I am really pissed right now. Okay maybe not pissed but kinda upset.

The Recording Industry Association of America is taking aim at my beloved music server Audiogalaxy. Apparently they are concerned that Audiogalaxy is the new Napster and that they aren't doing a good job of filtering out copyrighted materials. Well, the RIAA needs to realize this -- there are SOOOOOOOOOOOOO many music files out there and SOOOOOOOOO many different titles for music (both copyrighted and not) that it is virtually IMPOSSIBLE to stop all music. All people have to do is change the spelling of a word or put in a line from the song instead of the title and voila...there it is and audiogalaxy is none the wiser. I mean lots of the Madonna songs are not downloadable. You have to REALLY search for them because they are there...but it's hard to find.

RIAA has to realize that this "industry" is not going to die away. I mean if it wasn't for Audiogalaxy, I would never have my copies of Carries the Musical, Toshi Reagon, Norah Jones, and Jane Monheit. And I love all four of them. They just rock.

I think the RIAA should have seen tonight's episode of 20/20 where they showed that there is a form of payola out there that goes to independent distributors who pay stations to play a song or songs. According to these guys, it can cost up to $500,000 just to get a song on the air. So if you want to be a music recording artist you had better have deep pockets if you want to even THINK of getting your song on the air. So some of these smaller artists like Norah Jones and Jane Monehit NEED people like me who download music (and great music at that). I may be willing to pay a premium price ot get this music under the proviso that it goes to the artists and not to the pockets of record producers.