2000s in the music industry
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
|
Related e |
|
Featured: |
In the first decade of the 21st century consumers began to use computers and computer networks as the primary means to record, store, distribute and play music. This technological shift caused widespread economic changes and fundamentally changed the relationships between artists, record companies, promoters, retail music stores, the technology industry and the consumer.
The initial stage (~1998 - 2001) of the digital music revolution was the emergence of illegal P2P networks that engaged in copyright infringment (such as Kazaa and Napster). By 2001, the cost of hard drive space had dropped to a level that allowed pocket-sized computers to store large libraries of music. The iPod and iTunes system for music storage and playback became immensely popular, and many consumers began to transfer their physical recording media (such as CDs) onto computer hard drives. The iTunes music store offered legal downloads beginning in 2003, and competitors soon followed, offering a variety of online music services, such as internet radio. Digital music distribution was aided by the widespread acceptance of broadband in the middle of the decade. At the same time, recording software (such as Avid's ProTools) began to be used almost exclusively to make records, rendering expensive multitrack tape machines (such as the 1967 Studer) almost obsolete.
