this is not a rant about fashion, rather its a rant about music.

when the cost of shipping dropped to epic lows, the fashion industry realized they could do better for them selves by having garments made in economically distressed zones and sold in economically boisterous ones. the fact that as the costs of production and distribution approached zero, there was no way to differentiate ones self and maintain profits, lead the move to "branding". Branding had been around for a long time already, but now became the central role of many corporations. what made a Nike t-shirt worth 25$ when a 3 pack of Hanes was selling for 6$? Branding. corporations hollowed out, focusing on building "mind share" to gain market share. advertisement started taking on a near holy role. Nike turns huge profits despite the fact that they now produce almost nothing but commercials. All actual goods being contracted out for production. Most companies that failed to do this were wiped out.

But this is not a rant about fashion, rather its a rant about music.

With advent of P2P file sharing and the internet, the media industries costs of distribution was entirely taken over by the end user. The costs and concerns of storage, shipping and production racing toward zero. The media companies rather than adapt opted to sue the very people removing their costs. they rely on rationalized concepts of ownership and arguments attempting moralistic parallels. Is there a difference between an mp3 gained by file sharing and one gained through official downloading? Not to the end user. The media producers have failed to even attempt to differentiate the 2.

when i listen to a classic album i don't concern my self with the payment structure of the orchestra or compensation paid to those who wired the studio for sound, or any of the other of hundreds of people who were involved in the creation of the sound. i just pay attention to the sounds.

Some companies have sprung up realizing profit can be made. many web sites sell advertising on pages that do nothing but facilitate file sharers. Its the media producers who are failing to realize that users are willing to pay for the hardware to store the media and the bandwidth to transmit it. Ether adapt or diminish. As Netflicks is now streaming content directly to X-boxes and Playstions, Blockbuster is desperately struggling to avoid bankruptcy. a result of failing to understand how to maximize the new realities of the economy.