I got a bit sidetracked and lost what I was going to say.

My point is, you can no longer measure the value of music in the simple sense of the cost of an album. I don’t see them getting anywhere with tort law considering it is borderline impossible to put a true value on what is being “stolen”.

10 years ago, streaming content was in its infancy. Now you can (legally) listen to any song out there on demand. The internet has made it possible for previously invisible independent/unsigned bands to get their music out. I would bet that while album sales are declining, actual music consumption is increasing.

Until the RIAA lets go of this traditional album model, they will continue to get outpaced by the newer, more “modern” music sources.

Since 2000 the market has begun to shift. With the advent of good applications for finding music online popular culture has become more fragmented. Rather than listen to what is dictated by pop culture people are finding niches and sub-niches of music that appeals to them. The RIAA can’t deal with this fundamental shift in buying habits because it requires signing vastly more artists for the vastly more niches. And the more albums produced simply can’t fit in the brick and mortar stores.

It’s likely that there will never be an album to beat the record set by *NSYNC. The RIAA has to accept that big hits may be a thing of the past. Their intellectual property is the knowledge of how to turn a mediocre singer into an international star, but their tricks won’t work in a fragmented market.

The RIAA and Music companies are loosing more than money, they’re loosing control. And there’s no easy way for them to adapt.

But is music downloading theft? In my opinion, yes. Theft to me is taking something that belongs to someone else, without their consent, thereby making it illegal. If an artist wants his stuff available for P2P download, for whatever reason, that is the equivalent of leaving the doors of your house open and hanging a sign that says, take whatever you like. They are losing property, and the others are getting something for nothing, but it is legit.

This is where it gets tricky, what if a person bought an album legitimatly, and then put it on a P2P service. You are not stealing from the RIAA per se, you are more taking someone else’s property (he bought the album, it is his property after all) with his permission.

The point is, the RIAA is wasting their time sueing individuals. They had to pay for tyhe legal fees for their latest “victim,” they aren’t getting anywhere. They should target large companies who are ENABLING this stuff to happan.

Napster and Kazza didn’t go far.