"How The Web Changed Music Forever"

I recently read "How the Web Changed Music Forever" in Upfront Magazine. This article was extemely interesting and talked about the effect that the internet has had on the music industry, and more directly, on record companies. In the '90s, the internet stretched the known bounds of music distribution. "Unknown musicians could post music directly to websites and promote it for free, bypassing record companies and going right to the public." This is fantastic for the musicians and artists to get their work out to the people without having to depend on the big record companies. Many famous singers, such as Justin Bieber or Psy, got their careers started by posting on the internet.

Unfortunately, the effect of the web isn't always helpful. "It wreaked havoc on the record industry by making it easy for people to steal copyrighted music, which caused music sales to plummet." So not only is the internet destroying record companies, but at the same time artists and musicians are losing money because fans are getting their music for free. Before the digital age, musicians and record producers were both being paid based on what the fans of the music bought. That seems more fair than allowing fans to steal music, possibly causing their favorite artists to lose money, or possibly (for the less popular artists) go bankrupt.

To try and fix this situation, many record companies have sued illegal music downloading sites and "helped develop formats like iTunes, where customers can legally download music for a small fee." Although iTunes has helped to fix their financial troubles, the music there is still much cheaper now than before the web. Even still, music streaming is legal, causing more and more artists to lose more and more money.

Although the internet has changed the music industry forever, whether it's for the better or the worse depends on the way you look at it.