[The Flying Mouse]

Originally Posted by robgomm

I had a friend who had 100's of songs on his PC including bootlegs from various shows. He also had a HUGE draw with pretty much every official release at that time on CD and Vinyl. So I got into him by listening to these songs that he had on his PC.

So your friend had the hard copies, and he had the albums on his computer?
Did he download the albums on his computer from the internet, or did he upload his original CDs? (even with my limited knowlege on the subject, i'd say the second was more likely).

Even if he did download them, if he hadn't downloaded them I think it's safe to assume he would have uploaded the CDs to his computer, yes?

So even without an illegal download you would have heard Meat's albums on your friends computer, without the downloads you would have become a fan, so that leads me to think that downloads have had no effect on you discovering Meat whatsoever (feel free to correct me here).

Originally Posted by robgomm

Then years later I bought CHSIB which I absolutely loved, went to a few concerts etc. But I wanted more. I wanted to hear Meats performances from the 70's, 80's, & 90's, at shows that had never been and never would be released for everyone to enjoy. Obviously I had heard some of the stuff from my friends PC but I wanted them for myself. From there it just snowballed, I got the bootlegs of various shows from over the years, then got every single release ever done, plus the DVD's.

So apart from the bootlegs, which are not officially available (which means IMO they are not stricly the same topic) how many albums have you bought and how many did you illegally download?

If you bought all Meat's official releases since hearing (officially sourced) albums on your friends computer then you have discovered an artist through legitimate and legal copies of his work, and have proceeded to legally buy the rest of his available discography. Downloads don't enter the equasion.

If you have downloaded all Meat's albums yourself, you have discovered Meat through legitimate releases on your friends computer then decided to rip them off the internet rather than buy them (which would rather prove my point).

Originally Posted by robgomm

So while I would agree that in the vast vast VAST majority of cases people will continue to download things illegally, there are exceptions such as myself and Stretch.

Until you correct me about how i've understood what you've wrote, they look like completley different cases.