Music fans should seek out and support those artists and independent labels that make their music available at reasonable costs in downloadable formats.

Support the artists who reach you directly; go to live shows and buy the CDs directly from them, access their websites and purchase from their eshops.

Put away the notion of ownership; you cannot own a piece of music; in terms of pure economics in the digital age, for $25, you can purchase two CDs, or you can have 3 months of digital access to 300,000 songs. In an old-fashioned jukebox, 300,000 songs would cost $75,000

Boycott radio stations that adhere to limited rotating playlists and let advertisers know that you do not support stations which own multiple outlets in the same area; you must let radio stations and advertisers know that you do not plan to patronize them.

A spectre is haunting Music - the spectre of frustrated fans with new technologies. All the powers of the major labels and the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) have entered into an alliance to exorcize this spectre: Warner and Sony, BMG and EMI, RIAA lawyers and internet service providers. Where is the party in opposition that has not been decried as criminals by the labels? Where the opposition that has not hurled back the branding reproach of digital freedom, against the more advanced opposition parties, as well as against its reactionary adversaries? Two things result from this fact: 1) The Digital Revolution is already acknowledged by all labels to be itself a power. 2) It is high time that the community of fans and devotees of music should openly, in the face of the whole world, publish their views, their aims, their tendencies, and meet this nursery tale of the spectre of the digital revolution with a manifesto of the revolution itself To this end, fans of various nationalities have assembled in the internet and sketched the following Manifesto, to be published for all to see. Music is property; this property belongs to the artists; some artists choose to sell their property to landlords (labels) in exchange for the promise of financial security, fame and publicity; the landlords decide how much property to make available for public use, and at what cost, and when to make it available

Commercial radio is redundant, homogenized and carbon-copied; fans resent that programs are recorded for multiple markets from a single location with no consideration of local flavor. Satellite radio is a good beginning with much potential; if satellite radio becomes overly commercialized, if I can no longer find unique and interesting music with a variety of channels that play music and only music, happily bereft of DJ banter, morning zoo shows and annoying, volume pumped commercials, then I will abandon satellite radio.

We willingly give entertainment media copious amounts of our time and money: let’s make them listen. Music, TV, movies and books have an almost religious influence on our lives. This gives media conglomerate moguls god complexes.

Thanks for visiting www.musicfanmanifesto.com!