Music to Our Ears - The Debate Over Free Downloads on Limewire or DC++

Music has been a part of the American culture almost since…well forever. The demand for music in American society has never been greater and there has been great debate over the concept of downloading music for free on the internet. There are various sites on the web such as Limewire or DC++ which allows users from all over the country to download music from their favorite artists and listen to it.

All of this free music almost makes you want to feel sorry for I-tunes, the suckers that actually charge people money to listen to music. They real suckers are actually the people who pay money to I-tunes to listen to their music when there is music to be downloaded of any artist on the web for free. However, the attraction of I-tunes is that most Americans still own an I-pod and need I-tunes to download music off of their computer to their I-pod.

The issue of free music has come into fierce debate, especially among the political leaders of our country and some artists and bands have been outspoken in their criticism of free music downloads. Criticism has been both positive and negative. For some of these free music program downloads, they pay the band or artist a licensing fee for giving their music to millions of people on the web. However, there are so many free music download programs that it is hard to keep track of all of them and some programs give out music for free illegally without the band's permission.

One other side point of view is that by downloading music for free, people will want to go and watch the band or artist in person at their concert. They get a chance to listen to that group's music and if they really like the band or singer they will go watch them in person which generates more money for the group in concert appearances.

The debate has raged on and Congress has taken steps to sue music downloading companies on the net. However I suspect that this lingering issue will continue until legislation is passed that can be enforced and harsher fines are imposed for people who abuse free music downloads and make profits on it themselves. The current fines for abusers of music downloading is anywhere from $5,000 to $40,000 and possible jail time in extreme circumstances if prosecutors chose to go that far.