You can blame it on an irresistible urge to take something for nothing, or you can take him at his word -- he likes to even things out. For example, if a grocery store charges $6.99 for shampoo my grandfather, a 75 year-old who grew up on the Lower East side, says the store is making triple it should make and "evens it out" by taking a cup of blueberries, or, in this case, a pastrami.

Make of it what you will; I woke up thinking about him after hearing yesterday's Napster ruling, which said the company was required to pull all material protected under copyright from its site.

About 50 million people, teens mostly, have been "evening things out" for the past year on Napster, and they're not going to stop. My grandfather may not be allowed to visit another Price Club for a year, but he'll visit any store that sells Italian cheese or blueberries, or whatever, as soon as he forgets his embarrassment or decides to get "even."

Wondering whether Napster is actually a type of haven for shoplifting I went to the company's forum on its Web site. I found this entry: "Why should people spend $15.00 to buy a CD that costs less than a dollar to produce? If record companies would lower their prices, I am absolutely certain that we would buy more of the original."

I'm not so sure that people would stop lifting copyrighted material if the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) dropped the price of CDs. Peer to peer (P2P) file swapping is here to stay for many reasons, namely because it's just too tempting to snag something for free.

One company is well aware of a user's desire to even things out, so to speak. Troy, NY- based Aimster encourages users to search music files offered on its partner sites and "swap" on AOL Instant Messenger, Gnutella and soon Microsoft.

Aimster limits file sharing to circles of friends, and recognizes the addictive nature of peer to peer file sharing:

"Aimster brings together two of the most powerful Internet applications out there today", says Johnny Deep, a representative of Aimster. "The combination of file-sharing and instant messaging allows people to create their own instant private networks."

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"This application is the future of the Internet. Its users will find it to be fun, easy -- and addictive", he said.

The key word of course is addictive. Let's face it, we all hate shelling out between $12.00 to $19.00 and change for a CD that we don't even know we'll love. And who has time to sift through songs at a listening station to make a comfortable decision. Yeah, maybe I'll buy Sade because I want to support her career, but the fact is I'm being ripped off every time I put my credit card down. I'm my grandfather's child -- that's for sure.

First of all, I can already go to Aimster, sign up, and IM my friends all without paying a subscription fee. Now, that business model is bound to change of course, or it may not. Aimster plans to make money the old-fashioned Internet way -- with a targeted ad on a user's browser during an IM session. Profitable? That remains to be seen. Advertising revenue certainly hasn't helped many content plays stick to purely B2C business models.

The question is, can Napster really expect to lure shoppers, and not freeloaders like myself, to its site by charging a monthly subscription fee (first announced at $5.00, but now perhaps around $15.00)?

In the meantime, as Napster figures out how to remove copyrighted material from its site (the company claims it can't initiate a search and delete without shutting down its entire operation), it expects the freeloaders who have been visiting to start paying this summer.

What I want to know is why should I? After the courts finish with Napster, the depth of the company's "catalog" will be trimmed away to just a shadow of what it once was. That is, until the music companies either start charging Napster to carry its artists or the companies plunk money into their own sites to showcase their own labels. Whatever the outcome, there will be emptier shelves/files to lift/download from.

As for the possibility that Napster can make money on its own without music catalogs from Sony and the rest, here's another interesting aside to add to the mix.

A colleague of mine made a good point yesterday, saying that of Napster's 50 million members most are teens. Will parents allow their teenagers to pay a monthly subscription fee and more for premium content or new artist material, which is sure to be priced separately? I don't think Napster can expect a huge chunk of its member base to stay faithful, especially when other alternatives like CD burning continue.

If Napster is forced to shut down, as a result of paying punitive damages to record companies, other services like Aimster may flourish. The success of Aimster and others also depends on the injunction returned from U.S. District Judge Marilyn Hall Patel, funding and business practices. Those are a lot of hurdles.

Regardless, the offerings at these musical Price Clubs may be much diminished and as we all move to P2P we will encounter a much more restrictive trading environment.

In a sense, Napster was part of the old conception of the Web -- an unlimited expanse ripe for the gathering, and a Price Club where everything was even.

* Christine Gordon is a senior editor with atNewYork.com.