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First of all, I don't think that the majority of people who binge on promos or downloaded albums advance their knowledge of music or their taste in any particular shape or form. If anything, getting greedy and wanting to hear big quantities of what comes out on the market is creating more and more a situation where many listeners improvise amateurish journalistic efforts without having even listened to a record the way, perhaps, it might have deserved being listened to. Second, you are making assumptions about bands encouraging folks to download their music for free in a climate where record sales are falling sharply by the day: That is simply not happening and never will. Unless, of course, you still have a romantic view of the artist as canvas of artistic expression for the people. In some cases that is true, but more often than not that isn't the reality, no matter the amount of talent that an individual might possess. You Radioheads can afford to do the giveaway thing because they know that their vast and loyal fanbase will still want the product straight from the factory, but that's a very popular band which we're talking about.
edit-Pauly
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