"Art for arts sake, money for Gods sake"

If you are interested in distributing your work via the miricle of the internet then David Gratton's blog should be required reading
amongst other things he has posed the question "What if music were free?"

Okay, so he was referring to the audio file in the context of the "new musical experience" and the need to put together a media package that would enhance and support the purchase of music, but let's pre-suppose that, in the current climate, the audio file has reached the point of negligible monetary value, what will happen if "music" is free?

Well for a start the artists would vanish.
It’s simple economics. If there is no financial incentive, or perhaps more importantly no potential for monetary gain, then we will see the demise of the audio artist.

Now I expect to be taken to task about the above statement.
Surely, you will argue, the accessibility of the new delivery systems via the internet & associated technologies will only encourage the blossoming of talent, and that would be a fair conclusion.

You can argue that any emerging artist needs exposure, and “giving away” audio files is an accepted marketing tactic. However, there will come a point when the artist will crequire some recompense for their efforts.

This is a perfectly logical progression. How many of us aspire to become professionals, to make a living out of doing what we enjoy, namely making music?
In order to advance our skills (we all know practice makes perfect)it is almost a pre-requisite that we devote more and more time to the art.

However, unless you are someone of independant means,the real world impinges on your quality creative time and somehow or other you have to find the lucre from more mundane pursuits to keep body & soul together.

If,and this may have already happened, the music is going to be increasingly dependant on the window dressing to sell, then you have to question the value of creating that music in the first place - it may sound awful but its delivered in such a pretty box wrapped in ribbons that it will sell by the boatload. Is that really what we want?

Alternatively, the other option is that the musician will have to take on the production role for the packaging and associated bells and whistles.
Now many of us are quite able and keen to take on creative control of our "product" but wouldn't wearing many such hats by very definition detract from the time we could devote to the core of any offering, the song itself?

However, take a look at the quality of some of that “user generated content” currently available. I don’t even pretend to be a taste guru, but even the most open minded listener would have to concede that the majority of it is, frankly, below standard.

Can Clapton paint? (its a rhetorical question)