Really, really open music: not actually that great?

I'm sure everyone who's looked into 'open music' for more than five minutes has found this, or at least something similar. There's quite a few open labels online that release albums royalty free, but jamendo seems to be one of the larger ones. According to their site, they have "over 346, 353 free music tracks!"

While that certainly doesn't seem like much compared to the iTunes store, or even my own music library for that matter, it represents a growing phenomena in the music industry where artists release their albums for free. A growing number of groups, such as the Indelicates, release their albums digitally, allowing buyers to set their own price ($0.00 being a legitimate choice) in hopes that fans will like them enough to support them, and even people who don't like it will be able to spread their music. Another group named, ironically enough, Bomb the Music Industry, does the same, but even goes so far as to open up their concerts, and will even allow anyone who's practiced the band's songs to some level of proficiency  up on stage to play with them. 

 

Unfortunately, it sounds awful. And looking through jamendo's library, the pickings there are pretty slim as well. It has been my experience so far that quality open source songs are few and far between.  Looking through copyright free images has yielded about the same results. As far as open culture goes, I have yet to see any real, genuine success outside of professionals that establish themselves commercially and then turn open. Is it really possible to establish something openly from the very beginning? I haven't found any examples yet, but if anyone is able to find them, I'd be very curious to see how they manage to stave off initial costs. I posted about Lastwear, an opensource clothing company. They recieved their funds through kickstarter, basically by asking for donations. They got their money, but according to their website and the financial information they've posted, it still hasn't been enough and they're close to going under. So while openness might be great in industry and the scientific world, I don't see it turning out any Mozarts in the near future. 

It's a good idea guys, but you're not quite there. Maybe if you had an incentive to practice, like... making money?