Responding to a reader’s suggestion that pop music became terrible once folk could just download (legally or not) any music they desired, Megan McArdle sensibly disputes the premise, writing:
I’m not sure that musical talent is eroding so much as being dispersed. The rise of cheap distribution means there are more genres and sub-genres than there used to be–and also that acts don’t need to broaden their appeal so much as they once did. If you don’t need to get on a top forty station to make it big, you will lose the elements you once might have added to attract that audience. Conversely, the pop acts will stop trying to appeal to the genre fan base, so their music will sound worse to those of us who didn’t much like top forty in the first place.
For music, read journalism.
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