You are making a semantic argument. I apologize for not being more precise with my language.
Going out on the street to sell your music is hardly meaningful distribution at all compared to putting up a Bandcamp with your music for sale. One has the upside of maybe a few hundred people in a day, the other has billions of Internet-connected consumers.
In the past, the distribution channels were owned by radio conglomerates and retail conglomerates and distributors/publishers/marketing/etc. Basically the music industrial complex. And it was very hard to penetrate that complex with your art and have anyone consume it, much less pay for it. And they picked winners and losers capriciously.
Now you can put your music on YouTube, Spotify, Bandcamp, iTunes, etc. If one of those won't take you, there are others that will. And you can promote a song on Reddit and it can go to the front page and you can have millions of people listening to your music tomorrow. That's what I mean by distribution.
Going out on the street to sell your music is hardly meaningful distribution at all compared to putting up a Bandcamp with your music for sale. One has the upside of maybe a few hundred people in a day, the other has billions of Internet-connected consumers.
In the past, the distribution channels were owned by radio conglomerates and retail conglomerates and distributors/publishers/marketing/etc. Basically the music industrial complex. And it was very hard to penetrate that complex with your art and have anyone consume it, much less pay for it. And they picked winners and losers capriciously.
Now you can put your music on YouTube, Spotify, Bandcamp, iTunes, etc. If one of those won't take you, there are others that will. And you can promote a song on Reddit and it can go to the front page and you can have millions of people listening to your music tomorrow. That's what I mean by distribution.