Changes

The artists who were there at the beginning and who were there during those very exciting first few months took these developments badly. There was a great sense of something unique (perhaps unique in the history of Western music) that had gone terribly wrong and a sense of being caught in the middle of a boring and pointless game.

The artists who were there at the beginning and who were there during those very exciting first few months took these developments badly. There was a great sense of something unique (perhaps unique in the history of Western music) that had gone terribly wrong and a sense of being caught in the middle of a boring and pointless game.

One of the the most evocative and direct responses to this situation is a song by the artist Dyonisos <a href="http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page_songInfo.cfm?bandID=105722&amp;songID=719567">''Play my song list again, my friend''</a> which sums up the aggressive atmosphere, the drama, and the endless quest for "more hits! more hits!" -- not musical ''hits'', but simply hits on the play buttons on the artist pages, like so many mice running through a maze and hitting a button to get a reward. In other words, the tool became the master and the original usefulness of the tool became an activity which replaced the entire point of the exercise. What should have set musicians free became a depressing prison, where one spent one's days promoting music to people who weren't listening, except if you clicked their buttons.

One of the the most evocative and direct responses to this situation is a song by the artist Dyonisos [http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page_songInfo.cfm?bandID=105722&amp;songID=719567" "Play my song list again, my friend"] which sums up the aggressive atmosphere, the drama, and the endless quest for "more hits! more hits!" -- not musical ''hits'', but simply hits on the play buttons on the artist pages, like so many mice running through a maze and hitting a button to get a reward. In other words, the tool became the master and the original usefulness of the tool became an activity which replaced the entire point of the exercise. What should have set musicians free became a depressing prison, where one spent one's days promoting music to people who weren't listening, except if you clicked their buttons.

==Reality rears its ugly head==

==Reality rears its ugly head==