Why is everyone so surprised that this has happened? Why does everyone think that movies and music should be free?
Was he giving away a physical format? No. What I find to be really funny is that free file sharing has actually spawned the biggest technological trend in years. Hell, bigger than Tamagotchi's.
Mp3 players. If people weren't getting free Mp3's iPods, Zune's, and the Creative players never would of taken off like they did. In fact, digital downloads from iTunes are all a result of people downloading music for free. They should be thanking those who download because they were the ones who created this new source of income for them.
Those who weren't going to buy Chinese Democracy downloaded it. Those who are going to buy it downloaded it as well. Those who weren't going to buy it may of downloaded it and then went to see them on tour and even buy a t-shirt.
Bootlegging like that is one of the greatest things that could happen to an artist. It is basically a free advertisement. It costs about 5 million to get your song played on the radio. Yeah, you gotta pay out the ass in order to get paid the 32 or so cents the artist gets each time his song is played on the radio. Geffen just had one of their artists get airplay for nothing. Think of how many people heard those 9 tracks and said "I can't wait for that record to come out!".
If there is a whole message board with a lot of posters all wishing for Chinese Democracy to come out it obviously means that downloading 9 tracks isn't going to hurt this record.
You know why? Because the record companies are actually giving us something we want to buy.
The only way this could of hurt GNR is if the 9 tracks were god awful pieces of shit that would make people say "Holy crap, I'm not buying that bullshit". Then again, if Axl stuck a mic up his ass and ran up and down steps for 45 minutes I'm sure some would still buy it. I might just for the novelty of it.