As a teen I used to pirate it and supplement with the very occasional cd purchase. I felt justified at the time given I did still pay at least sometimes and I couldn’t afford to otherwise. These days, it became so ubiquitous on YouTube that I just never felt the need to buy it or torrent it and the filesharing networks all kinda disappeared anyway.

It’s not exactly ethical since I use adblockers but it’s just there, always instantly available and at zero cost. I’d never use a subscription service, I have no idea how much, if any music I would consume over a fixed period so paying a fixed monthly quantity makes no sense at all.

I guess the issue with this is that it’s hard to discover new music. I guess it’s a little sad but really but truth be told the rate of discovery for me has been significantly curtailed since high school, I guess I was never a connoisseur or great appreciator of music so my imagination in the space was pretty limited to just whatever my friends were listening to.