April 13th, 2000

So, almost 2 full decades later, what's everyone's thoughts?

I still side with Metallica in this fight.

I always thought it was strange how it was them of all bands who did it.

Remember, back in the 1980s, they were one of the first bands to openly encourage their fans to buy blank tapes for their friends and record their music onto them to get the word out about their music.

Recording albums onto blank tapes was the 1980s and 1990s equivalent of peer-to-peer downloading. So it's strange how that worked out, especially considering Metallica were the richest band in their genre at this point.

Metallica got a lot of hate for the Napster debacle at the time, but obviously history has proven they were right.

They were the first band to step up and tell the music industry, "Look, you need to deal with this right now, because once the genie is out of the bottle, it's never going to go back in."

The music biz, naturally, said "What, this computer stuff? Pfft. It's a passing fad. It'll never catch on."

...and within five years, they were like "Hey, where'd everybody go?"

Though I agree with him, Lars is still a douche.

Honestly? I despise the result of the technology more than than issues like this. The internet [basically] took away one of the major loves of my life - scouring pawn shops, record stores, thrift shops for rare cds. Physical CD trading is almost dead now, too. With that said....the internet also paid off my house [twice] with the ability to sell said cds for outrageous monies.

I guess I will just stick with the morals I have always had when it comes to downloading: If it is a new release don't - ever. If it is demos or or live stuff and the band is not losing cash, I will sleep good at night.

I agree Uncle, I miss those days spent in used music stores looking for those special finds. This new era of never leaving the house sucks.

the sentinel wrote:

I still side with Metallica in this fight.

As do I.

A lot of musicians probably feel the same, but are afraid to speak up. But someone (big) needed to step up and stand up for the artists' rights to their intellectual property.

A lot of bands/artists give up songs for free, but the idea is that they can choose which ones. It's not right to distribute their work for free, if the artist is still selling the product. And obviously it's also illegal. But it just doesn't get through to some people.

Hindsight being 20/20 and all, Metallica was right. It killed the music biz. At the time, I was firmly in the "spoiled hypocritical rockstar" camp, but I eventually came around.

Lars can still be a douche though.

UNCLE SAXON'S KICKASS CDS wrote:

Though I agree with him, Lars is still a douche.

Honestly?  I despise the result of the technology more than than issues like this.  The internet [basically] took away one of the major loves of my life - scouring pawn shops, record stores, thrift shops for rare cds.  Physical CD trading is almost dead now, too.  With that said....the internet also paid off my house [twice] with the ability to sell said cds for outrageous monies.  

I guess I will just stick with the morals I have always had when it comes to downloading:  If it is a new release don't - ever.  If it is demos or or live stuff and the band is not losing cash, I will sleep good at night.

All of this.

At the time, I had no idea what Napster was, thou I remember a friend who once owned like 700 CD's who never bought another CD, and just downloaded music from that point forward from various websites. Now he does not even listen to music, or rarely does. I believe treating music as a disposable entity as deluded people's love and appreciation for music in general, maybe I am wrong but that is the way I feel.

Downloading has cheapened music. People seem a lot less interested in it. Most people used to care about bands and follow them, now people just cherry pick songs.

UNCLE SAXON'S KICKASS CDS wrote:

Though I agree with him, Lars is still a douche.

Honestly?  I despise the result of the technology more than than issues like this.  The internet [basically] took away one of the major loves of my life - scouring pawn shops, record stores, thrift shops for rare cds.  Physical CD trading is almost dead now, too.  With that said....the internet also paid off my house [twice] with the ability to sell said cds for outrageous monies.  

I guess I will just stick with the morals I have always had when it comes to downloading:  If it is a new release don't - ever.  If it is demos or or live stuff and the band is not losing cash, I will sleep good at night.

Internet auction sites have destroyed all collectibles and hobbies. They killed the sports cards, stamps, comics, even dudes like my Uncles and cousins who would scour the flea markets for motorcycle parts. Don't get me wrong, I love to find an online deal, but I don't want to become like some people who are in a store on their phone on amazon to see if it's a buck cheaper.
At first, it was great, everything from around the world was at my fingertips; but then people stopped bringing in used discs to the local shops for resale and started selling on their own online. The stores began to shutter as they couldn't live off the pittance they profited from the greedy record companies. If the hipsters didn't bring back vinyl, then brick and mortar record stores would be totally gone.

manny wrote:

At the time, I had no idea what Napster was, thou I remember a friend who once owned like 700 CD's who never bought another CD, and just downloaded music from that point forward from various websites. Now he does not even listen to music, or rarely does. I believe treating music as a disposable entity as deluded people's love and appreciation for music in general, maybe I am wrong but that is the way I feel.

I agree wholeheartedly, many. That's a great point.

Troublezone wrote:

Downloading has cheapened music. People seem a lot less interested in it. Most people used to care about bands and follow them, now people just cherry pick songs.

Agree with this point, too. My boss has been on a Queen kick ever since the movie came out. Listens constantly. Doesn't own a physical copy of any of their albums. He is 53 and grew up buying all the mediums of music. Now, he has the "rdio" app on his phone for $15 bucks a month and has like 1 million songs in his cloud. It's basically disposable to him.

Required Fields wrote:

I always thought it was strange how it was them of all bands who did it.

Remember, back in the 1980s, they were one of the first bands to openly encourage their fans to buy blank tapes for their friends and record their music onto them  to get the word out about their music.

Recording albums onto blank tapes was the 1980s and 1990s equivalent of peer-to-peer downloading. So it's strange how that worked out, especially considering Metallica were the richest band in their genre at this point.

That's how I felt at the time too, RF; but the tape trading of the '80's had a different mentality to it. For me, a dubbed copy held me over til I got the cash to buy my own legit copy. The copy was nice, but it wasn't the real thing, no matter how cool your own artwork or logo interpretations were. I always think about the copy of WASP's "Live in the Raw" a buddy made that had the first "Keepers" album on the other side. I discovered this by accident and have been a Helloween for the last 32 years.