SXSW Offers Torrent of 2009 Acts

Major labels may be…ahem…slow to recognize the benefits of filesharing but not everyone in the music industry is so dense. Case in point: South by Southwest.

The premier music festival of the year has once again posted on their site the mp3s of this year’s acts. That’s great, but who wants to scroll through the entire site downloading one file at a time? Nobody, and the SXSW organizers seem to recognize that and in years past even created a torrent of the files users could download all at once.

Well, SXSW isn’t doing that this year, but they have allowed a user to do it and it’s available to all without fear of retribution from heavy-handed labels. TorrentFreak reports:

For the fifth year in a row, SXSW has released a DRM-free, RIAA-safe collection of songs totaling 6 GB, which can all be downloaded for free, thanks to BitTorrent.

This is nice for just about everyone. A) Users get to download everything in one neat, relatively fast package; B) SXSW saves on bandwidth; C) Artists get yet another channel to distribute their music and spread the word; D) The Man is going to sue your grandma when he finds that you’ve downloaded his band’s gear.

More from TorrentFreak:

There are three torrents for the 23rd SXSW edition which contain a record breaking 1267 MP3s of both upcoming, as well as established artists who will appear at this year’s festival.

Previously: 21 Best SXSW 2009 MP3s

SXSW: web, unofficial torrent site.