[grawprog]

I don't buy music from labels or online shops. I go to either an artists website or somewhere the artists will directly get the money from it or i'll buy albums from shows. I've probably paid for more music in the last few years than I did most of the time as a teenager. I feel a lot better giving my money to people who are more directly involved in creating the music than large companies that produce albums for them. Hell i've even bought some new recently produced vinyl albums in the last couple years. When I was young I refused to use places like hmv so all I did was either pirate or buy music from shows. Now i've replaced pirating with buying music online.

The thing is there's just so much music now. The artists you represent may be more popular but there's so much more competition for people's money. There's music i've bough I enjoy from artists whose shows i'll probably never get to see. I spend a lot of time listening to concerts and such these artists freely post online, i'm enjoying their music, legally, but I haven't paid for it.

There are a lot of things contributing.to lower album sales. Piracy, while i'm sure contributes doesn't seem to be the biggest problem. Plus i've been hearing this since I was a kid and cassette tapes were being blamed for killing the music industry because people could just record anything they want off the radio or a friend's cassette so album sales were dropping.

[EADGBE]

Labels get their money regardless of where you buy it from if they have a stake in the album/band.