http://archives.cnn.com/2000/TECH/computing/08/23/nearly.free.sex.idg/

As Peter wrote the music industry has done everything within its power to eliminate file sharing. The music industry sees money running out the door and the only solution that they see is eliminating file sharing all together. The same thing happened when the VCR was first introduced in the 1970’s. The major motion picture companies did everything that they could in order to keep the VCR from entering the market because they saw the immediate loss in movie ticket sales instead of the potential to sell videos to individuals to watch at home. The motion picture companies failed because the public pushed hard for their right to watch videos at home. This is similar to the alcohol prohibition that happened between 1920 and 1933 in the United States. There were many people that backed the consumption of alcohol during this period which made the laws hard to enforce. Eventually the United States decided to allow for the consumption of alcohol so that they would have better regulation over where the alcohol was consumed and who consumed the alcohol. The adult films industry has taken a similar approach. Many major adult film companies have decided that they best approach is not to work against the consumers of the good, but to work toward a common goal of appropriate artist reimbursement. One of the ways that they have gone about accomplishing this goal is to provide small sample of the work online free of cost. Instead of making it harder for the consumer to obtain illegal material the adult industry has taken steps to make it easier to obtain legal material. The thought is that once the consumer has sampled a portion of the work that they will be more willing to spend money to receive the whole work. In order to get the consumer to purchase their product the major companies provide video clip samples that are arousing in nature instead of satisfying. The consumer is then moved to purchase the goods that will satisfy the arousal that the video sample created. The incentive created by the video clip sample is similar to the way that Cosco provides food samples of many of the products that they sell in order to entice consumers to purchase those products. This is an innovative approach that has helped the adult film industry to combat illegal file sharing. I believe that if the music industry would take a similar approach that they would find similar results. If bands provided free a free sample of one of their best songs online than consumers might be enticed to purchase a CD. This is especially true for a new band or for a person just getting into new to a type of music. If someone has never listened to country before but decides that they would like to give that particular genre a chance than they would want to sample a number of different artists before purchasing an album. Currently the easiest way to sample music is to download numerous free illegal music files in order to sample and listen to the music. The music industry should follow the adult films path and make it easier for interested individuals to legally download music.