Friday Five
You know the drill.
1. Who is your favorite singer/musician? Why?
Oh, for the love of god. I can't possibly answer this. I love a lot of different singers and musicians for a lot of different reasons, depending on my mood.
2. What one singer/musician can you not stand? Why?
This list is equally long, for largely the same reasons.
3. If your favorite singer wasn't in the music business, do you think you would still like him/her as a person?
I listen to music, I don't pay attention to personal shit. So I have no way of answering this question.
4. Have you been to any concerts? If yes, who put on the best show?
Probably the most consistent fun I've had at live shows is They Might Be Giants. Doesn't matter about the venue, large or small -- they always make me laugh.
5. What are your thoughts on downloading free music online vs. purchasing albums? Do you feel the RIAA is right in its pursuit to stop people from dowloading free music?
Stealing is wrong, any way you slice it, but I take a practical approach to it: I really don't have a problem with someone downloading music if it's to listen to it to decide whether or not they like it enough to buy it themselves, as long as that's the end-goal. To that end, I see it as the moral equivalent of borrowing your friends' CDs to make sure you really want that Wayne Newton collection before you buy it yourself.
Should the RIAA be subpoenaing and suing people to stop them? Probably not. I see it as a high-publicity but probably ultimately ineffective way to manage the situation. The public already views the RIAA as the gestapo end of a corrupt business, and having them sue 12 year olds living in housing projects for stealing music isn't going to help that public image.
Nope. The horse is already out of the barn -- no sense in closing the doors now. The more the RIAA does to support the efforts of companies trying to legitimize commercial music downloading (like the iTunes Music Store), the better.