Amy Adkins How Does Illegally Downloading Music Impact The Music Industry

The question then became “Just because we can get the music we want without paying for it, should we?” (Tyson, 2000, p.1). This issue of illegal downloads, which is also referred to as piracy, has been a hot topic ever since the introduction of Napster. According to Recording Industry Association of America “In the decade since peer-to-peer (p2p) file-sharing site Napster emerged in 1999, music sales in the U.S. have dropped 47 percent, from $14.6 billion to $7.7 billion” (RIAA, 2014).

The music industry has been greatly affected by the rising interest in the internet. People can instantly listen to songs by a single search, even entire albums. Digital downloading has allowed people to have constant access to any and all music. Deciding whether it is affecting the music industry positively or negatively is its own question, but there is absolutely no question that the entire industry is affected.

According to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), 30 billion songs were illegally downloaded between 2004 and 2009. Even with sites like iTunes and Rhapsody offering legal downloads, peer-to-peer file sharing still exists. Illegally downloading music has had a significant impact on the music industry resulting in a loss of profits and jobs, and changing how music is delivered to the masses. (Adkins, n.d.) Showing that even having the ethically correct option P2P sharing of illegal media is still thriving. The RIAA reports that music sales in the United States have dropped

In the article “Internet Piracy Harms Artists”, Phil Gardson explains how internet piracy such as online music sharing and other forms of copyrighting music hurts hardworking singers and songwriters. He also asserts that it is imperative that Congress should in act a law against these types of crimes to help protect artists.

When thinking about music downloading and streaming we must not only consider legal mediums (which only exist because the practice was illegal after Napster’s failure) such as iTunes and Spotify, we must consider the overwhelming presence of illegitimate or illegal streams and downloading mediums such as FrostWire or YouTube2MP3. The music industry revenue streams have been changed, molded, and affected by the music downloading and streaming world in many ways. The music industry makes money through three ways: album/single sales, royalties, and concert revenues. All three of those streams have been effected in various ways some negative and some positive. Musician, and record label founder, Isaac Hanson said it perfectly; “I think downloading is both saving and killing the music industry at the same time”. His quote is confirmed by the data as well as my This partially confirms my theory that the music downloading has completely destroyed the music

How does download a song illegally, sharing it amongst friend affect an artist who is worth millions. Take for example, if one download a song from an album, instead of purchasing the album, how will this affect the millionaire star? It makes sense to not have to pay for something that is in the public’s grasp anyway through the gateway that is the internet. The issue is not that it affects the artist dramatically, but can negatively influence the songwriter’s astronomically. The one song in particular being downloaded, isn’t reason enough for a songwriter to complain, but it is the fact that every song is being downloaded for free, where songwriters start seeing the negative effects on their incomes. Phil Galdston, a current songwriter, writes “Internet Piracy Harms Artist” in order to show the public how music piracy is negatively influencing the songwriters dramatically. Galdston’s argument, strives because it is backed by claims, appeals, a concession, and a refutation, in order to display to the public how the effects of piracy are affecting him, and makes a suggestion that the issue must be addressed.

Music piracy has been detrimental to the music industry and I believe it will only get worse with time. Music has become much easier for people to steal off the internet without paying the artist a dime. Technology continues to improve exponentially every year, because of these improvements in technology piracy has become much more accessible to music pirates. Overall album sales have gone down from 500 million units sold in 2007 to 200 million units sold in 2016. If this trend continues it will eliminate some of the smaller artists who depend on album sales to pay for studio time and other expenses. These lesser known artists also usually lack the funds to try to prosecute these music pirates and get their music off of the sites they are being

4.Ofcourse, music companies share a moral responsibility for what has happened. The main goal of this music companies is their profit from the music that they produce but it seems that they don’t see any benefit from this happening. Many people would prefer to spend their money on something else instead of purchasing pricey music unless they are fans. Fans won’t exist if the artist weren’t popular and artists wouldn’t be popular if there were no fans. There is no difference at all for a fan who bought an album of an artist and a fan who downloaded the artist music in the internet. Both are still fans who made the artist known. Technology like Napster did change the music industry both in a good way and a bad way. Let’s face it, nothing in this world is perfectly good or perfectly bad. Everything has its own bad and good side. Good because like what I just said, people who are thrifty or cautious of purchasing music may have a option to download it and listen to it for free and in this way, it is easily shared to anybody unlike physical albums. Not everybody visits the music store frequently. It’s bad side is it is very accessible to everybody like some music may contain harsh words which may influence the youth who downloads the music from the website and also physical album sales

Ever since 18-year-old Shawn Fanning created Napster in his Northeastern University dorm room in 1999, downloading and sharing music online has become one of the most popular things to do on the Internet today. But why wouldn't it? Getting all your favorite songs from all your favorite artists for free, who wouldn't want to start sharing music? The answer to that question are the people who feel that stealing from the music industry is not morally right, because that is exactly what every person who shares music is doing. People who download music think it's something they can get away with but now it might be payback time to a lot of those people.

In the recent year, illegal downloads have been dominating the music industry not only in the UK but worldwide. In 2015, numbers showed that a massive 62% of people in the UK either illegally download or steam music online, this affect artist’s income when it comes to illegally downloading music as when they see how much money they have made it will be plummeting each month. Throughout the UK many people were surveyed and results showed that, 26% of the people surveyed downloaded music illegally online. In the USA, The Recording Industry Association of America (also known as RIAA) reported that music sales have dropped massive 42% ever since illegal download was invented. This can affect the music industry in many ways some may be that if illegal downloads keep rising it will make sales lower and potentially make it harder for artists getting worldwide recognition and will make it harder for new upcoming artist to get signed by record labels. Spotify, the world largest streaming service, could be affected by people illegally downloading music as Spotify will end up losing money which will be used to pay artist royalties but won’t be able

Companies like Apple, have decided that it is best to get in with the downloading business. However, an end to the illegal downloading conflict remains to be realized. The RIAA and associated artists continue to wage war against illegal downloaders while computer savvy audiences persist in sharing music files online every day. While it is undoubtedly true that downloading music is a crime, it remains to be proven that it is wrong. Without establishing this principle, most downloader's are likely to continue the activity. Even with new, inexpensive and available means of downloading files, they can still be shared for free online. The rift must be repaired between music lovers who feel that they have been taken advantage of in the past and recording companies and artists who worry about their future livelihood.

3-4). While these statistics provide a look into the numerical growth of the streaming industry, it is also important to discuss the power that these streaming services have generated—over both the music industry and over established/aspiring artists. Subscriptions are on the rise, having increased significantly over the past ten years, but as is the amount of users streaming music on a free-trial or ad-supported basis—ultimately undercutting the music industry and artists alike. Blewett and Gollogly (2017) elaborate on this point, stating that, by the end of 2016, paid music streaming subscriptions drove a revenue growth of 60.4%—this growth more than offsetting a “20.5% decline in downloads” and a “7.6% decline in physical revenue” (Blewett & Gollogly, 2017, para. 4). Moreover, Borja and Dieringer (2016) explore the concept of streaming even further in their academic article, positing that the decline in paid digital downloads may be a direct result of streaming—as, music streaming can be perceived as a “complement” for music piracy, in which listeners can freely sample music to pirate later on (Borja & Dieringer, 2016, p. 1). The authors also suggest that streaming can provide a “venue for discovering and listening to new releases”; and after completing their 1052 surveys, conclude that streaming increased the likelihood of piracy by

Nowadays, teenagers are living constantly surrounded by technology. Even if the younger generation may not see it, technology has had an impact on different factors. The widespread use of digital technology in the music industry has allowed consumers to reproduce digital versions of copyrighted songs inexpensively, with the help of many software and websites. There has been an increase in digital copying activities and those are most of the time claimed responsible for producers’ loss in revenues. While some people claim that the increase of digital technology has killed the music industry, in fact it has lead to innovation and new ways of consuming and sharing music, such as

The music industry claims to be suffering losses in large amounts due to pirates. Apparently billions of dollars of money that could have been made is being taken away. Peer-to-peer file sharing, born from the advancement of modern technology, has been a large aspect of the internet for a couple of years, but still the music industry cannot figure out how to use it to their advantage. The truth is that file sharing should be viewed as a good thing for the music industry because it proves beyond any reasonable doubt that this industry is stricken with flaws; music software is unrealistically expensive; industry based promotional techniques for bands are ineffective; and as a whole, the music industry is using ancient methods of operation.

Digitalization, data compression, and the internet have affected the music industry significantly. These technologies have shifted the recording industries from hard-copy recordings to digital music distribution. This has made it easier for consumers to enter the music market through copying. Consumers have access to copying technology that allows them to obtain music without paying the record label. The situations clipped high in 1999 when Napster, a file-sharing service was launched. The service facilitated music file sharing on a wider scale. The consumers just download the music and transfer it to a digital music device. This has negatively affected the trade value of music sales, for instance in