Published April 10, 2005 in the Hibbing Daily Tribune
I hate it when big time marketing promotions work, especially when they work on me. I pride myself on being the bane of Madison Avenue. No shirt of mine displays name brands on the front. If “Brand X” were available at a lower price I would buy it in a heartbeat, no matter how drab and unappealing the packaging. My cereal comes from a cumbersome bag, not some elitist box.
Recently, however, I have allowed myself to become consumed by a national marketing campaign. Pepsi has been offering “free” songs from iTunes using codes underneath the caps of their soft drink bottles. Thus, for the past month I’ve downloaded as much “free” music as I can drink.
Note: In the following paragraphs I will discuss the Internet. I do so based on the following premises: 1) the Internet is not “the devil,” 2) I’m not going to ask for personal information, and 3) just because it’s on the Internet doesn’t mean it’s pornography or sponsored by a neo-fascist splinter group. For more information, send your social security number to mephistopheles@nazi-hotties.com.
To bring you up to speed, when the Internet first gained popularity, people found an easy way to exchange songs for free. Then the music industry realized they were losing money and cracked down on the practice. Now there are many opportunities to download music legally, for a modest price, such as iTunes and other services. Naturally, there are still ways to illegally download free music, but I choose not to. After all, I must deflect attention from my vast and lucrative mattress tag removal operation.
But when Corporate America attaches codes to receive free music inside the caps of my last remaining vice, caffeinated diet pop, I am at last its willing slave. My pop consumption probably doubled since last month, which means that if you cut me, I would fizz. I’ve forgone sleep in favor of 4- or 5-hour sessions of stimulant-induced convulsion. It’s not easy, but it’s all worth it when I get to listen to the savory sounds of a Clarence Carter song I didn’t have to pay for.
The nice thing about downloading music online is that you can get individual songs buried on albums you normally wouldn’t buy (or would feel sheepish placing on the counter at a store). Thus, I am proud to now include “Ice, Ice Baby,” “Rock Lobster” and “The Night Chicago Died” in my music collection. I might not have sought these songs out on a CD, but they proved just too tantalizing an option in the solitude of my home office. I can’t wait to regret their existence as much as the people who bought them when they first came out.
There are downfalls to the free music avalanche. One is that eventually you end up with a very bizarre playlist, including Tito Puente and deep Neil Diamond tracks. I like to listen to music when I’m writing and, more than once, my wife has questioned the sanity of my musical selections. Even Molly Dog seems perplexed by the abnormality of playing “Hard Knock Life” by Jaz-Z followed by Bruce Springsteen’s “Cadillac Ranch.” She vacates her spot on the futon whenever I turn on the computer speakers.
All I can say is that, hey, it was free. Eventually, the marketing scheme will expire and I’ll resume normal life, complete with occasional decaffeinated liquids and congruent musical playlists. Meantime, pass me another diet pop and fire up the computer. I’ve got some work to do.
Aaron J. Brown is a columnist for the Hibbing Daily Tribune.