> It's happening without artists' consent as we speak. No, that's not "distribution". Suppose I own a shop in a lawless city where police are known not to enfo

> It's happening without artists' consent as we speak. No, that's not "distribution". Suppose I own a shop in a lawless city where police are known not to enforce property rights. I place my fruit on baskets just outside the shop, and a significant amount of people steal fruit from the front of my shop. I think you'll agree that it would be trite to call this "distribution", for the simple reason that I'm not in control of the distribution. > The hard parts are marketing and monetization. It's possible that someone might come around and fix those problems if the record labels weren't holding it back. While I agree that marketing is "hard", I don't think it's "the problem". The problem is monetization: first, there is rampant piracy, and this canibalizes sales in both the physical and digital domains, and second, average prices in the digital domain are much lower than CDs. The first problem can be solved -- though it's doubtful that the average consumer will like the solution because the end result will be for his net wealth or time to diminish! -- through a mixture of carrot (hulu.com, Spotify, and iTunes come to mind) and stick (the three strikes law in France comes to mind). The second problem is not so much a problem as a new reality. The equilibrium price of music is probably somewhat above its current price (due to the effect of piracy and the "everything for free" culture prevalent online in the last ten years [which appears, to my mind, to be drawing to a close]), but it is certainly below CD prices. In addition, buying patterns have changed and products like iTunes make it easy to purchase individual tracks, further eroding revenue for the record companies. I don't think this is a trend you can reverse, because any attempt to restrict the buyer to purchasing the entire album will be met with increased piracy. Record companies will have to, and are, adjusting to this by emphasizing other revenue streams, e.g. merchandising, 360 degree contracts, licensing revenue maximization, etc.