I have seen the rising culture of blogs hosting copy written (or otherwise) music for download discussed in various places, mainly on the issue of it being right or wrong in terms of copyright and piracy, but I want to talk more about the advantages and disadvantages for a potential blogger themselves, and how this might effect them.
Is it wrong, or can exceptions be made in the light that it allows the music to reach a wider audience who may not have discovered the aforementioned tunes before?
I have thought about the idea, but often find myself feeling that if it were something I were to do (which I doubt I would, for various reasons) it would hinder my progress as a DJ, by allowing me to become known as someone who doesn’t pay for his music (See disclaimer at bottom of post*), although I do know of people who are downloading music from Hype Machine and then going and playing it in a packed club an hour or two later (I am not saying this is right or wrong).
Offering music on a blog to download for free would probably also hinder being given promos, as although a clause is ‘signed’ stating the music wouldn’t be shared, an element of doubt would probably come from the artist or label.
On the other side of the argument are artists and labels who see the blog as an entirely different promotional tool, and actually allow their music to be blogged and downloaded in order to gain them exposure, perhaps even sending the blogger free tunes up front as exposure, this functioning as a more up to date promo tool. Also more functional than the current model, as lets face it, promo lists are a dated concept, sending records to DJs who are pretty likely to think the record is shite and put them in the ‘melt down and make bowls with these’ pile.
Whereas in this case, a DJ can download tunes that HE/SHE wants and play them out, giving the tune and label more exposure by being played in public, than it ending up in the bin because it wasn’t to their tastes.
The final point, is that of course there are people who will download the tunes, whether they have been released or not, and then not purchase them if they like them. But my opinion is such that these people would not pay for the music anyway, and would most likely download their music for free from another source.
It’s an interesting topic I think, with positive and negative points to either side, one being a potential financial loss, the other being increased exposure for the artist and label, thus leading to a potential financial gain.
At the end of the day, there is no way Justice and the majority of the Ed Banger camp (I’m using this as an obvious example) would be as huge as they are without the hundreds of thousands of kids chasing the next big thing downloading their tunes from blogs.
I leave you with this thought, it functions in the same model as your local heroin dealer, offering you a cheap buzz at a discount price, he makes a loss but before you know it you have a £100 a day habit and he is laughing all the way to his own dealer and quite possibly incarceration.
*Disclaimer: I can assure you for the sake of the argument, and before there is a witch hunt at my door, the only music I download for free and play out is unreleased bootleg remixes, any legitimate tunes are purchased before I play them out, although this is something done for my own conscience and support of the artists more than anything