Does it pay ?

[MrBud]

Maybe a bit naive of me to ask,but i have not been around the music industry in a while,
and was noticing that Springsteen's newest album just appears on you-tube..? the full album--
I was very much set on purchasing this one in the next few days,and really got disillusioned about the whole
piracy thing.
I'm sure,it would not take me long to simply find a way of recording the album right off you tube with not much problem--that's kinda sad... How in the world to make $ in "record" sales etc?? 
I see now,that these guys tour their butts off is one way.
Any solutions to this in the future to benefit/safeguard music on line ?
There must be a way.
PS: Feel like sending $5 to him myself ! shitty.

[peterp]

I feel that the audio quality coming off things like you-tube and many of the mp3 download places is horrendously low. The compression and clipping to get file the size down makes things sound not good on a relatively decent sound system.
I know I and many of my friends will audition something on one of those services then buy the disk.

I prefer picking things up on dvd-audio which is not easy to find, or blu-ray audio or sacd, failing one of those options I get a cd.

The one friend that uses downloads gets his files from i-tunes (paid by file) and uses it as filler house music, playing in all his rooms through blue-tooth or something similar.

As for getting youtube (or any other of that kind of service) files, use firefox and the NetVideoHunter plugin http://netvideohunter.com/

[Ferryman_1957]

I've found youtube, Grooveshark and similar have had the opposite effect on me. I have been able to explore and find new music that I would never have discovered through traditional distribution media. I can listen to it before buying, generally if I find something I like I buy an mp3 download. The artist can connect directly with me the buyer without having to rely on radio airplay, CD/record distribution etc.

I think this benefits young and new artists, although it makes it harder for the big, name artists to sell megamillions of CDs. But in some ways that's a good thing, because music is not so dominated by a small number of lucky artists that have the massive marketing machine of a big label behind them.

[MrBud]

Thank you,this is some really good information i'll look into.
So much has changed over the years,it's like the digital Wild wild west out there.. !

I guess the days of the record company [as they used to be] are coming to a close

Thanks,
George

[Hilary]

You can actually make money off Youtube now, if you get enough views. Let's face it, it doesn't apply to me (!) so I didn't take a lot of notice but from memory it's something like 50p per 1,000 views (presumably from advertising) - there's money in merchandising too (apparently!)

I've got 35 views on Youtube and a keyring - I'm not planning a world cruise just yet!