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By Undustrial (registered) - website | Posted July 15, 2009 at 14:33:30
(I hate to get all Marxian about things, but there are times where his analysis is somewhat useful.)
This is an issue of capital. When control of capital is centralized, those who control it are able to exact a larger profit margin off the transactions between producers and consumers. This pretty well describes the record industry for the last few decades - owning radio stations, record presses, recording studios etc. But home computing has changed all that. First off all, it creates a frontier so vast and chaotic that it is nearly unpolicable. Sure you might get busted for running a giant child molestation network or stealing thousands of credit card numbers (and sadly, most don't), but downloading an album or two is safer than jaywalking. Since property is a function of the state (both in its regulation and enforcement), and because the state is utterly impotent in this area, music has become free for virtually everyone. When you combine this with that fact that home recording software and hardware has come down in price and gone up in capabilities, and enter networking sites like Myspace which allow music downloads, you get a revolution in music.
In the immortal words of NOFX, "Dinosaurs will die".
While big record companies have been devestated by filesharing, independent musicians are now able to reach audiences around the world. I've known homeless train-hoppers able to record full albums for musicians and master the recordings themselves, and countless more who are able to print and distribute their own albums (spray paint and stencils, the original lightscribe).
Technology is always a double-edged sword.
"Today, the notion of progress in a single line without goal or limit seems perhaps the most parochial notion of a very parochial century." — Lewis Mumford
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