Pirated again !

I really don't believe that each pirated download = lost sale, but it's impossible to know for sure of course.

I do know however that at least one guy that found my music on one of these Russian sites that put music for free actually ended up becoming a fan enough that he has bought every album of mine since (including some obscure stuff I published on another channel), including physical ones, and it's one of my most loyal fans to this day. And perhaps he would have never heard of me if not for the pirates. And I doubt this is a one-case situation.

Sometimes good can come out of evil, I believe.

Let me just mention two things - "entitlement mentality". Well, a rough calculation of the value of downloads I've missed out on is about $5,000 - $7,500. To which, sorry, I was actually entitled. 

"Faux moral superiority" - remove the faux, please. I don't steal anything off music sites, lots of people do. I'll also just say, nope, not superiority, just moral. 

Unfortunately - as you say, generational thing, mid 50's here, I seem to have a different view than people many years younger. But that doesn't mean to say that they're right and I'm wrong. Legally, I'm actually right, sorry.

As for setting up a Bandcamp account, etc, nope, I'm not that important a musician. But there's the general principle behind it. People do go off and clone Bandcamp accounts. They do go off, rip music off sites and put it up either for free or for a paid download, and it doesn't just affect small artists - big ones as well. It's morally and legally wrong. I've had radio play where someone will say "You can forget any royalty payments, they're worth sh*t here in Belgium". 

Unfair ? Do something about it. 

As for self righteous and delusional, no. Sorry, I'm right on behalf of all musicians, who are honestly getting ripped off. Like you, I'm not in it for the money, I'm honestly in it for the music. I'd charge nothing or very little for a download and produce CDs if there was actual evidence that those CDs would sell, but most people want something for nothing, which is a very sad state of affairs. It'll kill music. As I said, musicians will go off jamming with other musicians instead and will just stop releasing music - whilst a lot may pay for free, few have the time to recoup money by gigging - which rarely breaks even. 

I'm very happy to release music for free or low cost - but I'm not happy to be ripped off, or to see any fellow musician ripped off. 

It's a really sad state of affairs and I do wish you luck and all the best with your music, which I genuinely enjoyed. I also seriously hope - honestly - that you don't wake up one day to realise you've been ripped off for about $5k. 

If you don't believe that's the case, feel free to set up another Bandcamp account and clone all my music. We can discuss it in court. 

Complaining about something when you know there is no solution is just wasting time and energy. So, do you have a solution? Or are you just complaining to complain? I'm all ears.

So what is the solution? Shut down the internet? Execute people who copy and share files? How do you do this across borders? I honestly don't see any other way.

I don't think copying and sharing is stealing - when people share a copy of one of my tracks I don't lose my copy. I think you can only truly own something if it has a physical existence (CD, vinyl, whatever). Also if you take the idea that you can own non-physical things, like mp3 files or pdfs, to its logical conclusion, it becomes absurd. Imagine I come up with a new recipe of lasagna. If I share the recipe and someone decides to try it out, do they owe me royalties? How am I going to collect them? Should I go to court and give lawyers a bunch of money to force the guy who is using my recipe to pay me every time someone orders that at his restaurant?

It might be morally wrong, but should we legislate morality? I think that would be a nightmare, because not everyone has the same set of moral principles.

Speaking for myself, I make music because I love to do it and every time I was hired to make music I hated it. Somehow bringing that monetary reward to the forefront kills it for me. So I give it away for free, because it's either that or keeping it to myself. I end up selling a few CDs, a few downloads, a few vinyls. I doubt if I wanted to sell only the physical stuff without putting it on the net I would have even got anyone to listen to my music outside of my small circle. For bands who tour, that's how they will have to make their money. And the truth is the time when you made music off of physical records was an anomaly, for the majority of human existence, musicians made their money through patronage (still possible today) or through touring (minstrels, big bands, etc).

Should people be more educated to appreciate art and support artists? absolutely. But there really is no alternative to the current system without nuking it entirely and getting rid of the internet. Also will that happen? Nope. Do I want it to happen? Nope.

On top of that - if you put "personal circumstances" aside, look at the bigger picture. If you condone piracy of intellectual property, then that's all the Arts stuffed. Any books, music, film, doesn't become the property of the artist, it gets sold or given away by nothing by pirates. 

Not only is this morally wrong, but it removes the incentive of artists to produce work. Someone might have a MIDI keyboard and a few VSTs, others may spend months and thousands putting music - or art - or a book together. If they don't get fairly financially compensated, not many will either want to work for nothing or be economically capable of doing so. So they do something else. 

So what is being advocated is, essentially, the death of music. As we know, small, specialised musicians with lesser audiences will go first. I see on this site "I always pay for music" and my Bandcamp analytics tell me quite another thing. Frankly, the music scene has become a freeloaders' paradise: the retort is "If you were a proper musician, you'd play for nothing", to which my answer is "In a pig's eye, Sir, and if you were a proper fan, you'd support musicians properly."

With piracy and fans just hoovering up free downloads - look at the free downloads thread, nothing on it any more - music will die. Simple as that.