Comments on: Free is Free

By: Tom

Tom — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 11:00:07 +0000

And in all this, The The gets overlooked for releasing their last album for free over the intertubes after getting pissed off with Interscope. Sure it had been a CD release first but Matt Johnson released NakedSelf for free, track by track, and hoping people would buy the CD and future releases. (Full article, from January 2001, here)

By: rika9787

rika9787 — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 03:35:34 +0000

I think that a lot of change has already started to come from Radiohead’s online release. It has only been a few weeks so far. Madonna left Warner Music. Nine Inch Nails praised Radiohead on what they did and said that they will follow in their footsteps, and they recently left Interscope.

I agree that it is frustrating that people wouldn’t pay for the downloads. It’s great that Radiohead get all the profits. An advantage to the optional pay online is if a listener isn’t sure if they will like the new album, they can download it and see! I think many people do still enjoy the tangible CD, either for the better quality music or the inserts. Hopefully by pre-releasing online more people will buy the album since they already know what to expect. Lets keep our fingers crossed that this release will start to change the music industry!

By: hans stolte

hans stolte — Sun, 02 Dec 2007 23:29:28 +0000

Oh a free album you say, in this day and age everything ‘electronic’ can be pirated, thus the move from PC’s to Consoles to protect the game companies ‘Margins’. Software companies no longer allow you to get the ‘full’ product for download unless you are absolutley trusted, no more ‘free’ online information.

The music industry just came off worse, as if you want Hi_Def video, downloading 8GB+ of data to have a corupted film is 8 hours of your time stuffed, better off paying £10 and get the ‘extra’ items.

Music or sound can be recorded and compressed very easily, and if its not 100% while driving around in your car, well really who cares.

As for the ‘people will pay for it model’ I would assume that fewer people will pay for something that is free, if people are actually going to accept this model, then there is hope for the other pointless ideas out there ie : Facebook.

By: shauna

shauna — Sun, 02 Dec 2007 20:53:50 +0000

The band are the cover story of next week’s Observer Music Monthly so will be interesting to see what they have to say about it…

By: Cat

Cat — Sun, 02 Dec 2007 13:48:50 +0000

Surely the whole thing was a huge (and hugely successful) PR stunt? The media coverage was massive, and let’s face it, a band of Radiohead’s stature could afford to take the chance that people would pay nothing for the album or just a small amount. I have friends who never, ever pay for music – or films – as they have ways and means of downloading them for free, so in that sense this isn’t that new.

Personally, I am a bit of a purist, and always buy my CDs from my local independent record shop and have never downloaded anything in my life. Just call me a luddite!