Music is, and will continue to be, shared among the masses. When someone hears a song or band they love, they will spread the word. Some people will burn copies of CD's for friends while many others find ways of sharing with people online by using Torrents or applications like Limewire. Even basic applications like Project Playlist give people the ability to put together a list of music that others can listen to when visiting a site of theirs.Ever since music has become more 'viral' and easier to share for free, the Music Industry has made a fuss. Due to the ease of sharing that today's technology, combined with social media provides, music labels have lost a bit of money in record sales. And no matter what they do to try and stop it, people will figure out ways to get around it.
Project Playlist banned
If people are going to spread the word, let them. Music labels complained and successfully got Project Playlist, a very popular application that allowed people to share playlists of music that they enjoyed, disabled on MySpace and Facebook. By taking this down, I believe it took away some very good free advertising.
Let's say I were to visit someones Facebook page and happen to hear a song on their playlist that I really liked. There is a good chance I would go purchase that song or look more into that particular band. It seems to me like that band just received some good, free, word-of-mouth advertising.
Sharing Will Happen
Like I said at the beginning of this post, people have always shared music with one another. It's part of human nature to share what is good and enjoyable. Before the Internet, it was only possibly to share with those around you. Now you can share music with people on the other side of the world. Labels have tried to stop people from sharing illegally, yet so many people do it that it's an impossible task to accomplish.
Although music labels are continuously losing money (although it's not enough to hurt them too much) because of free sharing, they should begin taking more advantage of that same capability through social media. MySpace is full of bands who post a few of their songs to try and get the word out about who they are.
It makes sense that the music labels should try to make the best out of this situation that they will never be able to control. By letting people use applications like Project Playlist they will continue to get free advertising all over the world. It's true that not quite as many people will purchase music as in the past, but it will be sought out all over the world and there will still be those faithful people who purchase music legally.
I, for one, will continue to discover new music through social networking. I'll "trial" the music online, and if I enjoy it enough I will most likely purchase it. The music industry can't stop others from sharing, but we should try to do our part to support the labels as well as the artists we enjoy.
~Connie Jo
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