Napster saves Classical?

The BBC Beethoven downloads continue, with stunning implications. Herewith, read Norman Lebrecht on La Scena. Check out his lede paragraphs:

...When the first five symphonies of Beethoven went on-line in the opening week of this month, the Radio 3 website registered 657,399 individual downloads, a figure so immense it exceeded the annual sales of any classical record label and should, by rights, have qualified each of the symphonies for a slot in Top of the Pops.
Last night the BBC let loose the second tranche – from Pastoral to Choral symphonies – amid growing confidence that the demand for free Beethoven will cross the million mark, transforming the future of musical dissemination.

Could classical downloading possibly be less "evil" than pop-napstering, simply because there are fewer (yes, some) rights issues? Who will be the enterprising and forward-looking imressarios to seize on this?

The downloads themselves are here. (Warning: it's so popular it takes a while...)