For some time now, I've been hearing about how, in the near future, we're

gonna be able to download music off the Internet instead of buying a CD in

a record store. Here's how it has, in the recent past, been explained to

me: You pick a song, you download it to your hard disk, you get charged a fee.

OK, but then what? What if I don't have a computer in my living room, where

I like to listen to music? Or what if I want to listen in the car? What

good is a song on the hard drive of my computer?

I can now tell you that the future is here and that -- while record company

executives have good reason to be pulling their hair out -- all the pieces

are finally in place. Many of those questions that I kept asking every

time someone started talking about electronic distribution of music have

been answered.

The other day, I acquired one of the first MPMan portable players -- which

is about half the size of a cigarette pack -- to reach the U.S. In a matter

of minutes, I had loaded about an hour's worth of MP3 song files that I had

downloaded off the Net -- actually a rare acoustic performance that Billy

Corgan gave at the Viper Room in L.A. earlier this year -- from my PC to

the player, headed out to my car, plugged the player into my car stereo

using the same $20 or so adapter that I use to connect my portable CD

player to my car system and was listening to Corgan play acoustic versions

of the not-yet-released Adore songs as I drove through San Francisco.

Like I said, the future is now.

Only there are problems. The major labels, through their lobbying arm, the

Recording Industry Association Of America, have been busying fighting the

proliferation of MP3 sites, websites that traffic in bootleg songs. And

well they should. If you can download the music you like for free, what

impetus is there to buy a CD?

While fighting piracy is something the RIAA needs to do, what it -- and the

labels it represents -- seems to have ignored is the need to develop a

strategy to make use of the revolution in audio (and video) distribution

that is occurring right now.

Kids around the world are downloading sound files and listening to

the songs on their computers. They will certainly buy up MPMan players. So

why isn't the record business working with hardware and manufacturers to

make it easy to pay for songs or albums you download?

FYI: In no way do I support the stealing of songs. If an artist is cool

with live versions of their songs that are not available on CD being made

available online and the label they are signed to has no problem either,

great. But bootlegging, be it on- or offline is not cool.

That said, I'm a huge music fan. And I love the Smashing Pumpkins -- I've

got all of their albums. I wasn't at that Viper Room show, but thanks to

the Internet, I have a sense of what that performance was like. It was

awesome.

I believe that if cheap portable players ($200 or less) -- be they MPMan

players or some other player that would also allow an album or more worth

of songs to be played through home or car systems -- were available, and if

there was a straightforward way for people to purchase songs or entire

albums online and download them right to their computer, that most people

would do that.

Perhaps there might even be a way for artists and song publishers to get

royalties from the live show performances -- like that Viper Room show --

that fans are posting on MP3 sites.

By now, with decades of experience collecting royalties, the music business

ought to quickly be able to figure out the details and then get all the

online record stores, fan sites and any other sites that want to sell music

involved.

Really, whether they know it or not, they have no choice. It's either

figure out a way to ride this revolution and make it work for them, or

chaos will ensue.

With the arrival of the MPMan, the number of people downloading MP3 files

will only increase. Listen up music business! Get on the bus or be left

behind.

The kids have already voted, and the verdict is that they want to be able

to download songs. Right now.