Napster No Good for Oldies

from the quit-your-complaining dept

Mon, Mar 20th 2000 11:33am — Mike Masnick

I'm surprised that Wired devoted an entire article about a reporter complaining that he can't find the music he likes with Napster because he's too old. The concept behind Napster is that it is a sharing community. You're definitely going to find what's most popular. And, if you don't like what's there, why not make your own tracks available? Oh, but in this case the author thinks it's bad to use Napster since the artists don't get paid. So, then I don't see why he should be complaining about songs missing. Those artists are obviously not getting ripped off.

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RIAA Coward, 20 Mar 2000 @ 2:53pm

The MP3 lie
the author uses a line I've seen in almost every other MP3 article: "if I find an MP3 I like, I go out and buy the CD". Bullshit. Mike said this in an earlier article, too, but I trust Mike.
I'd propose that this line be added to the list of top 10 Internet lies. When I find a song I like on Napster, I download every other song by the artist I can find.
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- Mike (profile), 20 Mar 2000 @ 3:06pm
  
  Re: The MP3 lie
  I can back that statement up, if you'd like. I see no reason to publicly list CDs I own, but if you contact me personally I will tell you CDs I've purchased due to first hearing the MP3. I will say that I don't buy every CD of every artist who's MP3 I download (and I should add I am actually fairly new to the whole MP3 world - owing mostly to only recently buying a computer that had more than 40 megs available). However, if I find an artist I like, and I notice I like repeated recordings of that artist, then I want to own the CD. It might just be the collector mentality in me: I don't consider MP3s to be permanent. Having the CD as a part of my collection makes it real to me. That's why I own an insane number of CDs (and vinyl too - but that's almost purely for collector reasons). But, I will say that there are a number of CDs I've purchased simply because I've heard a few MP3s by an artist and really enjoyed them. I will also say that at this time (and who knows if this will stay true) I don't have any MP3s on my computer (that I can think of) that I don't also own on CD.
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