A MP3 is a short for MPEG level 3 compression. It is a file format which allows to encode music (or any sound..) into much shorter space than many other formats. The invention of this format allows people to download music off the internet and to share it with friends.
In essence, it also questions the value of a record... When you pay a fucking 20 or 25$ for a record, how much do you think you're paying the artist??? 10$? Ah! 5$? Maybe, but in most of the cases, who gets rich are the megacorporations. Do you really think you're paying for the labour of an individual??? Once recorded, producing a CD costs about 30 cents! Probably less! And the worst thing is that they've raised the prices of retail blank CD-ROMs, supposedly to counter "fraud" and illegitimate copying , because, yes, it is possible to copy a CDROM. All you need is a CD-writer that you can install in any recent computer for about 300 to 600$, depending on the quality of the device you buy. In fact, the immediate effect of this raise is a clear and simple doubling of the expenses for private authors (as Orange Seeds) that wish to record their own CDs or simply people who need the technology for any reason.
The same goes for MP3s. The big companies panic because people can now copy songs indefinitely for 0$ without any loss in sound quality, which was not the case with tapes or Vinyls. So they band together to sue copanies like MP3.com or individuals like the author of napster, a MP3 distribution system, that in fact have nothing to do with the actual "crime" itself of copying music but that simply ease the process of doing it. O such hypocrisy from these megacorps! Their mission is supposed to be to communicate the music of the authors they're supposed to represent but on the other hand, they try to shut down any attempt to widely publish the said music. Why? Because their motivations are NOT to publish music and raise public awareness to it or to the message it carries but are really economic interests. And anyways, if they would let the fury of music and creativity of the multitude of authors and creators they have contracts with, it is very likely that it would include a lot of stuff that would go against them or their partners.
Did you know that there is about 3 or 4 big companies that, through one way or another, sell the heaviest majority of all the records sold on the planet?? These are:
It would be interested to build a list of record publishers/editors. Making a hierarchy of your ennemies is a good idea. It's not that hard. Just pick every CD in your collection and when you hit something like:
(C) Outpost recordings. All rights reserved.
Manufactured and distributed in Canada by
Universal Music, a division of Universal Studios
Canada Ltd.
...You know you've got a new one!