Downloading Music essays

Downloading Music essays Downloading Music: Useful or Harmful? Napster, the original creator of free music shareware over the internet, developed a concept that changed the music industry and the consumption of music forever. Napster enabled users to download music from a certain artist in order for them to hear what the artist sounded like before purchasing the entire compact disc. However, people who downloaded a particular artists entire CD so they would not have to buy it abused this revolutionary concept. While this was not Napster's wish, there was very little they could do to monitor it. The music industry quickly discovered Napster's free distribution of copyrighted material and took them to court. While Napster fought for the relatively new way to obtain music over the internet, the music industry countered them claiming it was wrong to give away music for free and would inevitably cut into the entire music industries profits. How often does a person buy an entire CD just for one song? What is the harm of downloading just one song? Does downloading only one song from a CD even hurt the music industrys profits? These are the types of questions answered in Downloading Music: Who Gets Hurt? by Carlton Vogt, a columnist for the InfoWorld website, written on May 4, 2001. Vogt believes he holds a neutral position in the Napster debate due to "never purchasing music or downloading it off the internet." However, his article seems to support the Napster concept. Vogt states that Napster can actually benefit artists. Due to the fact that users can hear the song, decide if they like it, and then recommend it to friends or buy the artist's next CD themselves. Therefore, furthering album sales. This would not be possible without somehow first being introduced to an artist. Vogt deems that not purchasing a CD in a store because you are unfamiliar with the artist actually ...