My company [cdbaby.net] is one of the main distributors of music to Apple iTunes, Rhapsody, Napster, etc.

I gotta admit that when we started doing digital distribution two years ago, I thought it would be just a small income stream for the musicians - some extra income, maybe $5k/month combined.

But our checks from Apple et al have been over $300,000 a month so far this year! And that's just for our catalog of mostly-unknown all-independent music. (And hey for the record, 91% of all that income goes directly to the musician.)

NOTE: a lot of this discovery of independent music is thanks to cover songs [cdbaby.org] - another twist I never expected.

Yes us alpha-geeks here on Slashdot may get our music from allofmp3.com or SoulSeek or whatever, but there's definitely millions paying that 99-cents-per song, or $20/month subscription out there. I get to see the detailed sales reports every month.

(Personally, I'm so impressed with Yahoo Music Unlimited [yahoo.com], that it's making me want to use Windows again!)

"Overall, once they stop focusing all of their energy on litigation and lobbying for worthless copy-protection standards, they will begin to create a market-driven system that people will gravitate to and embrace."

You're assuming that the litigation and copy-protection has had no influence on the results we're seeing.

NOTE: a lot of this discovery of independent music is thanks to cover songs - another twist I never expected

The first lesson a band learns is that bookings come easier when you do covers.

How exactly are they measuring the usage of the P2P networks?

Id be willing to bet that combined, P2P as a whole would dwarf all of the legitimate distribution models combined as well.

It's odd how journalists often refer to peer to peer networks as "sites", because normal people don't know that the internet != the web. But it's more than a semantic distinction, of course. Now people who see the term "p2p sites" will think that you go on to some website owned by someone, and you download all this copyrighted material from a single centralized source, which is completely wrong in most cases (allofmp3 aside).

I wish journalists were more informated about stuff they wrote about.

1)I refuse to pay for DRM on principle
2)I can't use it on my linux box anyway
3)I have better things to do with that kind of money.
4)I don't rent anything I intend to use long term. Not a house, not a car. Why the hell would I rent my music. If I can't buy it and keep it, I don't want it. The only things I rent are books fromt he library, and thats because they're free.

I've seen him post before long ago. He's around and has been for a while.

Beyond that I've bought things from CD baby over the past few years and they are a GREAT company that gives artists a good deal. You should be praising them, not burying them.

My favorite CD from them so far has been The Haight Gang. Great stuff.

I found out this week that a bookmark i had to some site that catalogged .torrent files was now stale - imagine my surprise when i went to that bookmark only to find the page covered with "sponsored links" and no torrents for me to peruse.

I didn't try and find other places for more .torrents. I just stopped looking and did something else.

I haven't looked for any kind of music online in a few years because its too much work. I dont want to install crap, i dont want to uninstall spyware, i dont want to worry abou not getting all of a file, and i dont want to be sued over a couple of songs that aren't any good to begin with. Hell, when i see mp3 files with naming convenitions i disagree with, i get upset and dont want the work of making sure the ID3 data is right and what not.

iTunes is really, really convenient. I haven't bought anything from it, but my wife has when shes looking for some specific song for some reason or another.

I think the value proposition is that paying 99 cents for a known quantity is more convenient than wasting a bunch of time and perhaps needing multiple attempts to get the same thing.

Apparently this value proposition is working for alot of people.

linuxbaby - excellent post! Now, is there any way to know whether any given artist is supported through cdbaby when shopping at iTunes - frankly, I don't mind 99c when most goes to the band but will stick to allofmp3 for all other fat-ass artist ripoffs - alternatively, do you or can you post on your website lists of disributed bands?

I would like to point out that in your post you use the word legitimate in the same way as the R*AA. Legitimate downloads are only those where the suits get paid.

This appears to ignore MP3s freely offered for download by the artist or label (and usually here we're talking about indie labels, not the majors who typically only let you stream a song or two) and it definitely ignores the fact that people who trade songs freely are simply engaging in the same kind of behaviour in which we have ALWAYS engaged.

Or did you never trade tapes with friends in the "old days"?

Thats assuming they don't continue to put out new music that I like and want. If they do that, I need to continue my subscription. Gee, putting out new good music, what a concept. Of course it does seem to be one the record companies don't get lately.

...the movie industry was losing money on opening day box office receipts...

Solution: make better movies so people see them at the theaters?

I called apple asking if I could restore music I purchased from itunes after my laptop got stolen and they let me do a one time re-download. Tell me that when your cd's got stolen from your car tower records let you have new cd's... I thought that was pretty cool. :)

I think that, as has been said, it is about convenience more than cost. Hypothetically, if there were an artist who isn't available on itunes (I am an avid itunes user) and I wanted a song/album by them, I would hypothetically find it on a free download site. It wouldn't be that I don't want to pay for it or am not willing to pay for it, it is that I am not willing to get my chubby self up, get in my car, drive to the music store, buy a CD that has 11 other songs on it I may not want, talk to the record store employee who has never heard of the Rolling Stones but recommends some Britney Spears, drive home, and then load that CD into my itunes....
Perhaps I am naive- but it is my understanding that when someone wants your product, you make it as easy as possible for them to buy it. Forcing people to do it your way, especially when that way is archaic and inconvenient, is going to lose you sales/customers. There are lots of examples of this in the business world- there are many hard to buy products/hard to shop at stores. Perhaps they don't care that they are losing sales...
I was a freshman at a large state college when Napster was the rage. Although I was a poor college student, it wasn't about the cost, it was about the convenience. Having friends over and want to hear a certain song? The record store closed an hour ago, and you are too drunk to drive anyhow- download it! Girl coming to your dorm room in half an hour, and you need to download some Barry White- download it. During those days I wished for a way to download clean copies of single songs legally- so when it became possible, I was all into it, and I use itunes all the time now.
With my cable company I have movies on demand (with full rewind, ff, pause etc), but I still hate being pushed into the mold of the networks (cable or otherwise) that I have to watch shows when they want me to. I will be excited when i can subscribe to say, a Seinfeld library or simpsons library where I can watch whatever epsiode I want, whenever I want without having to buy expensive DVD sets.
Also, re: opening day movie sales v. DVDs- I used to enjoy going to movies, and the consensus amongst my friends is that the reason we don't go anymore is a: $8.50 to see a movie so that some actor can make 20 million a movie is irritating, and the bigger deterrant- other moviegoers. People talking, yelling into their cell phones etc. during movies is so prevalent now that I have given up movie theaters, and instead have a decent home theater system. An usher in every theater for the whole movie may bring back people like me. Why spend $18 for two tickets, $5 for popcorn, $8 for a couple sodas etc. when you can buy the dvd the day it comes out for $20, or a week later for $10? Then you can watch it again and again...
It is all about convenience, for me.