ 50 Cent while you were doing it, but no matter.

You decided it was time to make Coldplay’s Chris Martin a major star—or was it just because of Gwyneth? You gave it up to Justin Timberlake because, admit it, he’s not as bad as you really wanted him to be. And I damn well know you sang along with Christina Aguilera’s “Beautiful” at least once, though we all know Clem Snide’s version was way better. Really, I’m just glad you finally read that memo about punk going all touchy-feely, and realized that yes, it’s cool to cry while slamming in the pit, even if no one can tell one emo band from another.

But your biggest achievement of the year was telling the RIAA to go to hell. Now, it’s fine to confess that you got scared for a minute. I did too. No one wants to be sued by a special-interest group that the government sucks up to. And ever since Congress gave the RIAA the ability to subpoena Internet service providers for information about their MP3-lovin’ clients—that would be you—without getting a court order, the RIAA has become a spooky blend of Big Brother and the CIA, just with a cooler soundtrack. But imagine what would have happened if Orrin Hatch would have gotten his “computer killers,” hard-drive smart bombs that wipe your PC clean and render it useless: CompUSA would suddenly turn into the nation’s largest repair shop—buy stock now!

Yet despite handing out a few hundred sure-to-financially-destroy lawsuits and allowing the rest of us to sign away our MP3 playlists prosecution-free if we just admitted we were naughty, you stood your ground. There was a dip for a while. 0Downloads on sites like Kazaa and Limewire dropped significantly over the summer. But that was just because you were out showing off your junk in the sun. The thing the industry doesn’t want you to know is that by September, downloads had almost reached pre-legal-onslaught levels.

You played that smart, though. You threw those bitches a bone—and maybe sparked a revolution in the process. You started downloading non-free (but cheap) music from Apple’s iTunes. Maybe too much music. Thing’s addictive. I mean, how can you resist the temptation of Devo’s “Working in a Coalmine” or Snow’s “Informer” when they’re only a click away? And until the credit card bill comes, 99 cents don’t mean nothing. It’s like having guilt-free sex and a box of Twinkies the second you imagine it. Instant gratification. Which is probably why, a few weeks ago, a digital version of a song, namely OutKast’s insta-photo ode “Hey Ya,” outsold a top conventional single (Mercy Me’s “I Can Only Imagine”) for the first time ever. A few more years and Steve Jobs will own us all.

Until then, though, you’re still the supreme ruler. You’ve got the power. You can toy with the dying beast or just put it out of its misery. Your call.

Full Story Here

[Shawn]

Good article.

[HolyMoly]

The thing the industry doesn’t want you to know is that by September, downloads had almost reached pre-legal-onslaught levels.

And that's a fact, Jack, hehe. It's just that FastTrack downloads have gone down, not all downloads. I'm glad to see someone point out that truth about downloading "numbers."

[Pebbles100]

You started downloading non-free (but cheap) music from Apple’s iTunes.

I don't know about that one there...

Good article!!

[HolyMoly]

I don't know about that one there...

I've been shut out of iTunes, Napster and other pay services since they don't cater to Win98SE users. But, I think the author was using iTunes as a simile to all pay-services ... which the music industry is still stingy with when it comes to licensing rights.

The thing that really scares the bejeezuz out of them is the real revolution started by the old Napster years ago ... ushering in the death of the album-concept of marketing in favor of the song-by-song concept. The industry got away with selling an $18 CD with 2 bonafide hit songs on it and 14 clunker songs for years ... but not anymore. Recent predictions for 2004 made by Business Week magazine (CLICK HERE) suggest as much ... that while online services will thrive, CD sales will continue to drop (and that the industry won't be able to use piracy as an excuse this time around). But, there's nothing they can do about it now. It's the wave of the future.