[itzmygun]

What other product are you forbidden to sample before you buy? I can test drive a car, I can try on a shirt. I have purchased about 10 albums this year that I would have never bought if I hadn't been able to check out some songs by downloading them from Kazaa - something the recording industry says is hogwash...

[LibertarianInExile]

Toilet paper.

Not that I disagree with your point.

[Sacajaweau]

The industry is concluding that everyone who downloaded was a buyer who would have gone to the store and made a purchase. To stretch it, that means when I turn on my radio and hear a song, I violated their copyright and my actions were a lost purchase. Everytime I rent a video, I violated their copyright and my actions were a "lost purchase".

The truth of the matter is that the music distribution industry has a monopoly and the public is getting ripped on extraordinary high prices for these "cheap to manufacture" CDs. The solution "Boycott the Industry" for a month.

[randog]

What other product are you forbidden to sample before you buy?

Plenty, but I think a better argument would be 'how many industries force you to buy their entire product line instead of a single item?'. It's like going to McDonald's and having to buy a Big Mac and Fries when all you wanted was a shake.

The music industry is suffering through one of the worst slumps in its history and blames the rise of digital music for its much of its pain.

Hogwash. The music industry could be taking advantage of the digital music medium to offer singles online instead of entire CD's full of music their customers don't want.

[majordivit]

Good point. In fact, the decline in revenue for the recording industry has nothing to do with so called music pirating. It has everything to do with tons of crap that passes for music. Most discriminating music listeners are not quick to buy a CD because they heard one song 50 times on the radio or saw one music video 10 times on TV. They wan't to know that the CD contains mostly good music and not mostly filler garbage. They won't know that just by listening to one so called hit song. It's not like the old days when you could count on a band or artist releasing a record that contained mostly good songs. Today, it's just the opposite. I do not purchase a CD unless the amount of good music is greater than the amount of filler.

[freekitty]

"What other product are you forbidden to sample before you buy? I can test drive a car, I can try on a shirt. I have purchased about 10 albums this year that I would have never bought if I hadn't been able to check out some songs by downloading them from Kazaa - something the recording industry says is hogwash..."

Yeah, they should bring back single 45's. But they would find a way to honk the public for that too.

[elfman2]

"What other product are you forbidden to sample before you buy?"

Art, clothes, shoes, jewelry, furniture, computers, beer etc… Of course there's probably a rare exception to each of those. Just like how you buying 10 CDs a year of sampled music is the exception to the all the kids downloading millions of tracts worth billions if dollars with zero intention of spending their money on what they can get for free.

I don't like the recording industry any more than you do, hyping their over priced crap. I also don’t like the advertisement industry or the insurance industry, but they all deserve legal protection.

[Wondervixen]

Why is downloading music from the internet any damn different than popping a cassette into your radio boom box and getting it from your favorite radio station?

[temp]

Do I need to burn my library card?
How many books, magazines, and news papers have I
checked out or read at the library?
I'm sure that the writers and publisher of
of all these books/magazines/News papers that are being shared through the library have no plains to sue anybody.