SOPA

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/01/19/anonymous-hackers-claim-to-take-down-justice-department-website-in-retaliation/

So it's the Stop Online Piracy Act... Perhaps you've heard of it? It's basically everyone up in arms like how it was with Napster back in the day.

And as I'm sitting here typing this, crazy stuff is going down. See, a preemptive strike was made, shutting down megaupload.com. It's a site where you could upload music, videos, etc. Basically, it was "legally" used for piracy, like half a million other sites are, where you get others' uploaded content. Like Napster, but less blatantly illegal. But after word got around that that happened, that brought Anonymous, a global collective of hackers, out of the woodwork. Now they're going on a hacking spree. Here's the count so far:

1. justice.gov
2. universalmusic.com
3. riaa.org
4. mpaa.org
5. copyright.gov
6. hadopi.fr
7. wmg.com
8. usdoj.gov
9. bmi.com
10. fbi.gov

But what's the big deal with piracy?

Piracy is "theft." It's people stealing things they don't believe they should have to pay for. We live in a day and age where you can have anything and everything at your fingertips. It's no surprise. It's an age where it's harder to "make it" not only because of there being less money in recorded media, but there's also so many more people fighting for the same taste of the limelight.

The old way is done. You won't make money selling cassettes the same way that CDs are on their way out. I still like CDs, but it's all digital now. And digital, people believe, should be free.

As an artist, I'm actually all for sharing media. If you want to "steal" my music, please, do. Today, you need people listening to you. No one is willing to spend money on something they don't believe in, so first you've gotta make them believe in you. At that point, you've got fans, not just people spending money blindly. You actually have people vested in you. And that's how it should be.

I have no problem "stealing" music online from sites like megaupload. I limit my buying to two cases: artists I know or see/have seen live and artists that absolutely blow me away. The second accounts for hardly any of my music. But after downloading something, if I like it, I'll tell people about them, I'll see them live, and buy merch when I see them live.

Those complaining about piracy haven't caught on. Money isn't in the media, but in the experience. Make people want to support you and come up with new ways for that to happen. Innovate or be left behind ...or, as the case is today, HACKED :)