What is the main message of How Music Got Free?

The main message of How Music Got Free is the revolutionary impact of digital piracy on the music industry.

Who is the author of How Music Got Free?

The author of How Music Got Free is Stephen Witt.

Economics

How Music Got Free Book Summary - How Music Got Free Book explained in key points

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How Music Got Free summary

Name: How Music Got Free
Rating: 4.7 (29 reviews)
Author: Stephen Witt

Stephen Witt

What happens when an entire generation commits the same crime?

4.7 (29 ratings)

23 mins

Brief summary

How Music Got Free by Stephen Witt tells the story of the music industry's evolution into the digital era, from the birth of MP3 to the rise of pirated music. It’s a fascinating tale of technology, greed, and the enduring power of music that changed the industry forever.

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How Music Got Free
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What’s in it for me? Learn some modern music history.

How big was your CD collection 20 years ago?

And how big is it now?

Non-existent?

It’s safe to say the music industry has changed. A lot. And quite quickly, too. But how did it all start? What really happened? Who was involved?

In How Music Got Free, the author provides you with answers to these questions. The book is also chock-full of insights on a piece of modern music history, tracing it from the early days of the birth of (and war between) the mp2 and mp3 formats to the time when concepts like piracy and streaming emerged and accelerated, stirring up lawsuit upon lawsuit from frustrated record companies.

In these blinks, you’ll discover

how the mp3 is connected to the National Hockey League;
the tactic Universal deployed in an attempt to stop the music marketplace from changing; and
why wearing big belt buckles is the way forward when smuggling CDs.

Since the early days of the CD, some people realized there was a more efficient way to deliver music.

When the very first CDs started appearing on the shelves of music stores, people who were familiar with data storage already knew these discs were an inefficient delivery system. This was especially true for those who studied psychoacoustics, the science of sound perception.

As early as the 1980s, one German team working with empirical psychoacoustic data started experimenting with digital music compression.

In 1987, a team lead by doctoral student Karlheinz Brandenburg came together at the Fraunhofer Institute in Germany. Their goal was to reduce the size of digital audio files by way of extracting bits of information and sound that were scientifically proven to be imperceptible to the human ear.

Originally, the goal was to reduce the size of a CD track, which averaged about 1.4 million bits, to one-twelfth of its size, i.e., about 128,000 bits.

After years of testing and collaborating, the team finally reached their goal. They took music from every genre and used the recordings of a single human voice, bird sounds and even jet engines in order to perfect their compression methods. Interestingly, the human voice on its own proved to be the most challenging sound to deal with. Fun fact: the team tested it by using the acapella intro to Suzanne Vega’s Tom’s Diner.

The group continued perfecting their work and it wasn’t until 1989, when Brandenburg collaborated with James Johnston, who was working independently on his own psychoacoustic algorithm at AT&T-Bell Labs, that the quality of their compressed files started to sound indistinguishable from that of a CD.

Getting the mp3 recognized by the standards committee was a losing battle.

Armed with decent-sounding compressed files and funding from AT&T, the Fraunhofer team was set to submit their work to the technical standards committee: the Moving Picture Experts Group, or MPEG.

While awaiting approval from MPEG, the team was oblivious to what lay ahead: a format war and a host of political battles.

It was the internet that allowed the mp3 to win the format war.

Even though the financial support from the NHL helped keep the mp3 afloat, the Fraunhofer team knew it wouldn’t be the answer to winning the format war in the long term. They weren’t discouraged, though, as they knew they had a superior format. What they needed was for people to listen to it.

So the team decided to make a bold move that would, unbeknownst to them, mark the beginning of the music-pirating revolution. In 1995, under the threat of being driven out of business by the Philips-backed mp2 format, the Fraunhofer team decided to give away their mp3 conversion software – called L3Enc – and their PC mp3 player application – called WinPlay3 – for free on their website.

What started as a small side business for a CD-manufacturing employee soon became an all-consuming lifestyle.

If you downloaded mp3s between 1998 and 2008, as incalculable numbers of people did, chances are most of the files came from one small town in North Carolina. Here’s how it all began:

The biggest mp3 pirate in the world, a man by the name of Dell Glover, had rather humble beginnings as a computer hobbyist who happened to be an employee at the PolyGram CD-pressing plant in North Carolina.

Tightened security at the plant couldn’t stop the leaks from coming.

In 1998, while Glover was in cahoots with RNS, PolyGram and Universal Music merged. As a result, security measures at the plant became more stringent. However, the merger also meant that Glover now had access to the most sought-after music in the world.

Glover didn’t actually steal the CDs himself, though. Rather, he coordinated with coworkers and informed them about which CDs Kali was requesting. And despite random searches, X-Rays and closely observed inventory, CDs somehow always managed to make their way out of the plant.

Until 2007, RNS was able to avoid authorities and ran the most successful pirating group.

Getting busted for releasing The Fix was a huge blow to the whole RNS operation, but soon things began picking up. After seven years working at the plant, Glover was promoted to assistant manager. Thanks to access to security information and his new role in scheduling shifts, he was then in an even better position than ever to sneak out CDs for RNS.

Yet, both Glover and Kali knew that they had to take more precautions if they were to continue without getting caught. After the The Fix incident, Glover stepped back from RNS for a few months, but when he returned in early 2003, he put together a safer approach where leaks would be postponed until two weeks before their public release date, when the discs had actually left the plant.

The music industry wasn’t prepared to adapt to technology.

For a while, arguably the most powerful person in the music industry was Doug Morris. He worked for Universal and brought some great labels into the Universal Music Group. It was a line-up of artists from Marilyn Manson and No Doubt to rap powerhouses like Dr. Dre, Jay-Z and Eminem.

Thus, when Universal and Polygram merged in 1998, earnings forecasts seemed impressive. Except that the impact of the internet was completely ignored.

It took the music industry years and more missteps to come to terms with the digital revolution.

When Napster died out, the idea behind it evolved into massively popular torrent sites like PirateBay. In reaction, labels and the RIAA were forced to come to terms with the changing market.

Universal and other labels still filed new lawsuits, even though labels like Warner Brothers disputed the tactic of continuously filing them.

It now seems clear that lawsuits won’t deter pirating.

Despite the numerous lawsuits filed over the years by RIAA and other labels, it has done very little to deter the general public from pirating. In fact, when those responsible for supplying pirated music were put on trial, the results opened up an alternative perspective on copyright law.

People all over the world became increasingly reluctant to punish others for file sharing.

Streaming music may bring about the retirement of the mp3.

Over the last few years, the public’s preferred way to listen to music has continued to evolve and as CDs go extinct, music-streaming sites like Spotify have become the standard.

Unsurprisingly, research has shown that the majority of Spotify users have indeed stopped pirating music, but with this they have also stopped buying albums.

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What is How Music Got Free about?

How Music Got Free (2015) tells the remarkable story of the mp3 file, from its inception in a German audio lab to its discovery by a man working in a North Carolina CD-pressing plant, who would eventually team up with a piracy group to bring the entire music industry to its knees.

How Music Got Free Review

How Music Got Free (2015) is a fascinating exploration of the music industry's transformation in the digital age. Here's why this book is worth reading:

It unveils the untold story of how MP3 piracy revolutionized the music industry, revealing the dark underbelly of the digital music era.
The book delves into the lives of key characters involved in the piracy scene, humanizing a complex issue and providing a unique perspective.
Through meticulous research and compelling storytelling, the author crafts a narrative that keeps the readers captivated, ensuring the book is far from boring.

Who should read How Music Got Free?

Musicians and music consumers
Anyone interested in copyright law
Anyone interested in internet freedom

About the Author

A member of the pirate generation, Stephen Witt holds degrees in mathematics and journalism and has worked in economic development and the stock market.

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