Stephen Witt’s How Music Got Free, I learned that with all of our technology today, its easy to share information, as well as steal it. There are many efforts to combat copyright infrindgement politically and legally, however with the growing technological field, the political and legal sphere cannot catch up. The music industry has also had its own efforts with leaders such as Doug Morris on the forefront of adapting to our growing music sharing technology. While we have the tools to roam the digital and music world, we don’t often think about the consequences on the music industry and artists, alike.

In class we discussed copyright sampling and hip hop. While I know that sampling has been one of the building blocks for hip hop, I didn’t realize how many songs really aren’t original. As mentioned, music is way less original than we think. We listened to the power puff girls, who sampled a James Brown song for their theme song, which I had no knowledge of. In this post sampling era, can we even expect originality anymore? This made me question some of my favorite artists. This also made me look on the other side of the coin; is it a talent to take a sample and create something entirely new?

We discussed the four freedoms of software as well as crowdsourcing via wikipedia. The fact that people who are experts in their field can edit an entire wikipedia page to reflect their studies and findings is amazing. Crowdsourcing allows a large amount of people who are most often unpaid to provide information to the masses. It allows people to capitalize on their own knowledge to educate the public. “Free” internet allows us to not only learn, but educate as well, which is powerful.

In class, we discussed the novice in archives and internet history. With this, we talked about archives detailing black confederates. While I knew there were black confederates, I was not aware there was such a large number. With this information, the theory that slaves were inferior would not hold up any longer. They fought along side confederate soldiers within the same capacity, so the archived letter proved that they were fully capable. Internet history has the capacity to educate and debunk any misconceptions.

In discussing frequency and sound waves, the analogy of ripples in a pond was helpful to better understand. We discussed the physical proportions embedded in the vibrations of a string. I used to play the violin when I was younger, and I always appreciated how the sound would vary depending on the amount of pressure you put on a single string. This made me think of what it takes to put into creating music, and also how I will manage our final project. Music has so many components that create endless possibilities of the sounds you can create.

While learning about the history of distribution, we learn how music can travel just as people do. Specifically, we discussed country music and how people in the city appreciated the nostalgia from their old life in the country. Although the people themselves were displaced, music allowed them to feel the comforts of home.

In Miller’s Segregating Sound, he discussed the musical color line in which the music industry has made certain sounds racialized. This is why when I think of Country music, I think of a white person. When I used to think about race being attached to a genre, I never questioned where these stereotypes came from. It was just a fact to me that African-American’s tended to listen to hip hop. But now knowing where this racialization has stemmed from, I believe its based on unfair stereotypes and prejudices.