Why I am not interested in buying cds anymore?
Dear all of you:
I’ve been looking (for long) for a good reason, an explanation to my behavior. I've often felt guilty about not buying the albums of bands I absolutely love. There is no use for the physical albums in my opinion, I already have good quality downloads and never plays cd's anyway, only mp3's.
First, I think I should start with a background:
I am 26 right now; I lived in Russia, Venezuela, France and nowadays in Switzerland. I moved often, so moving discs all the time were not an option when it comes to travel.
My dad and my brother are audiophiles, both have tons of music (each with a particular style) I grew up seeing them buying music all the time. Fortunately for me, it never bothered me, perhaps classical music Saturday early in the morning… but, even when I did not want to listen it, it was never a problem.
I had some friends mixing records (they keep doing it) I learned the difference between house, D&B, acid with them. I tried to mix too, but I found myself playing the same records over and over again.
I must admit I am guilty of downloading. When I discovered Internet, I was a naive young innocent. I was downloading to find interesting stuffs. Whenever I liked something, I would go to the shop and buy the CD. Now, it’s convenient to get a song of the net. It is simple and fast. I rarely buy new CDs anymore, and only to convert it to mp3 and then give it to someone else like a gift.
People are not spending in music like before I guess. I ask every time the same question: how often do you buy music these days. Maybe they are spending their money on video games, computers or expensive mobile phones instead. Apparently it seems to be more important the device than music itself.
Also, there is so much music flooding the market; Is really people mad because of the industry and that they don't want to buy music anymore?
I am already used to get the music so easily, no regrets (when it comes to popular music), I don’t feel I am stealing for anyone if I download bad music and end up erasing it later.
If I grew up listening and buying records and I am not motivated to buy it anymore. What is it going to happen with the future generation?
Sincerely,
P.S. Changing the subject:
I am also tired of lossless and lossy formats; the difference is not so noticeable with all the styles. So is it worth it to save some music in lossless and others in lossy? Nope.
I was struggling to convert my music to lossless, then I realized it was much easier to find all my music already converted to Flac online, and that’s what I did. I stopped for convenience and frustration, finding the codecs to make lossless work with my iPod, my cellphone, my notebook senseless.
Nowadays I keep my music in mp3 for commodity
Any reason you're not buying your music off iTunes or some other online outlet?
I'm not going to get in to the moral side of what you are doing. All I am going to say is that when bands are signed to labels they are required to sell. If they put out new material and don't move enough units they are dropped. That is the bottom line.
The top 40 music that floods the radio and tv doesn't suffer much from this. The masses will always buy this stuff. The ones that will be hurt are the not so mainstream performers. They've got the talent, but do not appeal much to whomever is buying the auto tune dance hits or whatever is popular these days. These bands are judged by the labels (their employers) based on sales. Dollar and cents. Current album doesn't sell, next album doesn't get made.
OK. Maybe I will get in to the morals. Imagine it is payday. You make cars for a living. You go to the store to buy some cereal, but the cashier says your card is declined. Turns out that your boss thinks there are plenty of cars and plenty of people willing to make them. Why should he pay you?
I like to have the artwork that comes along with a lot of releases. Often, it can be a piece of work that the artist has had specially made for the album. In this case, it is very much a part of the album. I like to have a real version of this that I can look at. Some albums will also have a nicely made booklet to go with them, and I find that this can add to the experience too .
Can an artist sign your digital download? If I buy a cd directly from them, I occasionally get a handwritten note thanking me for buying the album. For me, music -- even though it's often listened to in isolation -- is very much something that can connect me to the vision of an artist. Why would I want to lose a part of this in a commodified mp3 form? It's not like a packet of biscuits that I get rid of once they taste different. Or put behind the couch to be forgotten...
Of course, there is the issue of money. But how often do I have to have copies of new music (or, more precisely, how much new music do I need at any given time)? If someone has put a fair bit of time and effort into creating a piece of music, I like to try and spend a fair bit of time and effort listening to it and appreciating what it is they've accomplished with their work. Often, it can even broaden my own view of what can be achieved with music and so forth, so the process is certainly worthwhile .
Edit: forgot to mention -- I also spend a bit of time looking for new music. If I don't actively seek out new (that is, 'unique') music, then I lose interest...
The funny thing is, nowadays I can pay for my music and still... Sometimes I buy using iTunes, but honestly I don't appreciate much leaving my credit card number store in any server, the price for only one song is fine for me. ITunes store is wonderfull for podcasts and online lectures. I am aware about the charts, but again, I can easily erase popular music (there are sometimes good things) that's not always the music I look for. Merely glazing to my music library, I find more single artists than entire albums like it used to be.
Sometimes I buy using iTunes, but honestly I don't appreciate much leaving my credit card number store in any server
it seems to me you are trying to rationalize your copyright violations. if you do not want apple to have your credit card, what's the advantage of buying there "sometimes" as opposed to more frequently? it would make more sense to either not buy there at all or use a gift card.
When you have hard drives get killed from a lighting strike you'll remember why CDs are important.
You are just trying to justify what you do yourself by seeing if anyone else agrees. If you don't pay for an artists work, either directly to them or via labels etc, then what incentive do they have to continue creating and releasing music? Those whose sole profession is that music are left penniless.
You are just trying to justify what you do yourself by seeing if anyone else agrees. If you don't pay for an artists work, either directly to them or via labels etc, then what incentive do they have to continue creating and releasing music? Those whose sole profession is that music are left penniless.
This is certainly an interesting opinion, but if I understood you correctly you're basically saying that copyright infringement is fine as long as he only downloads old music.
We could sketch two scenarios: one for retired and dead artists or split-up bands, another for still active artists and bands in relation to their old works. In the first case illegal downloading would be fully permitted, but in the second we’d have to first determine what constituted an “old work”, for only these would be available for illegal download. What could we suggest? 2 years after the original release? 5? 10? How about 70 years after the artist’s death?
It seems to me that this argument just doesn’t work. If our purpose were just to keep artists working, we'd be much better off returning to the patronage system. How about we just do what we do elsewhere and suggest that people should follow the law or else they will get punished? Well, that would be fine, except in this case they don’t get punished.
All I can say to the hordes of starving artists out there is: if you’re unhappy with your job, quit and find another.
Even thought there is an illegal side on the opening post, I would like this thread to continue on the distribution and consumption of music today as opposed to before year 2000. I think that the original poster had this in mind, and I find it interesting for us.
(Note: I haven't bought, neither downloaded music since 2008. I just listen to internet radio stations).
- First: There's clearly the singles vs album issue.
One could say that there are genres where albums are more important, but overall, albums are becoming something for a collectionist.
I don't remember having bought an album of an artist ever. I used to buy Mixed CDs (as in Various Artists, not necessarily mixed songs. I like dance, trance, house..).
Generally speaking, the industry made us consumists in this regard, so it was only worth to buy albums made of "bests songs of...".
Mixed CDs where the way to get singles before downloading existed, and today it is generally superceeded by single downloads. Said that, Mixed CDs are still the way to get popular tracks without having to search them.
- Second: The distribution and storage method issue.
People is less aware of what he has if there isn't a physical contact with it. When having music just in digital form, there is only a number representing it (or a list, or a tree view). The good part is that there isn't generally a problem of space, transportation, damage in use,...
It is true that a hard drive is more prone get damaged than a collection of cds and Vinyls, and as such, I believe that the only real way there is to maintain it is on the Cloud. Something on the lines of AudioSafe (http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=89802) and a mixture with iTunes Match.
The problem is that this is usually against labels' interests, because then, they cannot sell the same content again and again (See what I said above about consumism).
- Third: the owning vs licensing issue.
Once we buy a CD, we don't own the content, we are just given some rights about it.
It is obvious that we shouldn't get rights to take ownership of it, and it is reasonable to say that we cannot modify it and sell as our own. (But then, there are the countless remixes and "you copied my xxx" cases).
It is reasonable that if a radio station buys it, it needs to pay for a different license than a consumer, since that is a commercial use of the songs.
It starts not to be reasonable when you are a bar (as in snack bar, not as in music bar), a hairdresser/barbershop, or other similar business and you are required to pay for having music or the TV (yes, even the TV) in the background.
And it gets worse when you even get to pay additionally for the music played on your wedding.
<irony on>
Spain is different...
<irony off>
Of course, the industry even tried to say that making an MP3 of your CDs to hear it on your digital player, while the CD could be heard by someone else was also not permitted.
Ideally, what I would be interested as an user is a mixed mode, where I could buy some songs, while I would have access to listen to others for an amount (not necessarily a monthly plan, but neither something that would make buying songs the better solution).
I sincerely don't have the necessity to buy music anymore. (It helps that I don't go out to party much anymore so I am not as aware of new songs). As I said above, I mostly listen to radio stations and sometimes I listen to the older songs I have (remembering the good times I lived).
If you don't pay for an artists work, either directly to them or via labels etc, then what incentive do they have to continue creating and releasing music?
I think there's way too much music available online. And probably my whole life won't be enough to know every artists / musics I could be interested in.
I'm suffering "musical attention disorder", I found hard to focus on anything, because of the insane quantity of music available.
Before I could enjoy one album, and relisten again & again, and know well weak/strong points. I'm trying to go back to this.
And regarding the mainstream artists, you can listen on radio, I often don't like them. Fast generated music, just to generate fast money, and to be quickly forgotten.
Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber,...etc just makes me sad. Also I realized that some artist are ready to release their music for free, and that doesn't mean it's not interesting.
Especially at bandcamp. Then off course, if you like the artist enough , they sell some albums.
There are very good artist at bancamp, they shouldn't be underestimated.
[JAZ] Thanks for your comment, Is good to see people pointing at things records can improve (unfortunately no artist can change industry). With electronic music in general, i prefer to listen online too, there is no reason to buy Mix compilations anymore.
[extrabigmehdi] I also agree with availability these days, there is music everywhere and it's getting hard to discern what's worth it and what is definitely not. "Musical attention disorder". You made my day Bro.
[ProbeDB]: Even if I don't like it, I did it already; my information is already stored in Itunes store servers, that's not the point of the whole article (probably it is my fault for writing about unrelated things) I use Itunes from time to time to give the artist some credit.
The point is, I am losing the pleasure of buying music.
I do not intend to excuse myself. I am questioning what can i do. How can I change or what companies can do to evolve the industry. Not only merely looking and reading the booklet i will change my mind.
Thanks again to everyone
Well, buy things off bandcamp etc.
Conceptual definition will never disappear from the soul of the aural arts; music is an innate primal art.
Of all the arts created by mankind, music is the only one which does not require any form of education to be understood; it attaches itself to the human psyche effotlessly, and so it becomes a platform for infinite visualization and creation.
The OP wanted to publicly share his crystal ball, and good luck to him.
Me personally, I LOVE the coupling of music with all other arts, and I will support all those other industries, and they will make money from me.
If, in a future theoretical world, official channels gave NO visual or interpretive pleasures to go with musical works, then I would find a way of creating it all myself
and share ideas and output with other like-minded people... photographers, painters, sculptors, journalists, philosophers, writers and novelists, scientists and mathematicians, people who have "fuck cars" engraved on a tube of their bicycle, etc, etc, the list is never-ending.
If you don't want iTunes to have your credit card info, generate a virtual number via your card issuer and give them that. There are certainly ways around the problem.
When you have hard drives get killed from a lighting strike you'll remember why CDs are important.
Ever heard about backups?
Usually no CDs here as well.
When you have hard drives get killed from a lighting strike you'll remember why CDs are important.
No, you just learn about holes in your backup concept.
I haven't quit buying CD's, I'm just not so often tempted into it as ten years ago.
- My collection is on hard drive --> lots of old stuff to discover takes my attention.
- Spotify.
- And I am so p*ssed off at the MAFIAA. I mean, read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitch_Glazier (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitch_Glazier) -- their lobbyist frauded the president into signing a statute that Congress never approved upon, snatching copyright from the artists, and the MAFIAA has rewarded him with a Senior Executive Vice President title and salary. The sooner the music industry anno y2k is gone, the better.
So here's what I do:
- If a band I like is going to my city, then I deliberately do not buy the CD in advance. I go to the gig (I see on average a band a week), and hope to buy it from the band. Then *maybe* (but not always) the money ends up where I want it to.
- I use Spotify (free) to check out stuff. Using free Spotify means I will be blocked from listening to a track too often -- and that is a hint that this particular album is one of the few I should actually go out and buy.
- http://Bandcamp.com (http://Bandcamp.com) ? Yeah, give it to me baby. Think I've picked up more from there (and paid) than for free from http://www.jamendo.com/ (http://www.jamendo.com/) .
Aside this: if a band offers their music in that format (Jamendo again), the least I can do in return is to keep seeding. Even if I don't really want to keep it. (Well it has happened that it sucks so much I feel cheated and delete everything.)
The point is, I am losing the pleasure of buying music.
I do not intend to excuse myself. I am questioning what can i do. How can I change or what companies can do to evolve the industry. Not only merely looking and reading the booklet i will change my mind.
It is not your obligation, as a consumer, to do anything but choose how and where to spend your limited entertainment budget. If buying CDs doesn't reward you enough to make it worth the asking price, then don't buy them. Don't worry about what message it is sending to future generations, or what may or may not be happening to the copyright exploitation industry and those artists who choose to rely on it. The businesspeople behind the scenes are well-aware of changing patterns of consumer behavior, and they are responding in various ways—sometimes progressively, such as by trying to move music (and games, movies, books, etc.) toward being on-demand services, often of the "value-add" type, rather than being a direct product. There are pros and cons to their tactics, and they are making some huge mistakes, but they are also getting some things very right. Art will not die because you chose not to buy the latest Lady Gaga CD.
The top 40 music that floods the radio and tv doesn't suffer much from this. The masses will always buy this stuff.
You think? Most of the top 40 is aimed at people too young to earn money. 30 years ago most people recorded this music from the top 40 radio show. Or copied the albums from the one person in school who bought it. Now they download it from the one person on the internet who bought it.
I probably bought more music than most at that age, but I also had more copied music than most too.
For most people, there will be a continuum from "most have" music, to "can't stand" music - and most people will buy their "must have" music. If you're going to give it to someone you love as a gift, you've really got to pay for it!
The question is, how far down that continuum do people continue to pay for music? It depends on how much money they have, how much music costs, how easy it is to get the music without paying, and the quality/usefulness of that free copy.
The transition from dubbing friend's LPs to cassette tape, to downloading complete lossless albums with one click, moves that "pay for it" point considerably.
Cheers,
David.
P.S. I still buy CDs. I still don't have them all ripped. Haven't gone back to ones I haven't played for years.
Stopped buying CD. But I still buy surround music. Like 5.1 versions on a DVD(-A) with a CD on the side.
Think I've picked up more from there (and paid) than for free from http://www.jamendo.com/ (http://www.jamendo.com/) .
Why, oh why, did you show me this. As if I do not download enough stuff.
Found Saregama artist seems quite talented.... Oh no, must ignore.
Aside this: if a band offers their music in that format (Jamendo again), the least I can do in return is to keep seeding. Even if I don't really want to keep it. (Well it has happened that it sucks so much I feel cheated and delete everything.)
Failed to mention BitTorrent.
@ extrabigmehdi : You're welcome
You are just trying to justify what you do yourself by seeing if anyone else agrees. If you don't pay for an artists work, either directly to them or via labels etc, then what incentive do they have to continue creating and releasing music? Those whose sole profession is that music are left penniless.
This is certainly an interesting opinion, but if I understood you correctly you're basically saying that copyright infringement is fine as long as he only downloads old music.
Erm no, where exactly do I say it's fine copying old music?
When you have hard drives get killed from a lighting strike you'll remember why CDs are important.
I'm talking about a regular home user not a server setup.
When you have hard drives get killed from a lighting strike you'll remember why CDs are important.
I'm talking about a regular home user not a server setup.
What?
When you have hard drives get killed from a lighting strike you'll remember why CDs are important.
That is why you should do extra backup on optical media or tape for critical files. I've had *multiple* HDD's fail and data lost.
Erm no, where exactly do I say it's fine copying old music?
Right here: "then what incentive do they have to continue creating and releasing music?". The objective of your proposal seems to be to stimulate artists to continue creating music, doesn't it? In the two sketched scenarios the download of old music would have no effect on production of new music. In fact, for artists who are still active, profits from their back catalogue actually serve as a disincentive to work.
In the patronage system, OTOH, artists have the greatest possible incentive to continue creating and releasing music, and of good quality to boot. That's because their meal tickets depend on their performance.
Erm no, where exactly do I say it's fine copying old music?
Right here: "then what incentive do they have to continue creating and releasing music?". The objective of your proposal seems to be to stimulate artists to continue creating music, doesn't it?
Now you are extracting your implications from his[/hers?] argument. Not only that, but you are extracting your implications from what the argument does not say anything about. So you are invoking the implicit assumptions that (i) this is the only argument, and (ii) your opponent agrees with you on the implications. Of course this is sometimes justified (should we be restricted to putting forth only arguments which follow by logical necessity AND everyone else's sometimes fairly f**ked-up idea of logic, then we would probably not be getting anywhere), but I'd say you pushed it quite a bit too far here.
What would have been wrong with 'OK, then I guess it is fine copying old music' (written on your own behalf)?
Mainly directed to Shadowking - The best way to back up data depends heavily on how much data you're talking about, but hard disks are nearly always going to be the best option these days. (I'm going to have my personal music collection size of aprox. 200 GB in mind for the rest of this post.)
DVDs are really too small to be backing up this amount of data. My collection would take a shelf full of DVDs (43 discs, to be exact) to back up in its entirety. Assuming about 20 minutes for each disc, it'd take some 14 solid hours of flipping discs to finish the backup. Blu-Ray bumps up the capacity from 4.7 to 25 GB per disc, which makes it a bit less time-consuming (and a bit more expensive). But really, I don't think any burnable optical media is a good choice for a serious backup. Writeable CDs are known to deteriorate much faster than factory-pressed silver discs, and the same should hold true for DVDs and Blu-Rays. If anything, I would expect the deterioration problem to be worse on the newer discs, since each bit is represented by a much smaller surface area, due to their higher data density.
Tapes are more reliable for long-term storage, and have the large capacities to make them convenient. But they are also prohibitively expensive. Looking at Newegg real quick to get a handle on prices (http://www.newegg.com/Store/SubCategory.aspx?SubCategory=46&name=Backup-Drives) - It seems like modern tape drives (that store hundreds of gigs) start at $500 rock-bottom, quickly working up to $1000, $1500, or more.
Now, those are LTO-3 tape drives that store 400 GB. Compare that with hard disks, where you can get 2 TB (2,000 GB) disks for $150. So even if you don't trust your disk for some reason, you could buy TWO 2-TB disks for redundancy, and still spend $100 less for 4.5x more capacity, versus LTO-3 tape.
Also, the prices on hard disks are actually a little inflated right now because of flooding in Thailand last year that wiped out something like 30% of worldwide hard disk production. In the near-term, HDD prices will fall a bit as the factories come back online. Long-term patterns for HDDs have always been: drastically enlarged storage, plus lowered price. No doubt this trend will continue into the future as HDDs see competition from the newer solid-state drives that have been introduced in the last few years. Point is, the price advantage that HDDs currently enjoy vs. tape is only going to get bigger.
You mentioned something about having two HDDs fail on you at once - Unlikely, but possible. Now ... if you buy two HDDs to make a double backup, and still have the music stored on your daily-driver HDD inside your computer, that's a total of three disks that have to fail at the same time for you to lose your data. Which is exceedingly unlikely to the point of non-consideration. That's the kind of resilience to disk failure that you have in business-critical corporate RAID systems that process hundred-thousand-dollar transactions daily. If it's good enough for that, it should be good enough for your music collection...
The main things contributing to disk failure are heavy usage and high operating temperatures. These are largely mitigated for backup disks. You're only going to use it maybe once a month when you do your backup, and the rest of the time it's going to be sitting on the shelf somewhere. Unplugged, protected from power surges, viruses, etc... not in operation.
In terms of price, convenience, and longevity, your best option to back up music is going to be having the collection stored on two or three hard disks. Of course, if you've still got the factory-pressed CDs (which don't deteriorate like CD/DVD-Rs) you probably don't need to make a computerized backup at all. Although it could save you the hassle of re-ripping every CD later, if something should happen to your computer.
I've had a hdd fail mechanically, the second one had some filesystem issue..I even made careless mistakes myself , went to another drive only to discover its dying or backup never happened properly.. I even lost *part* of a DVD archive due to fungus that invaded storage. The backup procedure itself can go wrong and i've seen it many times. There are many point of failure and yes two hdd's is usually fine , But there is extra security in an additional HDD archive or *snapshot* backup (weekly / monthly / yearly etc) that way you can go back in time if some mistake corrupted your stuff ( no amount of HDD's will not protect you in this case )
Mainly directed to Shadowking - The best way to back up data depends heavily on how much data you're talking about, but hard disks are nearly always going to be the best option these days.
Personally, I use Blu-Rays for my backups which I do roughly bi-annually. I am somehow more comfortable backing up to a write-once medium. I retain the last few backups. I usually store them at an off-site location.
EDIT: My entire collection is on my desktop as well as on my (DJ gig) laptop so I guess I have an up-to-date hard drive backup as well.
The main things contributing to disk failure are heavy usage and high operating temperatures. These are largely mitigated for backup disks. You're only going to use it maybe once a month when you do your backup, and the rest of the time it's going to be sitting on the shelf somewhere. Unplugged, protected from power surges, viruses, etc... not in operation.
Counterintuitive as it may seem, there is a well known 2007 paper by Google engineers that demonstrates just the opposite: http://research.google.com/archive/disk_failures.pdf (http://research.google.com/archive/disk_failures.pdf)
Of course, speaking about backup disks used once in a while, it's true that having them offline, disconnected from any power source, even stored away from the main system is the best way to protect them.
And don't forget, from time to time, to try to actually read all the data stored on them!
Erm no, where exactly do I say it's fine copying old music?
Right here: "then what incentive do they have to continue creating and releasing music?". The objective of your proposal seems to be to stimulate artists to continue creating music, doesn't it? In the two sketched scenarios the download of old music would have no effect on production of new music. In fact, for artists who are still active, profits from their back catalogue actually serve as a disincentive to work.
You've completely misinterpreted what I was saying. The whole point is that artists get paid. You have to produce something in order to get paid for it. This doesn't just mean new stuff. I wasn't proposing anything, I was saying artists are unlikely to want to create anything (new) if you're not going to pay them because you just download anything they produce.
artists are unlikely to want to create anything (new) if you're not going to pay them because you just download anything they produce.
There's a big secret in the world of music, literature, acting, and other art: the artists generally don't divulge that they have ever had a day job, nor do they divulge when they cross that boundary in one direction or the other, and it happens all the time; very very few are living off their back catalog. If some full-time artists whose contracts depend on direct sales of artificially scarce copies of their work feel uninspired by low sales in this era of instant global distribution without middlemen, then too bad for them. They were mainly just in it for the money, and now they have to go get a job and do their art on the side, or find some other way to make money from their art...like everyone else.
Before anyone says I should walk a mile in the artist's shoes...I am an amateur photographer and musician, and my partner is a writer signed to a major publishing house. We are both modestly successful with our art (a CC-licensed photo of mine will be in a prestigious museum this year, and her book is selling despite also being torrented), but we also both have and rely on day jobs. We are far more inspired by the positive aesthetic response we get to our art than we are by any amount of money.
As a musician I try to buy some albums. I do it from a moralistic standpoint, I want to support bands.
However, I am not particularly wealthy, and through the years I have realized that since I can't buy all the albums from all the bands I like to support, I simply try to buy albums from the bands that seem to need money the most.
The last 50 cd's I bought are in a box somewhere unopened, I haven't even ripped the plastic off the casings. I downloaded them and gave them a thorough listen, the ones I liked I eventually ordered. But those are almost exclusively albums by bands who are fairly unknown and probably see a clear difference between selling 8000 and 9000 cd's.
Bands I like that have sold millions of records and go on international tours, yes ideally I'd like to buy their records too but since I can't afford all the albums I like and have to choose, I'll just wait and buy their records when I get rich some day
Through my nearly 20 years as a musician I have had the debate countless times how to deal with and how I view pirated music, and this is my standpoint - If you are an actual musician who likes to make music, be grateful for what money you can get from it but create for the sake of creating - if you are already making millions off it and still demand that "you should still pay for listening to my music by the simple laws of paying for a product" then I have strong doubts about their authenticity as a musician. You work to get paid, you create because you feel the urge, I want musicians around the world to be able to live off their music if possible, but once you start making 7 figures, you are kind of out of that bracket.
This leads to me being fairly sure that the genre that hurts the most from file sharing is popular music, which is in fact an industry to make money, it's work and economics, not artistic freedom, and they need to sell their crap fast before it goes out of date. Within any other timeless genre bands that are good do as well as they deserve to do (quality directly related to income) with file-sharing only improving their chances to get more listeners.
To sum it up, I like to buy albums from smaller groups that might need the money to keep making the music I like, that's our give-and-take relationship. Then again, I am a non-capitalist European with little understanding of the typical capitalist black and white view on earnings.
What would have been wrong with 'OK, then I guess it is fine copying old music' (written on your own behalf)?
It's fine only if you think copyright legislation is a bait for the production of new art. I don't believe it is. My own advice to squallkiercosa is more along the lines: either you follow the law because it's the law or else you should feel free to do whatever you want, as long as you can get away with it. I had understood probedb's remark to mean some sort of rationalization of the kind "buy cds - it'll be for your own good in the long run". I don't think this sort of argument works, but if you disagree I'd be eager to hear why.
I've had a hdd fail mechanically, the second one had some filesystem issue..I even made careless mistakes myself , went to another drive only to discover its dying or backup never happened properly.. I even lost *part* of a DVD archive due to fungus that invaded storage. The backup procedure itself can go wrong and i've seen it many times. There are many point of failure and yes two hdd's is usually fine , But there is extra security in an additional HDD archive or *snapshot* backup (weekly / monthly / yearly etc) that way you can go back in time if some mistake corrupted your stuff ( no amount of HDD's will not protect you in this case )
I just use an external hard drive for backup , that I can connect by USB from western digital "passport essential" of 1Tb.
I avoid to use it too much.
It's fine only if you think copyright legislation is a bait for the production of new art. I don't believe it is.
Apologies to the international audience if this is too US-centric.
The contstitutional justification for copyright comes from this power of congress:
To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.
So, yes, it is intended as bait for the production of new art. In return for that incentive, the public gets a pipeline of new stuff that becomes public domain after the inventor/writer has a
limited time opportunity to cash in.
That limited time for copyright was originally in the same general range as for patents. It's very unfortunate that it is now interpreted as "a time not less than that needed to keep the first Mickey Mouse cartoon protected," thanks to the best government money can buy.
If you want to make a distinction between moral and legal respect of copyright and old music, that would be a place to draw the line.
Usually no CDs here as well.
When you have hard drives get killed from a lighting strike you'll remember why CDs are important.
No, you just learn about holes in your backup concept.
Redundancy if the hard drive starts having bad sectors and therefore my folders now a days consist of par2 redundancy files with 10% recover size.
(http://s9.postimage.org/gk3aecjrj/folder_par2_redundancy_example.png)
[...]lighting strike
[...]
Redundancy
Lucky if that would help. If Thor hits one of your hard drives, then the rest of the RAID will probably be hit as well. Edit: and redundancy bits on the same hard drive, even harder.
Go offsite.
It's fine only if you think copyright legislation is a bait for the production of new art. I don't believe it is.
Apologies to the international audience if this is too US-centric.
The contstitutional justification for copyright comes from this power of congress:
To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.
It's not just the US.
It was part of the intent in the first copyright act, in the UK, too...
Whereas Printers, Booksellers, and other Persons, have of late frequently taken the Liberty of Printing, Reprinting, and Publishing, or causing to be Printed, Reprinted, and Published Books, and other Writings, without the Consent of the Authors or Proprietors of such Books and Writings, to their very great Detriment, and too often to the Ruin of them and their Families: For Preventing therefore such Practices for the future, and for the Encouragement of Learned Men to Compose and Write useful Books; May it please Your Majesty, that it may be Enacted ...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statute_of_Anne (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statute_of_Anne)
I think we lost sight of this during the second half of the 20th century, and things are just getting worse IMO. It's not just Mickey Mouse in the USA. We have our own problems in Europe too, where it's keeping the Beatles recordings in copyright that's recently caused the situation to become worse...
http://musicbusinessresearch.wordpress.com...mic-assessment/ (http://musicbusinessresearch.wordpress.com/2011/09/15/eu-copyright-term-extension-in-sound-recordings-to-70-years-%E2%80%93-an-economic-assessment/)
Cheers,
David.
So, yes, it is intended as bait for the production of new art.
I’m not well acquainted with the anglo-american system but I found this account of Eldred v Ashcroft (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eldred_v._Ashcroft) very instructive. It happened in the context of the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act (CTEA). The plaintiff argued that the progress of the arts and sciences would not be stimulated by expanding the duration of copyright to
previously created works. The Supreme Court decided for the validity of the law, but Justice Breyer disagreed:
Justice Breyer dissented, arguing that the CTEA amounted to a grant of perpetual copyright that undermined public interests. While the constitution grants Congress power to extend copyright terms in order to "promote the progress of science and useful arts," CTEA granted precedent to continually renew copyright terms making them virtually perpetual. Justice Breyer argued in his dissent that it is highly unlikely any artist will be more inclined to produce work knowing their great-grandchildren will receive royalties. With regard to retroactive copyright extension he viewed it foolish to apply the government's argument that income received from royalties allows artists to produce more work saying, "How will extension help today’s Noah Webster create new works 50 years after his death?"
Despite that, the act was upheld by a 7–2 vote. So it seems even in the US the matter is not so clear cut and copyright can be extended indefinitely, so long as congress restricts the extension to a finite amount of time. This is so whether the extension is supposed to stimulate the progress of the arts or not. But I’ll admit that the literal letter of the law would incline one to think that the anglo-american system protected exclusively the rights of the public.
In the continental system (droit d'auteur), however, the matter is markedly different due to the focus on the moral (that is, personal and non-financial) rights of the artist. Many prerogatives (like the right to keep your work secret, that of ordering it destroyed, or that of recalling it from the public if it jeopardizes your reputation) are in direct contrast to the desires of the public in having as many new artworks as possible. A lot more is being done here than just baiting new productions. The issue could even verge on the metaphysical by emphasizing the unique relationship of creator and created work.
Whatever the case, I still think squallkiercosa's dillemma ought to be solved by non-utilitarian means. Most people would never consider stealing a car. Not even if no one were looking. Not even if they were sure to get away with it. Not even if the owner were a millionaire and they were certain he wouldn't be harmed by the larceny. Why should we treat copyright any differently?
Redundancy
Lucky if that would help. If Thor hits one of your hard drives, then the rest of the RAID will probably be hit as well. Edit: and redundancy bits on the same hard drive, even harder.
Go offsite.
As a matter of fact RAID and other fault tolerance techniques are all about availability, not backup.
[...]lighting strike
[...]
Redundancy
Go offsite.
I have an unRAID (http://lime-technology.com/) server with system images for 2 desktops and 1 laptop, backups of all our music, photography and other important files, and movies. Periodically I create on offsite backup with only the music, photography, and other important files. The system images and movies are too large and unimportant to bother with saving offsite. My offsite backup currently just fits on a 2TB drive but my wife's photography will probably push us over that soon.
Ok, enough with the increasingly off-topic conversation about backups. We have several other discussions dedicated to the subject.
The point is, I am losing the pleasure of buying music.
I do not intend to excuse myself. I am questioning what can i do. How can I change or what companies can do to evolve the industry. Not only merely looking and reading the booklet I will change my mind.
It is not your obligation, as a consumer, to do anything but choose how and where to spend your limited entertainment budget. If buying CDs doesn't reward you enough to make it worth the asking price, then don't buy them. Don't worry about what message it is sending to future generations, or what may or may not be happening to the copyright exploitation industry and those artists who choose to rely on it. The businesspeople behind the scenes are well-aware of changing patterns of consumer behavior, and they are responding in various ways—sometimes progressively, such as by trying to move music (and games, movies, books, etc.) toward being on-demand services, often of the "value-add" type, rather than being a direct product. There are pros and cons to their tactics, and they are making some huge mistakes, but they are also getting some things very right. Art will not die because you chose not to buy the latest Lady Gaga CD.
I will never, ever buy the lastest Lady Gaga Cd. Seriously.
I will never, ever buy the lastest Lady Gaga Cd. Seriously.
Last year , there was in France an anti-piracy campaign.
There were an advertisement with a fictional pop star, with a single released in 2022.
And then, there's a flash back , where you see the little girl.
The moral: without hadopi (an anti-piracy french law), that little girl wouldn't be able to release her smashing hit in 2022.
The effect of the advertisement was the opposite of the one expected :
everyone thought that if piracy could help to kill such kind of junk music, then piracy must be good at the end.
The hadopi advertisement , sorry if it's in French:
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xj6h6s_ca...e-l-hadopi_tech (http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xj6h6s_campagne-de-pub-de-l-hadopi_tech)
I am one of these old farts that still likes the hard physical media in his hands.
I buy used cds on ebay and Amazon marketplace since some years now. I guess that out of my last 100 CDs there were more then 70 used ones.
Today i purchased one that normaly sells for 20,99€ new. Used prices were around 16-19€ all the time. Since i bookmarked it i sometimes have a looky. Today there was a 9€ offer i couldn´t resist.
Since i started watching this CD on Amazon around 2 months back i saw several used offers come and go but the Amazon stock only went from 5 to 4 in this time.
I really wonder how many people use that way to order, rip and resell. If soemone makes a hobby out of that it is an easy way to get a nice collection for a bargain. I doubt the music industry isn´t exactly happy with this development and whining about loosing sales is not only from the murder pirate downloader.
Me does collect these things still and the CD will go directly to one of my shelves when ripped.
Sorry for the second post in a row but this is related but completely different and deserves a seperate post or even thread.
Me bought the last "Tom Waits - Bad As Me as Deluxe Edition" lately. Since i still like the physical media i was happy with the delivered song-book and saw myself on the sofa enjoying the new album with scrolling thru the pages of the book. Seldom enjoyed a new buy that much.
Now 2 weeks later while absorbing my daily dose of internet surfing i stumbled across the HDtracks offer of this Tom Waits album.
They offer a 24bit 96kHz version. WTF!?
Does my CD version sound different? Is the HD version not as compressed? Did they rip me off with a lousy ultra-compressed CD version?
To be honest you won´t find any info on how it is created, leave alone how it is supposed to sound.
What to do from now on? Better buy nothing anymore till the day arrived we can easily get lossless downloads? Will they offer a coupon with the bought CD for a HiRes download because it doesn´t fit on a CD?
Several negative conclusions against buying CDs can be reasoned from that!
Seems like the industry only created another market making the loyal fan left with some bad aftertaste...
I like to have the artwork that comes along with a lot of releases. Often, it can be a piece of work that the artist has had specially made for the album. In this case, it is very much a part of the album. I like to have a real version of this that I can look at. Some albums will also have a nicely made booklet to go with them, and I find that this can add to the experience too .
You should definitely buy something from Richard Skelton's Sustain-Release label: http://www.sustain-release.co.uk/catalogue.htm (http://www.sustain-release.co.uk/catalogue.htm).
The music might not be your style, but the packaging is very special - and different for all buyers.
I think CDs are impractical. I haven't used a CD player in nearly a decade. I don't care about the package, the music is what's important to me.
I like supporting talented artists and I like album art and notes so I still buy CDs. I hope MP3s are gone soon; lossless sounds better to me and gives peace of mind that nothing is missing. FLAC is great for computer and portable media players. iTunes Apple Store and Amazon should be adopting it soon. I buy FLACs too.
Music is so cheap there is no need to steal it. Don't eat junk food that weakens your metabolism and get quality tunes with that money and feed your mind.
A few times my files got deleted, and Amazon mislabels many tunes so it's good to have CDs.
lossless sounds better to me
Are you prepared to provide us with objective evidence, and if so would you be willing to take part in future listening tests?
lossless sounds better to me
Are you prepared to provide us with objective evidence, and if so would you be willing to take part in future listening tests?
Generically speaking, lossless do sound better than lossy, only under certain restrictive conditions (high bitrates, average listener, no killer samples etc...), lossy may become subjectively transparent. Of course, we all know that nowadays these conditions can be easily satisfied in an ordinary listening setup targeted to SQ for nearly every given lossless source, but the simple assumption that lossy sounds worse than lossless can always be proven true!
You don't think that downloads provided by amazon and itunes (per astroidmist's post, did you read it?) don't also fall into your "restrictive condition"?
You don't think that downloads provided by amazon and itunes (per astroidmist's post, did you read it?) don't also fall into your "restrictive condition"?
I was speaking "generally", but ok, let's stay on the case: yes, I think they do at 99.99%, but can you be a priori sure that they do at 100%?
All the more, in the sentence you quoted he also says "[lossless] gives peace of mind that nothing is missing" and even if I myself actually don't listen from lossless sources any more, this latter, if not subjective quality, seems to me a good reason not to buy lossy material.
A few times my files got deleted, and Amazon mislabels many tunes so it's good to have CDs.
If you don't backup your data that's your fault. And even a CD could break or becomes otherwise unreadable...
All the more, in the sentence you quoted he also says "[lossless] gives peace of mind that nothing is missing" and even if I myself actually don't listen from lossless sources any more, this latter, if not subjective quality, seems to me a good reason not to buy lossy material.
If all that was given was the "peace of mind" argument then this would have been fine.
Writeable CDs are known to deteriorate much faster than factory-pressed silver discs, and the same should hold true for DVDs and Blu-Rays. If anything, I would expect the deterioration problem to be worse on the newer discs, since each bit is represented by a much smaller surface area, due to their higher data density.
I've had more than my fair share of CDs go bad with no use at all which is why I don't bother buying blank CD-R's anymore, however; each and every DVD I've ever burned with music, etc., on it over the past 9 years can be read perfectly fine.
Andavari, I am a satisfied user of TAIYO YUDEN writeable CD's from Japan and have nothing but good things to say about them.
Can you tell me what percentage of your "writeable CD's gone bad" are from TAIYO YUDEN ?
All I can say to the hordes of starving artists out there is: if you’re unhappy with your job, quit and find another.
I think you're missing the point, they like being artists, they just don't like people using their wares for free.