Not a particularly deep or original thought, but if not for the internet I doubt I would have purchased a CD or gone to a newish music concert since about 2004. I don't download music for free deliberately, in that I'm not trying to GET FREE STUFF, but of course I watch (and embed) clips of dubious legality on the youtube and similar. If I like stuff I buy it. I stuck to buying CDs for a long time, but now it's likely sound files as direct from the artists as I can perceive. And, yes, this increasingly old man also pays money to go see shows of bands I never would have heard of otherwise.
The internet provides an immense amount of free marketing. That's really sad for the people who earned lots of money based on their supposed ability to market things, but generally it's a feature, not a bug.
I remember back in the early days in of the internet when suddenly the megacorps started aggressively going after fan sites. And this was before there were easy ways to monetize such sites in any genuinely lucrative ways. They were mostly, if not entirely, hobbyist sites. Yeah, sure, some of them probably abused copyright more than they should, but the smart thing then would have been for the companies to buy the sites or pay the site owners, not sue them. After all, they were provide them with a very valuable service.