Ghosts I-IV

I am, by no means, a Nine Inch Nails fan. I do think what they are doing is cool though. Like Radiohead, NiN is allowing listeners to download 9 tracks for free off their web site. As you may recall, Radiohead allowed users to download the entire album, In Rainbows, back in October of last year.

After this decision to ditch their label and release the album on their own a lot of speculation began circulating as to whether this was the wave of the future or not.

Now with NiN jumping on the free download bandwagon (in a modified fashion) it seems we will just may be getting more free (and legally so) music in the future. The hope the bands express is that if people like the free tunes, they will be willing to buy the rest of the tracks (NiN) or extra material (Radiohead) or maybe even a solid-state copy of the album at a later date.

So what's the one problem with Nine Inch Nails approach? The problem is, after all's said and done, you're still left with Nine Inch Nails music*.

*In all fairness, I did really like the addition of Nine Inch Nails music to the original Quake --- it really made the game!