NYTimes: Now the Music Industry Wants Guitarists to Stop Sharing:

The Internet put the music industry and many of its listeners at odds thanks to the popularity of services like Napster and Grokster. Now the industry is squaring off against a surprising new opponent: musicians.

In the last few months, trade groups representing music publishers have used the threat of copyright lawsuits to shut down guitar tablature sites, where users exchange tips on how to play songs like “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door,” “Highway to Hell” and thousands of others.

The battle shares many similarities with the war between Napster and the music recording industry, but this time it involves free sites like Olga.net, GuitarTabs.com and MyGuitarTabs.com and even discussion boards on the Google Groups service like alt.guitar.tab and rec.music.makers.guitar.tablature, where amateur musicians trade “tabs” — music notation especially for guitar — for songs they have figured out or have copied from music books.

On the other side are music publishers like Sony/ATV, which holds the rights to the songs of John Mayer, and EMI, which publishes Christina Aguilera’s music.

Speaking as a guitarist, Olga.net and services like it have helped inspire me to learn new songs when the urge arises and inspiration hits. Countless songs. I’ve forgotten far more then I can play (that’s not saying much with my little memory or lack of talent).

Speaking as a social media groupie, Olga.net and services like it, represent the ultimate in what online community can aspire too. Olga.net was started way back in 1992. 1992! You want to see the Long Tail of the Web at work? Well dive in you would find tabs posted on the most non-mainstream of artists you could think of. Why do folks contribute so much of their time and effort transcribing these songs so that others may learn them?

Love. The free exchange of knowledge – driven by love of subject matter and the desire to share. As purest an expression of that human need as any else online.

And the bastards are moving to take it down for a little additional profit.

Let me join with Kent Newsome (who posted a great description of what guitar tablature is) and Mathew Ingram in protesting this latest industry blunder.