People who defend filesharing out of a sense of entitlement to music they don’t want to pay for make it easier for assholes like Jack Valenti and Comcast to justify breaking the internet.

The “copyfighters” are contributing more to the problem than they realize.

Kristen Hersh also had a career before going out on her own…and there’s the rub. Most of the people who are touting the DIY route are people who didn’t do-it-themselves to begin with. I mean, I love Radiohead, but they’re not in the position I am as a musician without a massive fan base. *Any* band of that size could strike out on their own and make a living.

I kind of look at people like Little Boots as more of an example of artists rising off the back of YouTube and the Net — even though she was a contestant on Pop Idol before that, she really got recognized off her videos. It doesn’t hurt that she’s cute as a button, of course.

Extremists always shout louder. I think things like the FAC statement and Lily Allen’s storm in a teacup are starting to bring the discussion to a wider audience—at least in the UK. With wider audiences comes the airing of more moderate views. Hopefully.

Kristin Hersh has been making a good job of surviving financially outside the traditional music industry. She’s paying for recording and generally living a decent life through the generosity of subscription payments. In return her subscribers get guest list privileges for shows, copies of each album when it’s ready, and a steady stream of one-off tracks to download. Or singles, as we used to call them.

Kristin has the privilege of an established and faithful fanbase, much like Radiohead had when they ‘experimented’ with self-financed downloadable music. The much harder question is how any artist is meant to get to that level in the first place without the traditional music industry.

Amanda Palmer may be the poster girl for the revolution, but she only built that rabid fanbase of alterna-kids on the back of Roadrunner’s heavy promotion of the first Dresden Dolls album. She wouldn’t be able to galvanise this incredible army of fans if starting from nothing.

It’s interesting watching The Indelicates as they try to attack the problem from brass tacks. Playing gigs, selling T-shirts, making art, and accepting from the off that actually selling records is more likely to cost them money than make them it.

Incidentally, I fucking *love* that Julia Indelicate’s recent chat with Jim Bob about this on Twitter has been quoted in press articles on the subject. Remember kids: Everything you say online is On The Record.

We live in interesting times.