The Politics of File Sharing

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

CounterPunch

October 17, 2002

The Politics of File Sharing:
Clay Pigeons
by DAVE MARSH

A bright young man spent a fair part of Saturday evening trying to convince
me that file-sharing and "piracy" were the reason that Eminem's new album
has sold "only" four million copies, like his last one did, but only four
million.

How many artists whose last records sold eight million sell that many or
more the next time out? He didn't know. The answer is damn few; it is
probably more typical for sales of a followup to drop off 50 percent or
more, and that was the case long before Bill Gates sold that evil gleam in
his eye to IBM.

How long did it take Eminem's previous record to sell eight million? About
twice as long as the new one has been on the shelves. It reached those
shelves early, by the way, because the record label convinced itself
downloading was killing its market. The most downloaded record of the year
then had the largest first week sales figure of the year. How did that
happen? Could it be that the Internet is more like radio than a back alley
music chop shop?

There are answers to all these questions, but we don't have them because
the RIAA and the cartel for which it fronts are too busy trying to get us
to pay attention to the smoke and mirrors of their propaganda.

full: http://www.counterpunch.org/marsh1017.html


Louis Proyect
www.marxmail.org


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