Fallacy of Free Music
Brayden Merrell
Reaction Paper 1
Com 250, Spring 2013
Fallacy of Free Music When a new song comes out the first thing my peers and I normally do is check YouTube to hear the latest new track. The internet is the easiest way for people of any age group to listen to music. There are hundreds and thousands of popular music downloading services that can be found within seconds with a simple Google search. Most of these websites are funded by advertisements that consume the borders of the computer screen. Other websites offer a subscription service fee for unlimited free music. Lastly, services like iTunes offer the public a small fee per song that is downloaded. However, the artists and the record labels are losing out on real dollars from people downloading music over the internet as opposed to people buying the latest physical copy of the song he/she is desiring to listen to. For up and coming artists I believe that the ability to find and download free music is a positive for brand new artists. These artists can upload mass amounts of music and get free publicity from all of these free music services. The artists that hurt the most are the well established artists who have large fan bases that would be willing to pay money for their music. While many people do buy physical copies, most download music online for free hurting the artist and the record label. I think that the music industry could be stricter on shutting down websites that are giving out free music without compensating the artists and record labels that are producing these tracks. Free music is definitely not free, someone has to pay to produce and distribute the music. I think that with the increase of the digital world, sooner or later the physical copy of music is going to be gone all
Reaction Paper 1
Com 250, Spring 2013
Fallacy of Free Music When a new song comes out the first thing my peers and I normally do is check YouTube to hear the latest new track. The internet is the easiest way for people of any age group to listen to music. There are hundreds and thousands of popular music downloading services that can be found within seconds with a simple Google search. Most of these websites are funded by advertisements that consume the borders of the computer screen. Other websites offer a subscription service fee for unlimited free music. Lastly, services like iTunes offer the public a small fee per song that is downloaded. However, the artists and the record labels are losing out on real dollars from people downloading music over the internet as opposed to people buying the latest physical copy of the song he/she is desiring to listen to. For up and coming artists I believe that the ability to find and download free music is a positive for brand new artists. These artists can upload mass amounts of music and get free publicity from all of these free music services. The artists that hurt the most are the well established artists who have large fan bases that would be willing to pay money for their music. While many people do buy physical copies, most download music online for free hurting the artist and the record label. I think that the music industry could be stricter on shutting down websites that are giving out free music without compensating the artists and record labels that are producing these tracks. Free music is definitely not free, someone has to pay to produce and distribute the music. I think that with the increase of the digital world, sooner or later the physical copy of music is going to be gone all