Thursday, October 11, 2012

It's not priceless


There was an essay in June that got quite a bit of attention on the subject of paying for music. Actually, the blog post I read was a response to a different post, that was in response to yet another post, and all of them relate. Here are the links:
I totally get the concerns about trusting the Cloud versus trusting your own storage. If I were mostly digital, I would want backups. Even with hard copies, it would not hurt to have backups. I’ve been writing about apocalypse and living on the outskirts of civilization with significant loss of technology, so I am in that frame of mind now. The other issue is more of a concern.
Actually, it made me think about my book practices, because checking books out instead of buying them does mean less sales for the author. If I had to buy everything I read, I would probably read less, so I’m not sure how it would affect overall sales, but that is a concern. Of course, if I went digital there, shelf space would not be an issue, but I still like paper.
In this case, what I really want is for there to be lots of fully-funded libraries, so that lots of books are bought all the time, and I can contribute to that, both in how I vote and in donations. There will always be people who want to own books for re-reading or for lending or so they do not need to finish within three weeks. I have checked books out and then purchased them for Aaron. That is a workable model.
There’s no equivalent for music, really, and this bothers me a lot.Here’s another link:
I had never heard of Grizzly Bear before, and I have no idea if they’re any good, but I think they make good points. You spend two years working on an album, and someone isn’t even willing to spend $9? For something they will have forever? Okay, most of my CDs cost $14, but still, for being able to listen to someone’s heart and soul any time I want, it seems like a reasonable deal.
I hadn’t thought a lot about the issue before, because I haven’t been downloading music, but they were talking about concerts on the radio recently, and asking what listeners would like to see, and people were mentioning multi-band festivals like they used to have, and no one can afford to throw those anymore. Bands need to rely on touring for their income now. Why? Because no one buys the records.
You know, touring can be a lot of fun, but it can also be really stressful, and I hate to think of bands working themselves into nervous exhaustion or drug dependency because they hope their kids will go to college. This isn’t even talking about supporting lavish lifestyles for a lot of bands. If they just don’t appeal to enough people, fine, but if you have lots of fans, but those fans only like you enough to listen, not to buy? That’s pretty rotten.
As I said, I am going to be getting into politics and religion soon, and there certainly seem to be some ethical issues here, where people are essentially stealing because it’s easy.
So this is what I am doing. I am using Spotify to see if I like things (because it pays a little, but not very much), and then if I do like it, and will want to listen again, I am buying. I will buy through local record stores. When I go in, I will try and pay cash so they don’t have the service charges.
I value music. I think it is easy to like things without really feeling the value, but that we are missing something if we do it like that.
And I am still undecided about going digital.

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