This newfound ease of music discovery is not, it appears, pleasing to everyone. In last Sunday’s The New York Times, writer Dan Brooks argued that, as streaming becomes the consumption of choice for more and more listeners, “we’ve made it a little more difficult to find new people.” His essay, titled “Streaming Music Has Left Me Adrift,” is a meandering argument that reasonably priced access to millions of songs ruins the discovery process, and, in turn, ruins the connections borne of that process. […] Mr. Brooks seems to prefer that music only be discovered and consumed within the oligarchy of cool within which he, and others he anoints, should exist. This brand of music elitism, with self-perceived coolness as currency, has for too long kept many potential fans from being comfortable in certain music scenes. […] streaming technology is only making those connections easier. In past years, the investment required to keep up with new, exciting music was enormous. Unless you had a great college radio station or music scene in town, or felt like staying up all night to listen to CBC’s Brave New Waves, exposure to new, especially independent music – and like-minded fans – was a difficult ordeal. File-sharing services opened the field up, but in less-than-legal ways. Today, hearing new music doesn’t have to be doesn’t have to be difficult or illegal. – Josh O’Kane,The Globe and Mail

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