Groove is in the Shark

In one of my music business classes, I just found out about GrooveShark. GrooveShark is an online music streaming site. If you read any sorts of music news, they have been on the trend lately. In 2008, they were illegally sharing song that were not copy written for them. How bizarre. In an article that I read, a former employee shared an e-mail sent to every employee at the time. It basically stated that all employees should collect as much music and then share with the world. So, as said, many of them ripped songs and put them into GrooveShark’s database and then shared with the world. The whole point was that back then, they shared files everywhere without permission. Not only are they saying “it was the past” but they also said in an article that they are looking forward to the future plans they have planned.

Back in the day, the best thing was when a good friend created a mixed CD for you. I know, it is probably not the same as a mixed tape (which by the way, my dad made me one). I loved mixing a CD together for someone as well. I was the “DJ” for my parents. I make them CD’s when they wanted something to jam to while driving. I know Deloy said he does not listen to CD’s in his car. What is his deal?? I STILL make CD’s for my car. My car is still old enough to only have a CD player in it. My first car had a cassette tape player in it, though I never used it.

What it boils down to is that I did not know I was file sharing. I could have gotten in trouble (or still could) because I am sharing music that people did not purchase themselves. Now that I have an iTunes account, I purchase my songs on there. Before that I would use software such as LimeWire and FrostWire. My influential friends showed me those programs and that created an opportunity for me to download WHATEVER song I could think of. I has such a ‘mind blow” happen. So, I thought it was so great that I could get songs, create playlists for me and my friends, AND it is free. Wow, little did I know that my teenage self could have gotten into some legal conflicts at such a young age.

Now I stream a lot. I like Spotify and Pandora. Pandora has changed so much since I began using it. Before I could skip so many songs, listen to little ads, and have a great selection of music. Recently I still have a great music selection, but now it is more of less skips between stations and TONS of ads. How rediculous. Spotify is great, I can listen to a whole album AND it is free. I like the different stations and they give you the songs that are in the playlist so you can see what you may like or not like. Both are good “free” websites that I can take everywhere.

Maybe the whole streaming and downloading thing should have a little notice once you start to let people know whether what they are doing is legal or not. I think some people do it out of not knowing that downloading songs and not purchasing them could be dangerous. Some though, are hackers or part of the illuminati. Either way, with this day in technology there should be some way to let people know that doing something ‘bad’ such as using programs that have had a legal past is something to second guess.

For those of you who do not get my title, your welcome.

[youtube id=”gzoEK545j64″ width=”” height=”” wmode=”transparent” showinfo=”1″ autohide=”0″ quality=”auto]