Would The Offspring support Napster in 2012?

[findout5]

Well, what do you think?

Back in 99 they did. Pretty Fly was the most pirated song up to that point, and they said it didn't harm record sales...au contraire.
With CO1 the band and Columbia got into a huge dispute about sharing the whole record for free. They reached the compromise where Original Prankster was downloadable and one US fan would win 1 million dollars.
Nowadays they seem to make a lot of jokes about wishing this is their most stolen / pirated record, etc....and considering the way downloads changes the music industry I do get the why of the sarcasm.

So...would The Offspring support Napster in 2012?
What's YOUR take on it?

[TheNooseIsFalling]

I think they look at illegal downloading the best way a succesful musician can and they don't give a flying fuck about it. Even without record sales, if there's enough hype around an album or a song, the band will continue to be succesful. Fans (like myself) who support the band will continue to buy their records, and as evidenced by the sales of YGGF,K, a lot of people still buy music legally. The whole piracy thing, I think, is really only bad for up and coming artist who have it hard enough already these days, there's nothing more despicable than a millionaire whining about "their music being stolen" LARS and suing their own fans.

[Llamas]

If you mean, do they still support illegal downloading, unlikely. Even the most hippie liberal bands and singers don't like it. Recording concerts is one thing, but people downloading music for free instead of buying it is another. It has hurt the musicians. I don't know any musicians who support illegal downloading as an alternative to buying music.

[JohnnyNemesis]

Speaking generally, I pretty much expect people's views on various things to change when 13 years have passed, so it's certainly not a safe assumption to think they support something like illegal downloading. And yes, the music industry has changed to the point where it seems like album sales are more important in some ways than they were before.

[GamerKT]

If you mean, do they still support illegal downloading, unlikely. Even the most hippie liberal bands and singers don't like it. Recording concerts is one thing, but people downloading music for free instead of buying it is another. It has hurt the musicians. I don't know any musicians who support illegal downloading as an alternative to buying music.

You're probably right about them not liking it, but it doesn't hurt bands as much as you think. I mean, not famous ones like The Offspring. Most bands make their money off merchandise and tours.

Like, this album is $12 for me. $12 every three-ish years from tens of thousands of people? Okay.
Concerts are what? $40 or higher? $40+ for many nights of the year from thousands. <--This is way better. Also, plus shirts.

Pirating hurts indie artists, definitely, but huge ones like The Offspring aren't hurt too much at all, especially when they also have a hot sauce empire.

Can't wait for this album to be delivered tomorrow.

[_Lost_]

If they were to have the "most pirated album ever", they would probably also have one of the top selling albums, because people clearly want to listen to it. Nobody wants all their music to be stolen, because they don't make money. But if a lot of people steal it and like it, a lot of people will probably buy it too. If their album is listened to by more people, they sell more concert tickets and merchandise. While they certainly wouldn't want everyone to steal their album, they want everyone to hear it. Its kind of a catch 22.

[Llamas]

Speaking generally, I pretty much expect people's views on various things to change when 13 years have passed

This. If anyone still holds exactly the same views they held 13 years ago (unless they're like 80), I don't want to know them.

You're probably right about them not liking it, but it doesn't hurt bands as much as you think. I mean, not famous ones like The Offspring. Most bands make their money off merchandise and tours.

Like, this album is $12 for me. $12 every three-ish years from tens of thousands of people? Okay.
Concerts are what? $40 or higher? $40+ for many nights of the year from thousands. <--This is way better. Also, plus shirts.

Pirating hurts indie artists, definitely, but huge ones like The Offspring aren't hurt too much at all, especially when they also have a hot sauce empire.

Can't wait for this album to be delivered tomorrow.

It's true. Bands don't make a ton of money from their album sales. However, album sales pay the label, and then the label pays the band. If an album doesn't sell enough, a label may choose to drop a band. Because album sales have decreased so much, labels are limiting the number of bands they sign, and going for people like Bieber and Gaga whose audiences are less internet-savvy and are more likely to buy albums.

[Britpunk]

When Napster happened, it was fairly difficult to purchase music digitally, and CDs were relatively expensive (a new album would routinely cost 14GBP, upto 18-20GBP for a back-catalogue album). iTunes wasn't launched until 2001 and when it did it was crippled by portability issues thanks to their shitty DRM. So while the music industry was utterly failing to recognise the shift on the horizon and react accordingly, systems like Naptser, and later Limewire and then Torrents were making music incredibly easy to obtain. Of course most of us were on dialup in '98, so you'd need to set aside a good few hours to download an entire album, but the means were there.

For a while, Pretty Fly held the record of the most pirated single (it may still do, but I'd be interested to see recent figures if anybody knows a source), and yet Americana went on to sell over 10m worldwide (~15m?).

So here was a technology that was effectively promoting the band and ended up giving them their 2nd best selling album.

Today iTunes (sans DRM!), Amazon et al offer an incredibly easy, and relatively cheap way to provide access to music (what other industry has seen the cost of its 'product' halved in the last 10 years?). Broadband is ubiquitous so an album can be bought and downloaded in minutes.

And yet the music industry landscape today is very different. Album sales are declining. 'Singles' (i.e. a song with 1 or more b-sides) are devalued and band-loyalty is pretty broken. Youtube and Spotify allow you to listen to whatever the hell you want for nothing, and of course as we recently saw, torrents can provide access to music before it is even released.

So frankly I don't see why any band, having spent a fair bit of money, time, and effort creating an intellectual entity, would be in any way happy for that intellectual entity shared around for nothing, particularly when its so damned easy to just buy the thing.

In conclusion - I don't pirate. I like to pay the band (and whatever distribution mechanism has enabled me to do so) for their art. In fact today I went and did that (UK release date Jun 25!!) and I have a lovely physical thing in my hand that I very much like and will enjoy for years to come.


TL;DR - piracy is retarded.

[KickHimWhenHe'sDown]

I have pirated quite a few albums, and over the next few years, I plan to buy them all to make up for it. I don't have like $400 to spare right now or anything, so it'll be a process.

[Llamas]

I have pirated quite a few albums, and over the next few years, I plan to buy them all to make up for it. I don't have like $400 to spare right now or anything, so it'll be a process.

This is where I'm at, basically. I'd buy every album I love if I wasn't so broke and could find the albums I want here. I've pirated albums in the meantime, but I plan on buying them, as well. It's important to me to support the bands I like, and to own something physical.