or do you take the higher road?

I am a musician, and I download music from Kazaa.

I mean seriously, unless I only want to buy the bubble gum crap that gets radio-play, how else am I going to get to listen and evaluate music before I buy it?

I am a student, and a very poor one at that. I don't qualify for any financial aid (because my PARENTS make too much, but that does dick all for me), nor do I receive bursaries or support for being part of any visible minorities. I'm making 9 bucks an hour at work, and paying down a $6,500 Credit card debt, the only school loan I did qualify for given my 'status'. I can't just throw my money away on any CD that I think might have promise.

So, I download a song or two by various artists, and see if I like them. If I do, I go to a listening booth in store to hear more of the CD. If I still like them, I look through used CD stores. However, these stores rarely have what I want, considering the CDs I like are the ones people keep, not the top 40s that people magically realize suck after owning them for a month. So, I usually have to go to the store to buy them new.

Kazaa doesn't help me to steal music. It helps me to support real artists. That's a fact. The only burned CDs I have are mixes of songs from CDs I already own.

Higher Road? Kazaa is the higher road.

MrBliss said:

Sure I use em, nothing wrong with that. We put a $ sign on most things in life, music is not for profit, profit is just a nice by product.

I am in the category of downloads from kazaa and then buys cds for music i like. My brother in law is in the category of burning 20 cds at a time and not buying the music. If kazaa wasn't available he probably would only buy one or two of the CDs, but still I don't agree with this.

Being Edward de Bono-minded I think that the music biz will need to come up with new ideas anyway. In someone's post the other day, I think Otan, he was saying the merchandise is a big part of the income. So if the record companies focus on other aspects of income, the CDs could almost be seen as promotional material for something else like merchandise and concerts.

nevermind
[This message was edited Sun Feb 23 20:10:00 PST 2003 by MrBliss]

MrBliss said:

Bliss - do you take the high road?

I use Kazaa like a mother. I don't burn copies for friends, but yeah, if I read about an interesting P song on here that I never heard, I'll go grab it asap. Kazaa is/was great for getting bootlegs/rare/unreleased Prince stuff. Prior to Kazaa, I spent $100 on Jewel Box II (WHAT a RIP). With Kazaa, I can go through, pick out the ones that I like.

And yeah, with new music, I'll check it out. I do buy CDs still, occasionally. I won't lie - I WOULD be spending a lot more on CDs if it werent for Kazaa.

And I'd be spending a lot more time at the used CD store, unloading them after 6 months.

I prefer WinMX. Kazaa is ok, but I don't use it much. Come to think of it, I don't use WinMX all that often either (once a week). I use it to listen to good stuff- not the crap offered by music stores.

otan said:

no i don't take the high road.. i do download music... but i make no lame excuses... it's wrong

If I had unlimited income, I would buy every cd I want. Since I don't, and I am barely getting by, I usually copy cd's from my friends and make copies of stuff I have for them. I don't go on Kazaa, but I used to go on Napster. Usually I would download bootlegs, unreleased tracks, or remix versions that you can't buy anymore.

I only download things from Kazaa, if they dont have it no more..fi it's just ONE song I want... if it's a program i cant afford...a rare remix unheard...

I haven't tried Kazaa yet, I uze Limewire, I only download hard 2 find material R music that iz out of print.

I will try Kazaa.