I take it you've heard the news?
A bunch of blogs I frequent have basically gotten ass-jammed, this one is no exception. Word on the street is Mediafire is next.
It seemed to me that the newest crop of bands, whoever's big right now, just kinda accepted that sharing music, while not immediately profitable, was a boon to their cause. Sure, there's a certain percentage of assholes who just hoard music and offer nothing in the way of support, but it seems that there are still a large number of people who are willing and perhaps even eager to support their favorite bands. I mean, didn't Coachella sell out? Isn't MDF pretty close to selling out? Of course, these are huge package deals, but that's still a point worth noting. Didn't musicians have to rely on some sort of network of other musicians way back when, to help with orchestrating shows and getting the word out? That should be easier now than ever before. Granted, the life of a touring act can be quite haggard, but isn't that just part of the job?
Anyway...we'll have to wait and see what comes of all this. I get the feeling that it may be the beginning of a domino effect, not just for uploading sites and music sharing, but for the internet in general.
I had read somewhere that in response to MU getting shut down, Anonymous attacked a couple of government websites. The ease with which Anonymous seems to be able to shut down government sites is almost alarming. Perhaps there's a few in high places? Hard to say, considering how divided they come off as most of the time.
In regards to the article, it's kind of a bummer that the prosecution is referring to the company as 'Mega Conspiracy' because, really? Is that how you choose to perceive this? Still, though, to be entirely honest, I don't want some federal shit-head kicking in my door.
Fuck. I don't know what this means for Team Little Things, or any number of the other blogs of our ilk. I plan to keep writing (and hopefully getting better at it) and hopefully the other dudes on deck will, too, but it's hard to say where things are headed.
In any case, I hope that despite what happens, the few people who do read this shit decide to stick around and converse and trade ideas and all the other stuff that the internet affords us.
Should everything go south and the whole game is changed, thanks for reading this meandering rant. I hope that in the short time we've been around, someone somewhere discovered something worthwhile. If nothing changes, thanks still anyway, and hopefully there will be even more stuff to dig on and enjoy.
Bong rips and bacon strips to our blahg-roll and to the handful of followers we've accumulated. No love for the prosecution (eat a dick).
xoxo
Czar Nicholas
CEO and God-Emperor of Little Things, Inc.
a subsidiary of Omaha Industries
8 comments:
I really cannot say what the future holds for music blogs. I would like to think that I would still post about the albums that excite me but I am sure that my "audience" would dwindle down with no actual music to download or Youtube clips to watch.
Screw 'em - just me ranting to 7 people then!
To me this whole thing is very similar to when OiNK got shut down a few years ago and the creator got hit with a bunch of charges. Dude beat 'em (although it took a few years), but everyone was shitting bricks for a good while. But in its wake a bunch of other sites in the same vein started popping up. I feel thats what the case might be in this whole fiasco.
Shit is pretty unnerving, regardless.
@Mr. Maim: I feel pretty similarly. This blog, and others like it, may not be huge nodes for taste-making or anything even remotely useful in a mainstream sense, but I don't think many music bloggers ever set out to be such. Hell with it, I'll keep ranting about the stuff I love and/or hate, regardless.
@Charlie: I watched the Megaupload video with all the famous celebrity types in it, and it occurred to me that if they can rope in rich people, odds are they have the cash to fight whatever legal troubles may come their way.
Oddly, the shut-down occurred a day after I started an account on MU.
Anyway, as someone who gives away all the music I create, this is kind of a bummer. Some people create just to create. While it's pretty apparent that many used said service to share stuff, there were still many who used it for legal purposes.
While I can't blow all the cash I have on new music, I do still go to shows and support artists as often as possible. There are a lot of factors to take into account and it certainly seems like the rich are only concerned about staying that way. Fuck 'em. The old model holds no water anymore, so it's time to change. Those who can't keep up will be trampled and subsequently eaten.
It's amazing, the whole "guilty until proven innocent" behind this entire SOPA/PIPA congressional push. As usual, the heavy ham-handed government stepping into a world they absolutely do not understand and will never have the capacity to control. And while more hosting sites will unfortunately follow in the steps of Megaupload's shutdown, new ones will keep popping up. I remember years ago when Rapidshare.de got the plug pulled and I thought it was the end of music blogs. Yeah, good thing I'm not a betting man. Whether it's torrents, some other peer-to-peer, or just new file server sites, the sharing of music is going to continue to happen as much as it did when everyone on the block taped my copy of "Shout At The Devil" onto their Memorex D60's.
Call me on this if I'm wrong, because I don't know much about much, but are bandcamp accounts not run by the bands themselves? I know quite a few artists offer their stuff on the website for free. Granted, this does nothing to help discovery of older, more obscure bands or simply recordings in general, but it's gotta mean something. I dunnooo.
This all blows pretty hard.
Bend over and grab yer ankles Suzie-May, this is gonna get a hell of a lot worse before it gets any better.
I can't really say how many bands run their own Bandcamp sites, but you're right, a lot of people do give away free or cheap digital editions of their albums. That seems to be the only way to go at this point. Makes me think of The Rich Man's Eight Track Tape.
Whilst the complete removal of Megaupload from the Internet by the authorities is a ridiculously over-aggressive and frankly fascist response, it's Kim Dotcom's many other illegal activities that have seen him come into the firing line. The whole "Megaupload encourages piracy" arguement is pathetic. Do Smith & Wesson encourage armed robbery and murder because guns can be used for such? Of course not, a product alone can not be at fault, but rather how people choose to use it. Now, because of the plug being pulled on all of Megaupload, countless legitimate users have been inconvenienced. I guess an extreme analogy would be to liken it to nuking an apartment building because one resident is found to be a terrorist or something. As such I support Anonymous' retaliation.
I have no sympathy for the Dotcom himself as the man is pretty much a serial fraud and comes across as a massive tool that society would be better off without. The site and the users should not suffer for the big boss man's crimes.
Haha I never actually meant to call him "The Dotcom" by the way.
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