That reminds me of when I did my taxes a couple of months ago. I used to pay an accountant to do my taxes for me. Over the last five years, I have done them myself with tax preparation software. Each year, the process gets even easier as the software improves. This year's program upon installation imported data from last year's return and from my finance software so that before I even started, I was already more than halfway done. I was amazed at how quickly I moved through the program. Within an hour, I was finished even though I used the long form and itemized. Another few mouseclicks and both federal and state were electronically filed.
I wonder if all the accountants and tax lawyers of the world are going to get together and force the government to stop the sale of software like TurboTax and TaxCut so that their profits can be protected too.
It will be interesting to see how things turn out for the recording industry when all is said and done. I still think they can make money off digital music if they play it smart. But in the worst case scenario, at least the recording artists should have no problem making a decent living performing concerts.
After all, the very first massmarket musical recordings were made to promote performers over the radio so listeners would come to see live performances.
There is a way to make money off digital music - it's just that it won't have the fat margins to which the RIAA has become accustomed.