"It's a dying gasp of people too young to pirate, people too old to pirate, and people too poor or otherwise technically un-savvy to pirate - nominally a very t

"It's a dying gasp of people too young to pirate, people too old to pirate, and people too poor or otherwise technically un-savvy to pirate - nominally a very tiny portion of the population, and consists entirely of horrible music." Piracy isn't the issue, though. It's a red herring. The effects of piracy on the music business have been massively overstated. Even if everyone in the world stopped paying for music -- even if all music in the world became by default free -- the artists at the top of the pack would still rake in the lion's share of attention and revenue, due to touring and merchandising. In fact, that's increasingly where the revenue in the music business is coming from. In a world where the only way to make money off of music is to tour or sell merch, the winner-take-all dynamics would arguably get worse, not better. There are only so many venues out there, and only so many acts who can sell tickets and pack houses to capacity. The venues will bet on the sure things, placing increased value on the role of the sure-thing-maker. The alternative is a lot more in-music or intra-channel advertising, and it's debatable if that's a better alternative for the consumer.