Culture is not free...

The term "Free Culture" is new to me, but the concept is something each one of us living in contemporary society has encountered. Recently, a college student who interns at NPR indicated that of the 11,000 songs on her iTunes playlist, she has only purchased 15 CDs in her lifetime. I won't unpack this admission here because it is done so well already in this post by David Lowery. It's a thoughtful post, but it also includes some zingers:

The existential questions that your generation gets to answer are these:

Why do we value the network and hardware that delivers music but not the music itself?

Why are we willing to pay for computers, iPods, smartphones, data plans, and high speed internet access but not the music itself?

Why do we gladly give our money to some of the largest richest corporations in the world but not the companies and individuals who create and sell music?

This is a bit of hyperbole to emphasize the point. But it’s as if:

Networks: Giant mega corporations. Cool! have some money!
Hardware: Giant mega corporations. Cool! have some money!
Artists: 99.9 % lower middle class. Screw you, you greedy bastards!

Congratulations, your generation is the first generation in history to rebel by unsticking it to the man and instead sticking it to the weirdo freak musicians!

While this is oriented to 'pop' (or 'indie') music, the implications are clear for concert music as well. Indeed, since the ceiling for commercial prospects in concert music is considerably lower than that of pop music perhaps the issue is even more important.

In a related matter, is anyone satisfied by the Spotify royalties?