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You can listen to the entirety of James Blunts new album on his Myspace, so I guess this isn't the first big name artist to try something radical. I just wonder myself what difference it will make, everyone who downloads all their music for free will keep doing so anyways, so what's changing financial wise? The music industry will keep nosediving because of the people who increasingly won't pay for their music. It's kind of ironic, because these same people always say that "I wouldn't have bought it anyway", obviously, that's not the case.



Bands offering their albums on Myspace has been going on for years; however those are usually poor quality internet versions or bands nowhere near the caliber of Radiohead. James Blunt is not Radiohead. This is their full album, most likely in a high bit MP3 format, and you can pay whatever price you want.

Most of the diehard RH fans (and their are millions of them) will pay for the album when it hits stores next year. It has been reported that the $82 Diskbox set has been more popular than the potentially free download. That's likely because you can only get it via the online site, plus it has that 2nd CD worth of material. That's not included in the download nor has it been confirmed for release with the store CD next year.

The music industry isn't in such dire straights as they let on. They only made 10 billion this year instead of 15 billion (made up numbers but you get the point). I think they will still survive.

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