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Packaged Discontent

Napster officially declared bankruptcy today. I'll be weeping softly into my pillow tonight, to be sure.

Actually, I fully agree with David Coursey, who writes that the lingering, painful death of Napster provides "proof of a loving higher power that eventually smites evildoers":

I was about to write something about feeling sorry for the people who worked at Napster and lost their livelihoods while the investors and executives doubtless looked after themselves quite nicely. But I won't, because I wonder how a truly honest person could have gone to work there in the first place.

Of course, one could say the same about certain other companies. And look! One has. (Although Coursey is wrong about the smiting evildoers bit -- otherwise Avanti would be out of business. But that's another story.)

I suppose that Napster simply demonstrates how far people are willing to go to rationalize their bad behavior:

• "But CDs are way too expensive."
• "But the record companies are really, really, bad."
• "But Napster actually increases sales to artists -- it's a form of marketing."
• "But in the future, we'll have a glorious P2P distribution system where everyone will make money -- you copyright-happy fuddy-duddies just wait!"
• "But the record companies are trying to take away our fair use rights."

All of which are true to one degree or another, and none of which has anything to do with Napster per se.

Honestly, what are we to think of a company that poses as a Champion of the People while building its business plan on the backs of others? How cynical do you have to be? The whole thing reminds me of Rage Against the Machine. In college I truly thought that Zack de la Rocha & co. were real, hardcore, angry revolutionaries. Fighting the System. Speaking Truth to Power. (Please stifle your snickers.) Not that I was really for fighting the system... but I could certainly respect fighting the system (and as a matter of fact, I still do).

Then one fine summer day, the most crassly commercial movie of 1998 rolled into theaters, and guess who wrote the title track? I learned a valuable lesson that day about who is into rebellion these days, and why. (Interesting aside: the imdb.com page on Godzilla says, "If you liked this movie, we also recommend Armageddon." They could not have picked a better match.)

One final point: I find Rage Against the Machine's pro-Napster histrionics particularly amusing. After all, their record label is a subsidiary of Sony, which is actively trying to destroy all semblance of fair-use rights. (Sony's recent forays into copy-protected media have been less than successful, but they shouldn't worry... someone has come up with a brand-new piracy-proof format already. Hooray!)

Posted by Evan Goer on Jun. 03, 2002 at 9:29 PM