1633 The San Francisco Bay Guardian has an article up by Victor Krummenacher of Camper van Beethoven. It's an interesting perspective piece by an artist who's getting paid by the iTunes Store (after a lot of his work has gone out of print, physically):

At least now I get some reflection of online sales in my royalty statements. I know it can be hard to understand for some of you, but I've worked really hard for a long time in the music game. Royalty checks have helped me stay afloat from time to time. It's been a big deal for me. But I haven't seen a check for mechanical royalties (compensation paid to each person with a legal claim to the composition of a song that has been recorded) in some time – in part because much of Camper's profitable catalog was out of print for a while, surely being digitally reproduced and downloaded for free by the folks who really wanted it. Even when sales are good, it can take a year for your record company to get back to your publisher. And when every penny helps, well, downloading can kind of suck.

Read the rest of the article. Besides raving about the iPod, Krummenacher presents both the problems with free downloading, but sees a positive side to it, and the fact that digitial music stores are slowly starting to change the way the music industry works. Revealing commentary from a working artist.

Bill's been using Macs since the late 80s. When he's not making smartass remarks to amuse Kirk Hiner, he enjoys fighting for the user.

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