For the past several days, I've been enjoying the new Fiona Apple album "Extraordinary Machine." I had downloaded the leaked version a while back, and am now happy to have paid my few dollars for this wonderful CD (even though some of the songs have undergone some changes, not for the better). I ended up buying the DualDisc version, which has some great video clips. The improved sound quality over the MP3s I had in addition to the nice DVD extras definitely made it worth the purchase.
In case you don't know the story, here's some background info: Epic (Fiona Apple's record label) had no plans to release "Extraordinary Machine," claiming that it had no commercial appeal, but they quickly changed their minds once the entire album leaked out on the Internet and was rabidly snatched up by her fans. Today it's Amazon's #2 seller in Music (despite Slate magazine's prediction to the contrary).
The whole debacle over the release of Apple's new CD just seems to be another example of how piracy of intellectual property is actually driving some industries. A similar phenomenon has happened in the video game arena; re-issues of classic arcade games that have been emulated on PC using MAME for years are constantly being released for all the major consoles. Turner Broadcasting System has started a new service called GameTap, which lets users download and play old video games from virtually every platform, for a small monthly fee, of course. Nintendo is set to launch downloads of their entire back catalog when their new Revolution console ships next year to counter the rampant ROM trading of classic NES, SNES, and N64 games on the web. Though they may deny it, it sure seems to me that piracy of commercially unavailable materials is sending a wake-up call to the industry; in these instances, they seem to actually be responding to existing demand among consumers instead of trying to create it using hype and marketing nonsense. What a concept.
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