Three Minds On Digital Marketing @ Organic

The popular playlist sharing site Muxtape was taken down this week, because the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) found it guilty of "hosting illegal content".

You might remember Muxtape, when we covered it on ThreeMinds about 4 months ago:

"Sometimes I get lost in all of the music-based social networks and recommendation engines and I forget that a lot of my favorite next-gen Web solutions are dead simple. I'm also a sucker for wistful remembrances of old media... File Muxtape in the 'do one thing and do it well' shoebox." Dan Sicko

We weren't the only ones who loved it's simplistic beauty. ReadWriteWeb said that "the news will run chills down the spines of countless music sharers. It's a tragedy, really, and one we hope to see reversed quickly." And while Muxtape claims that no artists or labels have complained and they won't be down indefinitely, the talk around the internet is pretty bleak.

Was this inevitable? First Muxtape, next Pandora, will the RIAA and social media ever play nicely? Even though artists like Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails are fighting to change the music industry from the inside, what will it really take for the revolution, Music 2.0?

"It's sad, really, to watch the RIAA thrashing like a drowning rat, biting and clawing at everything around it. All you have to do is take a look at history, going back to days of sheet music -- any time technology makes a copyright unenforceable, the solution is blanket licenses for use of copyrighted material. Whether the RIAA likes it or not, that's the way this is going to end. They should be hammering out the details of securing their revenue stream, not picking fights with the very people who consume their product."
Damien Boyes, Information Architecture

"Aggravation and sadness are definitely present, but I think my overwhelming emotion is impatience. This is all going to get worked out...eventually. Music isn't going to evaporate. And there will always be a way to make money in the industry. I just wish they'd hurry up and figure this out. TechCrunch has an interesting POV where they discuss whether or not one of the big players, such as Pandora, will need to go down before things really change. A sacrificial lamb of sorts. I think there are a lot of middle men who need to go under before things really change. Tough medicine, but necessary to really fix things."
Stephen Murray, Strategy

"I want my muxtape back :("
Eric Diem, Integrated Media