Or maybe?

This article talks about how the music download business seems to be stalling due to what is perceived as a limited market. The suggested solution is more advertising. The concepts that the industry might be stalling because the options generally suck from a consumers standpoint or because the music industry is continuing to spew forth garbage aren't even broached. Talk about informed reporting.

How 'bout this for a personal explanation. I don't regularly use any of the music download sites because I don't like all the restrictions they put on what I can and cannot do with the music once I purchase it. Some limit the number of devices I can enjoy the music on, some limit the number of copies I can burn to CD, some only come in one particular format that force me to use their player and their devices, and some just have crappy music collections. Why put up with any of this when I can run to Best Buy and pickup any CD I want, take it home, and do whatever I want with it. I can listen to it in my car, on my PC, on my home stereo, at work, or at a friends house on a portable jam box. I'm not required to be logged into anything, have a broadband connection or generally share any type of personal information with anyone if I pay cash for this CD. Show me a site that allows me this type of freedom for $.99/track and I'll rush right over and sign up.

What we're dealing with here is a difference in philosophy. Musicians, the music industry, and the RIAA all want me to "lease" music from them. This allows them to potentially charge me for every time I listen to the song and for every different type of device I want to listen to it on (I know they haven't come straight out and said this, but it's their underlying philosophy). It also provides them ultimate control over their music and how it's heard. This is a change from what consumers are used to, what they expect, and I hope in what they're willing to put up with. Me, I want to buy music. I want to own individual tracks and do with them as I please, within reason. I don't want to be able to resell them, and I agree that I shouldn't be copying them to share with others, but I should be able to listen to it when I want, how I want, and on whatever kind of device I want, without restriction and without someone tracking what I do.

Add to this the fact that there's very little compelling music being made today and it's a wonder the whole industry hasn't gone bankrupt. There a limited amount of music being produced these days that is worth listening to. There are only random individual tracks that are worth buying to listen to repeatedly. There are only a handful of recent albums worth owning in whole and only a few bands producing consistently good music from album to album. Then there's the constant drivel we're forced to listen to on the radio, the blathering idiots employed as DJs, and the general homogenization across the industry as a whole. I'd rather listen to the sounds of the traffic around me, or static, or heaven forbid classical music than the junk I get to select from on a day in, day out basis.

But no, that can't be the reason the music industry is going down the tubes and why people are refusing to pay for music. Providing crappy products through crappy means has no impact at all. It's got to be the file swappers that are causing all this pain and suffering. Bad file swappers. Thieves. Let's spend bazillions of dollars on legislation to restrict people's rights and force our sales model on them instead of fixing what's really broke. Yea, that makes sense!