The NYTimes Tries A Napster Wrapup

The video accompanying the NYTimes “Retro Report” on Napster, Grappling with the ‘Culture of Free’ in Napster’s Aftermath [pdf] is pretty good, although the article text still hews to the “piracy” framing of the issue. Unfortunately, I have no idea how to embed the NYTimes video here, but it’s worth a viewing. A chance to go down memory lane…

The video, along with some interviews with artists, can also be viewed at the associated Making Music in the Digital Age webpage. Ingrid Michaelson, Amanda Palmer, David Lowery, and Tommy Emmanuel give their own takes, which can give you certain pause — particularly their own difficulties reconciling the economics of production with the production of their art. Amanda Palmer, in particular, asks a really good question, while Tommy Emmanuel and David Lowery offer opposing perspectives on the realities of the music business today. Ingrid Michaelson’s interview, more than any of the other three, illustrates the confusion that is the legacy of the peculiar dialectics of music production over the past century, and the way that the art, law, and technology have evolved to sustain the peculiar framings of “creativity.”