Originally Posted by: RaskolnikovI'm not sure if you're trying to say Newstead was the problem or not, but I think he gets a lot of flack he really doesn't deserve.

It doesn't take a lot of investigation to see that not only was he almost totally shut out of the songwriting process, but also that his side projects tended to be much more "Metal" than what Metallica is putting out these days.




1). No matter how good or bad it may have been for artists, Napster was illegal.

2). Lars didn't file the law suit, he joined it. Take that how you will but as an enterprise, Napster was going down no matter what.

3). If mp3 sharing increases record sales (which, by the way, bands make very little money from), how could Lars joining the suit be considered greed?
4). Mp3 sharing hasn't gone anywhere or even slowed -- what has really been taking away from you?

I am aware that bands make most of their money from shows, merchandise, or endorsements. The point is, is that why shut it down when little money is lost? By keeping napster running the bands were making a good will investment; hopping that they would get more exposure. In turn people who really liked the band would buy your all of your releases. In comparison, the radio, someone hears a song that they like from the band and then buys your CD and are dissapointed with the rest of it. They then tell others that the CD sucks and not to buy it. I'm sorry if you don't see it my way but I did go to college for two years as a finance major, and shuting down Napster really does appear to be the stupidest thing that The music industry has ever dealt with.

Also I want to add that I personally did not use Napster very much before it was deemed illegal. My friends had like a 1000 songs on their PCs. I had like 2.
Of the songs they downloaded if they really liked the band they ended up buying the CD anyways. Napster was just a better version of the radio man.