me? wot? eh?

nah - not sitting on the fence - thought I'd explained my POV..

I see music servers as currently something that only hifi people and computer people have.

Im sure more and more people will store music on computers - computers just seem to get more and more powerful and capable of more and more things.

To look at it from a social level though, I think its necessary to look at how people use/want music in their lives.

If you had to categorise you could say there are-

1) People who have an interest in playing music for many hours each day and are always looking to expand their musical horizons.  (us?)

2) People who like music, but have smaller collections and rarely get anything new

3) Kids who are really really into about 3 bands only.

4) People who arent really that into music, and can live without it on a regular basis.

I believe that 'music servers' wouldnt interest 2) or 4). It would interest 3) - a bit. and of course 1).

There is also an aspect of the tangibility of an object, what we value and what we don't. I think there is a belief that something downloaded from the internet should be free, and something taken from a shop should cost money. I dont think that internet sites selling albums for say 6.99 - sellig an intangible asset will sway the public at large. I believe people will believe they have ''a copy'' and not ''an original''.

Just some thoughts.