The MP3 scared the crap out of all the cushy record label executives and A&R people who ruled the music industry. During that same period, the massive decrease in cost for hard disk recording scared the crap out of studio owners, record producers, and audio engineers who were all perfectly happy with the exclusivity of the record-making club: $100k budgets, giant recording studios, months on end to record an album… it was great.
And then the damn MP3, and Napster, and iTunes, and streaming audio that actually didn’t sound like it was underwater… times in the music industry changed. The record label executives who refused to change with the times went out of business (after first trying to sue everyone they possibly could to scare them… sort of like voter ID laws and prohibitive zoning laws on abortion clinics).
The point is: the music industry changed… the music “world” changed – just like America has changed.
So has the culture, the diversity, the economy, and the social obligations of the United States. All of the “rulers of the record industry” had a very, very difficult time keeping up. Many of them fought it and tried to keep it exactly the same way that it was when they came into it and made all of their money… sound familiar?
The people who hold publishing rights still sue for sharing MP3s as much as they can, and there’s some merit to that approach. An artist worked to create it, and they should get credit, but that’s about it. The country that was the major label music industry evolved with the immigration and economy-changing MP3. A lot of it is still painful for the fat cats who miss the easily-made millions they got in the old days…. but now there is more access, more music (not always better, but more), and the industry continues to change with the consumers (the metaphorical citizens of music industry-land) rather than fight them, and try to force them to stay in the archaic CD and record store-only model of music purchasing.
Washington, DC: your consumers are demanding you stop trying to sell us CDs in those giant plastic security shells. Your consumers need you to give up on the old ways that made you rich and keep up with the evolution of human culture. The citizens of the United States need the leaders to start leading rather than doing whatever they can to pull back and restrict rights.
Leaders of countries must adapt and bend to the will of its citizens.
The Democratic Party understands that – but is still flailing around like clowns trying to figure out how to do it effectively (always a bit too much heart and not enough logistics). That’s OK, though – at least they’re trying, so I can give them some credit.
The Republican Party, on the other hand, is knee-jerk reacting to cultural evolution to such a degree that they are trying to move thee country backwards. Back in time so far that maybe they can virtually “reset” sociological evolution by 70 years so they can then buy themselves two more generations-worth of political power of social conservatism and redistribution of wealth to the already wealthy.
Politicians: learn from the music industry. It screwed up a lot, and it still is, but its executives finally started to play ball with the evolution of technology and conception of music as a product, just like you need to keep up and start playing ball with the evolution of American government.
This isn’t YOUR country, politicians, just like the music as conceived by those who listen to it doesn’t “belong” to record executives… it belongs to the listener as an experience, and the listener is grateful to the artist for creating it. Just like how the country belongs to the people as their personal experience, it does not belong the politicians. If you can get your thick, old heads around that as a starting point, then maybe there’s hope for you yet.
