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4.14 AVERAGE
4.14 AVERAGE
Like most people, I imagined that the gradual dismantling of the music industry through filesharing was largely the result of the collective pirating conducted by hordes of music lovers/looters across the world. So while I enjoy music and books on the subject (and even still buy CDs for some inexplicable reason), I wasn't expecting any earth-shattering insights from Stephen Witt's How Music Got Free. As Witt points out in the introduction to the book, however, this massive change was actually largely driven by surprisingly few actors. In fact, he is able to chronicle the entire saga from the early 80s through the birth of Spotify by focusing on three individuals. How Music Got Free provides an incredibly entertaining account of the birth of the mp3 and the cultural and financial impact of everybody's favorite compressed audio file type.
Witt's three subjects run the gamut: Doug Morris, a top record label executive, Karlheinz Brandenburg, the German researcher largely responsible for developing the mp3, and Dell Glover, a humble "black redneck" from North Carolina who leveraged his job at a CD factory to become perhaps the most prolific leaker in music industry history. He deftly weaves between these threads in a large chronological fashion in chronicling the creation of the mp3, its fight for file-type supremacy, and how it turned the profit model of the music industry upside-down.
This approach keeps things fresh and allows Witt to dive deeply into a variety of diverse topics. How Music Got Free is almost three books in one: an analysis of psychoacoustics and file compression and how Brandenburg and his German research team were able to create the mp3, a case study on the business impact of the file-sharing revolution and how music executives (very, very, slowly) adjusted to the sea change in listening habits, and a thoughtful profile on Glover's leaking pursuits and a true-crime tale of the rise and fall of his circle of leakers. The book greatly benefits from extensive interviews with most major players, allowing Witt to really flesh out major characters and get some deep insights. How Music Got Free focuses extensively on Glover, and Dell's story is both engrossing and presented in a thoughtful and objective matter. The pirates aren't lionized as class-warrior heroes sticking it to the big record execs, and the big record execs aren't vilified as cruel and heartless automatons (well at least not all of them anyway). Witt is remarkably thoughtful and objective throughout, despite a few moments of snark (I guess I'm just angry he described Björk as a "scene queen").
Witt is a journalist with a mathematics degree from the University of Chicago and actually once worked as a hedge fund trader. That last fact probably explains why he is able to go into such lucid detail on the business strategies of major record labels. Witt also has a journalism degree from Columbia, which is likely why all of his descriptions, from how compressed files take advantage of neurological quirks of how the brain listens to music to lower file sizes to the legal messes the leakers got themselves into, manage to strike the difficult balance between being clear and detailed.
While the prose suggests a Wired feature, How Music Got Free doesn't ever feel like a bloated article. Unlike some of the insipid commercial full-lengths released in the 90s and early 00's that contributed to the death of the album, there is no filler here.There is definitely enough material to justify its length, and I almost wish that music took a bit longer to self-destruct so How Music Got Free could add a few more chapters, though I don't want to suggest that the book isn't comprehensive. Overall, How Music Got Free is a great read that will probably go down as my favorite book published in 2015. If you have any interest in music or business or even just want to read an entertaining story about one of the biggest culture shifts over the past 20 years you should definitely pick this book up.
9/10
Witt's three subjects run the gamut: Doug Morris, a top record label executive, Karlheinz Brandenburg, the German researcher largely responsible for developing the mp3, and Dell Glover, a humble "black redneck" from North Carolina who leveraged his job at a CD factory to become perhaps the most prolific leaker in music industry history. He deftly weaves between these threads in a large chronological fashion in chronicling the creation of the mp3, its fight for file-type supremacy, and how it turned the profit model of the music industry upside-down.
This approach keeps things fresh and allows Witt to dive deeply into a variety of diverse topics. How Music Got Free is almost three books in one: an analysis of psychoacoustics and file compression and how Brandenburg and his German research team were able to create the mp3, a case study on the business impact of the file-sharing revolution and how music executives (very, very, slowly) adjusted to the sea change in listening habits, and a thoughtful profile on Glover's leaking pursuits and a true-crime tale of the rise and fall of his circle of leakers. The book greatly benefits from extensive interviews with most major players, allowing Witt to really flesh out major characters and get some deep insights. How Music Got Free focuses extensively on Glover, and Dell's story is both engrossing and presented in a thoughtful and objective matter. The pirates aren't lionized as class-warrior heroes sticking it to the big record execs, and the big record execs aren't vilified as cruel and heartless automatons (well at least not all of them anyway). Witt is remarkably thoughtful and objective throughout, despite a few moments of snark (I guess I'm just angry he described Björk as a "scene queen").
Witt is a journalist with a mathematics degree from the University of Chicago and actually once worked as a hedge fund trader. That last fact probably explains why he is able to go into such lucid detail on the business strategies of major record labels. Witt also has a journalism degree from Columbia, which is likely why all of his descriptions, from how compressed files take advantage of neurological quirks of how the brain listens to music to lower file sizes to the legal messes the leakers got themselves into, manage to strike the difficult balance between being clear and detailed.
While the prose suggests a Wired feature, How Music Got Free doesn't ever feel like a bloated article. Unlike some of the insipid commercial full-lengths released in the 90s and early 00's that contributed to the death of the album, there is no filler here.There is definitely enough material to justify its length, and I almost wish that music took a bit longer to self-destruct so How Music Got Free could add a few more chapters, though I don't want to suggest that the book isn't comprehensive. Overall, How Music Got Free is a great read that will probably go down as my favorite book published in 2015. If you have any interest in music or business or even just want to read an entertaining story about one of the biggest culture shifts over the past 20 years you should definitely pick this book up.
9/10
It was interesting to learn so many details about internet music piracy. Witt defiantly writes like a journalist, especially with how he describes the different 'characters' in the book.
Amazingly written real story of big music labels, underground piracy groups and music industry in the last few decades. Long story short - while the sales of physical CDs peaked in the year 2000, by the year 2007 they were down by almost 50%, putting the whole industry in free-fall. The reason? Popular compression method that almost ended up being stillborn (mp3), improvements in connection bandwidth, invention of bit-torrent trackers and one guy from North Carolina who smuggled more than 2000 albums of the CD pressing plant to release them online weeks before their original release date. 5 stars.
adventurous
funny
informative
medium-paced
How Music Got Free is one hell of a greed and crime spree ride about the most pivotal moments in music/entertainment history that collapsed the industry’s CD business, brought piracy to the fingertips of people with computers beginning in the 1990s, gave rise to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) and forever changed the way we access music (and movies) today.
Oh, how I wish this could be turned into a movie or a docuseries. (But I know that'll never happen because of how the music/entertainment got outsmarted big time by young people.) I can't wait to reread this again one day.
Oh, how I wish this could be turned into a movie or a docuseries. (But I know that'll never happen because of how the music/entertainment got outsmarted big time by young people.) I can't wait to reread this again one day.
challenging
funny
informative
reflective
medium-paced
interested in the upcoming documentary of Dell Glover and others who features in the book. The book itself is a very interesting trail through the rise of piracy in the face of record company greed. It does favor the record companies, without going further into the policies that raked over artists, canalized the industry, turned the internet for a period into further surveillance. Overall very good.
This topic is one of my personal obsessions. I was formally diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome in 1999 now under the DSM V known as Autistic Spectrum Disorder. I am relatively high functioning, I'd like to report I just got my driver's license which is more challenging for us because we're adapted best to focus on a single task at a time and while nearly everyone overestimates their multitasking skills and actually sucks at it, And if you think you are good at it, you're probably wrong that goes doubly for someone with Autism. I do need to self report as well that I am not personally afflicted with some of the language oriented challenges that people autism have, I am sensitive to Sarcasm although if I detect a hint of it I might ask you to confirm that you're being sarcastic, I've never been wrong when I've asked for confirmation to date, I deploy a lot of metaphor and idiom in my own speech and sarcasm as a means of essentially flexing because I like to show off my vast vocabulary, my logophile nature that loves learning new words, think of me as the kind of nerd who a Great Birthday gift for would literally be a dictionary and thesaurus because ooooo new words!
I get sucked in when I visit Wikipedia I end up with so many tabs open its insane. I'm not trained as a critic at all.
I enjoyed learning about these groups, I Recently learned about Russia's using Xray film to substitute for vinyl and essentially produce bootleg music and bone music which means Piracy has been around for a long, long time, and is going nowhere. Anything that's lasted 70 years just doesn't go away. And that's despite mounting legal pressure, it isn't working. I have long decried in more personal spaces the war on piracy as Thepiratebay remains up today, and that If Laws are going to justify spending our taxpayer money, they should have to prove that they are effective in some way at discouraging the crime that they are prosecuting and essentially stamping it out.
I'm TIRED of being expected to fork over taxes for a drug war where despite fully militarized police the coast guard only catches 1 in 10 Narco Submarines and further I would have it STRESSED heavily that there is an above ground legal market for Opioids and that while OCCASIONALLY there are complications from their use in that space the rate is NOTHING like it is among those who engage in illegal use of Opioids as Addicts and get it on the black market, Where Deaths and complications skyrocket.
Lately it's with Fentanyl, and it happens essentially because the Cartels are trying to depurify it so It's less potent and to make more money, but they're cutting their product with basically safe stuff, but they are mixing it in Blenders and stuff and such the fentanyl is not evenly distributed between product so a pill you pick up on the black market is one in which the actual dosage you're taking is fully unpredictable.
Which tells you, if only we just changed the law to legally require that doctors instead of controlling access managed the cases of and kept supplying their addicted patients that Death rates from opioid abuse would plummet and tons of lives would be spared as you turned broken dysfunctional addicts into functional addicts.
And I, Now the son of a homeowner, Object to her tax dollars, being wasted to fight a Feckless ineffective war on drugs and internet warez.
Frankly too, my proposal policy wise would save far more lives than the cops do jailing addicts.
If we are truly concerned about these people and Truly want to protect them, keeping them on the legal market is the best way to actually achieve that result.
Why be against drug use unless it is for the purpose of wanting to prevent people from hurting themselves and their communities?
So if we truly have benevolent motives, and it's about saving lives, we should supply the Junkies on the streets with the pharmaceutical grade version of the drug, because Big pharma for all it's greed and ills, actually adheres to quality control standards.
I'm not saying no one will ever die on a Legal supply, but it will drastically reduce deaths from opioid abuse.
I think that's worth it, And of Piracy, Dude people have been innovating to Bootleg and get free copies of shit for 70 years now as Bone music demonstates -It's here to stay. Nothing we throw at it is going to take it down. So why Waste money fighting it?
I get sucked in when I visit Wikipedia I end up with so many tabs open its insane. I'm not trained as a critic at all.
I enjoyed learning about these groups, I Recently learned about Russia's using Xray film to substitute for vinyl and essentially produce bootleg music and bone music which means Piracy has been around for a long, long time, and is going nowhere. Anything that's lasted 70 years just doesn't go away. And that's despite mounting legal pressure, it isn't working. I have long decried in more personal spaces the war on piracy as Thepiratebay remains up today, and that If Laws are going to justify spending our taxpayer money, they should have to prove that they are effective in some way at discouraging the crime that they are prosecuting and essentially stamping it out.
I'm TIRED of being expected to fork over taxes for a drug war where despite fully militarized police the coast guard only catches 1 in 10 Narco Submarines and further I would have it STRESSED heavily that there is an above ground legal market for Opioids and that while OCCASIONALLY there are complications from their use in that space the rate is NOTHING like it is among those who engage in illegal use of Opioids as Addicts and get it on the black market, Where Deaths and complications skyrocket.
Lately it's with Fentanyl, and it happens essentially because the Cartels are trying to depurify it so It's less potent and to make more money, but they're cutting their product with basically safe stuff, but they are mixing it in Blenders and stuff and such the fentanyl is not evenly distributed between product so a pill you pick up on the black market is one in which the actual dosage you're taking is fully unpredictable.
Which tells you, if only we just changed the law to legally require that doctors instead of controlling access managed the cases of and kept supplying their addicted patients that Death rates from opioid abuse would plummet and tons of lives would be spared as you turned broken dysfunctional addicts into functional addicts.
And I, Now the son of a homeowner, Object to her tax dollars, being wasted to fight a Feckless ineffective war on drugs and internet warez.
Frankly too, my proposal policy wise would save far more lives than the cops do jailing addicts.
If we are truly concerned about these people and Truly want to protect them, keeping them on the legal market is the best way to actually achieve that result.
Why be against drug use unless it is for the purpose of wanting to prevent people from hurting themselves and their communities?
So if we truly have benevolent motives, and it's about saving lives, we should supply the Junkies on the streets with the pharmaceutical grade version of the drug, because Big pharma for all it's greed and ills, actually adheres to quality control standards.
I'm not saying no one will ever die on a Legal supply, but it will drastically reduce deaths from opioid abuse.
I think that's worth it, And of Piracy, Dude people have been innovating to Bootleg and get free copies of shit for 70 years now as Bone music demonstates -It's here to stay. Nothing we throw at it is going to take it down. So why Waste money fighting it?
informative
medium-paced
What is this man yapping about?? Like get to the factual interesting parts about tech and music- who cares what the researchers look like or what they're wearing... if the author wants to write prose he should go into litfic. Not a nonfiction book where I just want my facts straight.
Really interesting and captivating. Some storylines were less so than others (mp3 tech stuff) but it left me want to read a follow up about the rise of music streaming