The problem with Napster is not Napster. Too many people, corporations, and governments get tied up on the tools of Internet copyright abuse and lose sight of the fundamental shift in the way information and ideas are represented. In the past, the media that the idea was contained on (paper, CD, airwave, etc) was as valuable as the idea itself since the media is what made the idea tangible and controllable. Suddenly, with the advent of Napster type tools and the coming onset of faster computers and faster connections, ideas are set free from the constrains of their associated media and can be anywhere on demand.
It is wholly unimportant in the long run what profit model is chosen to represent audio, video, or any other information idea that we have traditionally paid for. Unless the tools are outlawed, it is only a matter of time before anyone will be able to duplicate and transfer any idea to anyone, anytime. The media industries will lose money and (whether they deserve it or not) will take losses. Eventually this will lead to a degradation of quality of information being created. (if you don't feed the hand that is feeding you, you will not get fed!)
Economics would suggest that the benefit of free ideas would eventually be outweighed by the cost of the worthless ideas created from the free idea model. As demand for quality media rises, eventually society will reach a critical juncture -- continue the current morality (acceptance of costless information duplication and transfer) or adopt some new morality that allows for the creation of quality media.
In "short" run, there is no way that I see a profitable future for certain information based industries -- music especially, since it's products are so completely pre-packaged prevalent in our lives. Sound quality will improve with better algorithms, distribution and accessibility issues will cease to be a problem as faster networks and the wireless convergence occurs, copyright controls will either be hacked or worked around, and prevalence will increase rapidly as the technology to duplicate and transfer information becomes easier to use for the common man and more widespreadly available. Until we reach that critical juncture, I don't think that either the label nor the artist has much going for them.
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The problem with Napster is not Napster. Too many people, corporations, and governments get tied up on the tools of Internet copyright abuse and lose sight of the fundamental shift in the way information and ideas are represented. In the past, the media that the idea was contained on (paper, CD, airwave, etc) was as valuable as the idea itself since the media is what made the idea tangible and controllable. Suddenly, with the advent of Napster type tools and the coming onset of faster computers and faster connections, ideas are set free from the constrains of their associated media and can be anywhere on demand.
It is wholly unimportant in the long run what profit model is chosen to represent audio, video, or any other information idea that we have traditionally paid for. Unless the tools are outlawed, it is only a matter of time before anyone will be able to duplicate and transfer any idea to anyone, anytime. The media industries will lose money and (whether they deserve it or not) will take losses. Eventually this will lead to a degradation of quality of information being created. (if you don't feed the hand that is feeding you, you will not get fed!)
Economics would suggest that the benefit of free ideas would eventually be outweighed by the cost of the worthless ideas created from the free idea model. As demand for quality media rises, eventually society will reach a critical juncture -- continue the current morality (acceptance of costless information duplication and transfer) or adopt some new morality that allows for the creation of quality media.
In "short" run, there is no way that I see a profitable future for certain information based industries -- music especially, since it's products are so completely pre-packaged prevalent in our lives. Sound quality will improve with better algorithms, distribution and accessibility issues will cease to be a problem as faster networks and the wireless convergence occurs, copyright controls will either be hacked or worked around, and prevalence will increase rapidly as the technology to duplicate and transfer information becomes easier to use for the common man and more widespreadly available. Until we reach that critical juncture, I don't think that either the label nor the artist has much going for them.