As I’ve said before, the sharing of music has a noble history. In fact the sharing of it used to be the significant way that people experienced music. This would either be in a formal performance setting or in participation. It was only with commodification that things changed. In some ways it is commodification that is the aberration, a departure from these finer traditions. With that departure comes a greater degree of alienation as music becomes experienced more in solitary whether in the car, on a ipod etc.

File sharing brings back a small element of mutuality in that you are able to access another person’s collection and share in their choices. Okay, it’s a rather postmodern mode of participation but it has the distinct advantage of directly connecting people based on their tastes. This, better than a bunch of commercial websites who would pre-select availability. With peer-to-peer simply anything can be exchanged that the host wants to.

It is understandable that the record industry drones on about revenue loss from p2p. It’s a very reactionary industry with virtually no capacity to innovate. And we’ve heard it all before. In the past we were constantly told how home taping was killing music. Given the excesses of an industry that has historically served to make only a very few individuals excessively wealthy this now seems absurd on looking back.

It is still quite reasonable we should pay for file-sharing. I for one would be perfectly happy to do that. We need some clever graduates to work out ways it can be achieved. For once the record industry might get off its fat arse and lead the field.