The past ten years have witnessed an outright transformation, both in the music industry itself (as a reaction to the new normal), and among the people who most listen to music (who have decided that changes needed to be made). On the vanguard of this transformation were companies like Napster (with busting open the doors of music sharing, before they were ultimately stopped) and Apple (who attacked the problem by introducing the iPod, turning music storage into a common cell phone feature and creating the iTunes music stores) that had the foresight to realize that charging people $18 for an average of ten songs is a little on the absurd side. After all, how much is a single song (which will probably be a little boring in a few months) worth, anyway? Some people even used to posit that with the Internet being what it is, everything should be free. Copyright holders fight this tooth and nail, however.
On the one hand, the Internet is all about sharing things. We are all sharing our information with one another, whether we know about it or even desire to do so. Why do we not also share the fruits of our intellectual labors with one another? Most successful musicians will still be paid a fortune for the concerts they perform, and their record labels and agents will also get their cuts. This is a fair exchange. But rather like many ads, these could be argued to be primarily about getting the artists’ names out there and building up their fame for the ultimate payoffs.
On the other hand, people (and the companies which support those people) deserve to be compensated for the work they have created. In much the same way as the writer of a book should receive royalties when a new copy of their book sells, the creators (musicians, writers and producers) of a song deserve to be compensated when someone wants to own it.