The Double-Dip Mentality

[Doc]

With the web, direct distribution is possible. Many artists offer direct over the web services, easily paid for. Artists many have probably never heard of. Artists need to break away from Sony and like distributors that take to much of a cut and form their own independant platform for selling their music. A lot of "deserving" bands could also be "discovered" this way. They would also make more money in the long run. And Apple is signing up a lot of independants with iTunes. Indies get a hell of a lot more of that 99 cents than they would if they were signed with a big name. Artists under the big name umbrellas get less than 1/100th of a cent for those 99 cent downloads.

Until such time that the entertainment media is fair to both the artists and the consumer, I advocate piracy. Many artists also take this stance. Like Korn for example, in their big battle with Sony. Korn was telling everybody to steal their music over file sharing networks, and not to please not buy their albums. Steal everything you can was the order of the day. Sony probably lost millions and millions of dollars, and decided not to force Korn to renew their contract. Korn even had it arranged for exclusive studio tracks to "leak" out before a big release intentionally sabotoging their own album sales. (Back in 2004 I think) Korn was let go, and now they have a much better financial situation and they are in charge of their own music. And that is just one of many examples of using piracy as a means of negotion. It worked, and everybody got something out of it, well, except for Sony. They got screwed hardcore by one of their headline acts. So yes, piracy can indeed benefit the artists, contrary to what the industry tries to make you believe. And a lot of other bands are following Korn's example.