i'm not saying musicians will cease to exist, but in the past a band or artist's hard work usually resulted in record sales. maybe making money wasn't the goal, but at least sales could sustain you along with touring and whatever else. now it's almost a given that your "fans" won't buy your music. you have to tour longer and harder (not a great life for most) and compromise your integrity (arguably) with corporate tie-ins to cover the lost ground from (relatively) guilt-free piracy. you could argue that the tradeoff is more/better exposure than ever before in the internet age, but if you're still making significantly less money than you would have or were in the pre-piracy era, it can be difficult to get all hippie about "doing it for the love" when you can't make ends meet thanks to your own fans. a lot of that good feeling goes out the window when faced with that reality. meanwhile here is another major label puppet of the moment or some internet sensation you won't remember next year but will be ubiquitous for a moment and sell a million singles before fading away. anyway, i think about these things and wish things were different even though they will probably just get worse.