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Originally Posted by Sonny Blount
I was a kid in the 80's and my older siblings were in their teens, we owned no vinyl records and purchased only cassettes. CD's were prohibitively expensive for us until well into the 90's and alot of our collectivions were copied. Most of my early musical loves were discovered on cassettes, and they were the only way to listen to music in the car.
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Okay. I think you're more an exception than a rule, but I can understand your position.
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I forgot about burning CD's, it is an important point. People are not exactly going to print and bind ebooks.
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I know people who might, but you're correct: the vast majority of folks would have no reason to do so, even if they had the ability.
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The flexibility of different formats always has a significant impact on the art it carries, from the original length of an album being tied to the sides of an LP (CD's caused a bloat of material and weaker albums for a long time). Ebooks could see a resurgance of the short story for example, where value for money considerations are more flexible due to the lack of scaling required to control printing costs.
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We are seeing something of a market for short stories in electronic form.
An old friend was bemused a while back. A random vanity Google revealed a short story collection of his work he wasn't aware of. He's written a lot of short stories, for a variety of print and online markets, and put them up on Fictionwise. His contract with Fictionwise gave them the rights to issue them as a collection, and they did do. He had no objection to them doing it, but it would have been nice had they
mentioned it to him...
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MP3s create a new landscape for bands and I would expect to see live performance return as the staple of a musicians living as well as merchandising and physical albums presented in a more upscale way.
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That's happening. An old friend is leader of an alt-rock band. They've had a couple of major label albums and a slew of indie label releases. They have a following, and make their living touring. He'd like you to buy the CDs, but if you rip them to MP3 and share them with your friends, fine by him: the more people who hear their music, the more who will come see them when they play.
It's an inversion of the market. In the '60s and '70s, the LP was the "product", and a tour was something a band did to promote the LP. These days, the gig is becoming the product, and the album promotes and becomes a souvenir of the gig.
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Dennis