that copyright produces quality. Abolishing shoes from athletics is likely to see a decrease in running times, but that's not to say that shoes produce great athletes. Why do you insist that those entities need to be financially successful? That is not what copyright is for. If they can survive and succeed, great. If not, fine - as long as the music gets made and is available. I spoke to a colleague yesterday about this. He also didn't know of any record companies working outside of copyright with any success (although he did mention a couple that started with the free music idea and then switched to selling music once they were well-known). So... if these businesses are not able to make a profit, they will obviously cease to be (or evolve into concert ticket / merchandise / whatever companies). So the question is whether that will promote or hamper the progress of music. I find it hard to believe very many musicians would stop making and releasing music if there were no copyright. Do you think that is what would happen? I agree with you. I don't think they would stop making music (although they may need to find a day job which could cut down available hours to make music). Without the labels though, we've lost the first bit of quality control, so we'd get a mass of music being uploaded to soundcloud / myspace etc. There would be no direct feedback on the tracks from the label