In this article from Pitchfork.com, Lily Allen addresses the impacts that file sharing has made on her success in the music industry as well as her opinions of those who do participate in file sharing. She blogged and tweeted about her concerns and now the Featured Artists Coalition is meeting to determine their sole stance on file sharing. Lily Allen is doing a great job bringing attention to the issue of file sharing through vehicles like Twitter and Myspace. These sources are aimed at a younger generation, especially Myspace, so by expressing her opinions on it she may gather more attention from the youth that are engaging in file sharing. I also found it interesting that Allen hinted at quitting the music industry. She explained that she does not receive much profit from selling her music, so those who steal it even further hinder her success at this profession. I feel that many people forget that musicians do have a job to create music and Allen reminds her followers that she is a musician and this is her job. Ed O'Brien from Radiohead also added that educating those against file sharing is the first step and Lily Allen is helping address the fight.
The point of contention is simply that file sharing hinders the musician fiscally and morally. I feel that Lily Allen and Radiohead state their feelings truthfully and bluntly, and are definitely in the position to make the argument for they as musicians are feeling the effects of file sharing first handed. I also think that the Featured Artists Coalition is trying their best to find a unified stance on the issue on file-sharing in the British music industry.
I think you're right on for the point of contention but I also think it may be important to look at who's talking. Lilly Allen is great but she's not a huge artist, she's fairly popular but not on the same level. I think it's important to note that because the musicians who are hurt the most by file sharing are those like her. If they're raking in platinum albums and doing tons of shows an artist is probably less likely to care, but we really do hurt those artists who aren't as big and can't make as much of a profit when they do their job.
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