Dear Andy,

“Since … Napster … record sales have been on a continuous slide …”

Talk about an oversight. It turns out that I understood the researchers from Harvard Business School and UNC Chapel Hill all wrong. Their abstract directly states that “downloads have an effect on sales which is statistically indistinguishable from zero.” Here’s the link: www.unc.edu/~cigar/papers/FileSharing_June2005_final.pdf. I trust that you can read more carefully than I did! The Social Science Research Network similarly finds that “sharing does not seem to hurt the survival of albums.” In fact, Market research company Music Programming Limited (MPL) reports that 87 percent of its respondents who downloaded music, bought albums after hearing tracks through the Internet.

“Big artists … get by … but the smaller artists … take the hit.”

Besides the fact that most of these smaller artists would remain unknown (and thus unable to sell many records) without the promotion of P2P networks, there is also no existing research that supports your theory.

“… radio play costs record companies nothing.”

Andy, that’s just incorrect. Freepress.net explains how “huge recording labels pay off radio conglomerates to play their most bankable performers. Commercial ‘talent’ is pushed to the top of playlists nationwide, shoving local artists off the airwaves.” But it gets worse! While “payola” (record label to radio station) is illegal, independent record promoters, or “indies,” get paid hundreds of millions of dollars under the table each year by these labels to get songs played on the radio. Today, nearly “every commercial music station in the country has an indie guarding its playlist” (Salon.com).

Thanks,

Brett Schwartz