file sharing

Here's an interesting article about a research paper on file sharing that is currently under attack by the music industry. [via BoingBoing]

I definitely checked out the file sharing thing late. Napster had already gone down so my first experience was with Gnucleus. Before it was emasculated, I was able to download a bunch of tracks by St. Germain to see whether I wanted to buy it. [I did] That was pretty cool. But then I had also hoped to track down a bunch of songs that I could never find on CD. And mostly that search was unsuccessful. (Although I did manage to track down the Cowboy Bebop theme song.) A few examples:

• "Ain't this the Life" from Oingo Boingo's original EP (only on vinyl back in L.A.)
• "How's the Air up There" from the Bangles' EP (on the same shelf as the Oingo Boingo EP)
• "Belly of the Whale" by Burning Sensations (on vinyl, sitting next to me from a failed analog to digital transfer)
• "Deeper Shade of Soul" by Urban Dance Squad (Why oh why didn't I buy that 12-inch when I had the chance?!)

Anyone got any leads?

Amusing side-note: the Blogger spellcheck wants to turn "Oingo Boingo" into "Ionic Bongo." Which seems like a pretty good name for a band, too. Maybe an Oingo Boingo cover band, even.