curious can anyone show me one song in the top 100 itunes, that the artist allows you to download for free?? not a sharing site but the artist themselves??? just curious!
The current #1 itunes song appears to be "My Life Would Suck Without You" by Kelly Clarkson.
Here it is available for free download from the Kelly Clarkson Official Youtube Channel:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h09_1qdkFIA
When people refer to illegally downloading music, they are usually referring to mp3 files. However, there it is, made available for free by the artist. It would take me about 5 minutes to download the youtube file, rip the audio from it, convert to mp3, and copy it to an mp3 player or cd.
Serious question that I really don't know the answer to... according to copyright law would that be illegal? They put the song on youtube so that people can download it to their computer (even if it's streaming, it's still downloading to your computer, and it saves it somewhere even if it's just saved in cache). If it is illegal, at what point does it become illegal? Ripping the audio from the youtube file? Converting to mp3? Saving to hard drive, cd, or mp3 player?
This isn't a moral or legal dilemma I often run into. As I said earlier in this thread, almost 100% of the music I listen to comes from etree.org or furthurnet.org, where the artists all give permission to record and share all their live shows. This is just like how the Grateful Dead allowed taping and tape trading... in fact, there are over 6000 Grateful Dead shows available for download.
I'd guess that the Grateful Dead made more money selling merchandise than they ever did selling albums. Maybe not, I don't know for sure, but I do know that I see a lot more Grateful Dead shirts than I hear them on the radio. I don't know if you've ever been to a show where the band allows taping, but people go there for a lot more than just the music... it's a loving, happy, sharing experience. The bands are happy to share their music, and the people are happy to support them by buying their merchandise and music, and spreading good reviews of their experience by word of mouth.
Commercial music through a recording company has marketing via radio, music videos on TV, certain internet technologies, and other promotions. A new band has a (slim) chance of making it big this way, but it's like making a deal with the devil. They have to do everything the recording company says, and in the process a musician can lose some of their soul. I'd bet there's a lot of musicians that would love to let people tape their concerts, but can't because of their contract with the recording company.
I'm not saying that downloading copyrighted music when the owner hasn't given permission is legal or moral. I'm just saying there's another way, and it's a hell of a lot more joyful and fun (to me and most of the people I hang out with anyway). Check out jambase.com... there's probably an awesome concert coming up that you don't even know about because it isn't promoted on TV or radio. And a few days later you might even be able to download a live recording of the concert you just went to.
To any bands that may be reading... you don't have to sign a contract with the devil. Technology is rapidly changing the industry. If you're good, you can make it without a record deal. You can enter your info in at jambase.com, set up a myspace page, upload some sample music to myspace, do some live shows at local bars, record the shows and upload them to places like etree.org. Get more popular by word of mouth, and you'll be able to charge more for your live shows. When you're ready to record an album, you can rent a studio for pretty cheap these days because the recording technology is so much cheaper, or you can even do a half-decent recording in a basement or practice space if it's set up right. You can burn your own CD's to start, or there are duplicating places that will do it cheap. You can even create your own record label... it doesn't cost much. The only caveat to doing it this way is that you have to love playing live shows, touring, and meeting new people to make it big. You can't just record an album and then sit on your butt letting the recording company do all the marketing and pr for you.
speciallyblend, I know you dj, so copyright law is a little different for you because you get paid to play music for a public audience. There are some bands that have music available for download that would be good for playing at a club. I can think of a few off the top of my head; Particle, Galactic, and Dr. Didge. For example, there are 171 taped Particle shows available
here. I'm sure there are many other bands that would be good as well. These bands give permission to download and listen and give copies to other people, but using them while dj'ing may be another issue. You may have to contact the band and get permission for that, but I'd guess they'd probably ok it.
NEVERMIND, i will not even sell it. I will just copy it and give for free so you cannot sell your product. I suggest you just give your product away for free ,since i will
