I personally hope that piracy is now viewed more as stealing than in earlier days. I think there is a greater understanding that the culture of music as a whole

I personally hope that piracy is now viewed more as stealing than in earlier days. I think there is a greater understanding that the culture of music as a whole will suffer if we don't put any money into the system. I at least hope that members of the HN community don't view relying mostly on piracy to get music as morally OK. The problem is that digital music is a type of good that is mispriced by the free market: a public good. There needs to be just enough money to going to the artist to get the album recorded, and once that amount of money is there, there is no incentive for anyone to give more money. Giving more money won't make it easier for more people to get the music, because distributing it digitally is pretty easy/cheap. Kind of like a public park. Because this incentive is only there up to a point, the good gets mispriced.