Steve Knopper, and the Spectacular Crash of the Record Industry

In his new book Appetite For Self Destruction: The Spectacular Crash Of The Record Industry In The Digital Age, Rolling Stone business reporter Steve Knopper frames the last 30 years of digital music against a backdrop of fear, ignorance and big bucks, to present a compelling narrative. We caught up with him to find out more.Music Ally: In your book you investigate a series of mistakes in the history of digital music, but what was the industry’s biggest error?SK: I think it was the industry’s reaction to Napster in the late 90s. It decided it would sue Napster out of existence and adopted a very offensive and defensive strategy for dealing with this, and I think that to an extent that was appropriate.But I do believe the next step the record industry – in the form of the major labels – completely missed was viewing internet downloads and internet distribution of music as an opportunity, and that really bit them in the butt.MA: Why do you think the industry was so unprepared for the internet and digital music?SK: The record industry has had a resistance to new technology going way back. Traditionally, the people who run record labels are not [...]