The Piracy Of Music Piracy

After the period elapses, any person can use, print, publish, and distribute the original work. The music industry has been in dispute for many years in respect to music piracy. It went after software and website developers, as well as consumers in the courts (Easley, 2005, p.163). As a result, this may be why governing the expansion of the music industry towards later benefits for the industry; however, not toward those who pirate from them (Easley, 2005, p.163). There is clear evidence of a willingness to pay for online music in general through legal download services such as iTunes (Easley, 2005, p.163). It is clear that some new markets are emerging; for example, services such as 4G LTE combine music with other services. These markets may provide both better margins and better copyright protection to the music industry. Nevertheless, some forms of music piracy may ultimately come to be seen as an effective marketing channel for those services (Easley, 2005, p.163). Clearly the industry is adapting piracy issues.

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.

Digital piracy on music has been a majorly disputed affair for the last eighteen years, about whether or not it favors the musical artists or affects them in a negative fashion. One of the many sides of the Digital piracy controversy expounds that it benefits the artist(s) by giving them a great deal of exposure that they may not have received had they not downloaded it for free, which in turn makes for a very significant acquisition in terms of sales on their part.

Although the action of retrieving music illegally can be easily accessed as group three states, “majority of the music that is consumed illegally by the individuals...would not have been purchased if illegal websites were not available to them” it provides a weak point because either way people see it music is available to them with purchase and if that is the only option than that process will occur. The society that illegally downloaded music created can be seen in one huge source known as, “Napster” in an article, by Stephen Seigel he states, “ Napster allows its users to "share" songs with other users, completely bypassing the traditional forms of music distribution” (“Nipping at Napster”). Napster allows people to share all types of

It is believed that illegal downloading does not affect the music industry and that recording artists are rich, so there is nothing wrong with grabbing a

The music industry has undergone radical changes since the end of the 1990’s, largely a function of the internet and its effects on sales and copyright. Besides placing artists and their music on the world stage, the internet also permitted the downloading of music from free-file- exchange networks. A parallel and equally worrisome, phenomenon is record pirating, a practice made easier by the proliferation of CD burners and access to high speed internet. Unauthorized downloading and pirating circumvent intellectual property laws and result in reduced sales. “In Atlantic Canada, average annual household expenditures on CDs and audio cassettes dropped by 27 percent between 1996 and 2001, from $96.00 to $70.00.”

In the short time that computers and internet have existed in the modern era, the world has seen a complete 360 degree turn and in the various forms of electronic entertainment that people all over the world are now using. In the days before CD’s, DVD’s and the internet, not much was said if a vinyl album (remember these?), VHS cassette (or these?) or an audio cassette was loaned to a friend for their listening / viewing pleasure, but today with the availability of sending an email with three or four megabytes (mb) of information, one can enjoy a borrowed song but is assumed that it is piracy or stealing. Is this a fair assumption? This Author will not give

The Global music industry makes around $43.9 billion dollars a year. $12.5 billion of that is lost each year due to Piracy in the music industry and 70% of online users find nothing wrong with online piracy (“Music’s Last Decade: Sales Cut in Half”). Is it wrong? Is music piracy stealing? This topic is said to have inspired Charles W. Moore to illustrate these points in his essay. Charles W. Moore writes the essay “Is Music Piracy Stealing?” and tries to answer his own question. Moore starts off by explaining that current day pirates simply do not care about copyright laws. He goes into detail about the philosophy, ethics, and morality of the threat to the free exchange of music over the Internet. Moore says, “Digital copywriting is as serious and criminal as stealing a CD from a record shop or a DVD from a video shop” (242). The subject on piracy is a controversial and an argumentative subject. Although Moore gives many great examples throughout his essay, he also has some faulty reasoning such as the root question of his argument is not provable, his factual data is excessive, he has lousy introduction and closing paragraphs, and his views are biased.

The article “Stealing Music: Is It Wrong Or Isn’t It?”, by Michael Arrington, presents the difference in the term “stealing music” as applied to the older decades and nowadays, in the 2000’s. It also presents the situations where sharing music is a good thing, and where it is not. Finally, it explains the abandonment of copyright infringement, due to the increasing lack of record labels. The article begins by discussing what the term “stealing music” really means. The article also explains the websites, such as MySpace Music, where streaming music can be done without any trouble. Furthermore, it discusses that in the country of China, you can listen to music free from Google websites.

We are currently in the Digital Era of music. Music recording has been transformed from music stored on vinyl records and audio cassettes to the first introduction of the Compact Disc. The Compact Disc was a huge shift in how music would be recorded, distributed and heard. Following the Compact Disk (CD), technology continued to advance with more inventions to aid our listening enjoyment. Among those inventions were the MP3 player, iPod, iPad, smartphone and the current ultimate digital music store, iTunes. Each of these digital advancements in music have intertwined their ability to offer consumers music that is handheld, portable and digitally store hundreds to thousands of music files into an electronic music library. However, all that glitters is not gold. The ability to download music from the Internet has created a piracy frenzy. Online file sharing sites, such as the now out-of-use Napster, have given consumers a way to steal music from the artists. “Napster opened us up to a world where we had the luxury of sharing music files amongst a massive community of nearly 80 million users (at its peak) without ever spending one penny” (Alex Bracetti, 2013). The history of music is not the only element that has been affected by digital technology. Digital technology has also

had touched on how people are making a hobby of illegally downloading music. I found an article by Amy Adkins titled How Does Illegally Downloading Music Impact the Music Industry. She touches on a few subjects of how illegally downloading music directly affects the music industry. She opens up the article stating that 30 billion songs were illegally downloaded between 2004 and 2009 which is a staggering statistic. Napster came out in 1999 and was a free file sharing website where people were getting music illegally. The music industry has loss $12.5 billion due to the availability of free music. Some people have been taken to court for being found downloading illegally. In her article Adkins reveals that due to the illegal downloading of music

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).

“Before the days of YouTube and the Internet, a band 's chances of striking it big depended on record companies. If a band was lucky enough to get a record deal, it gained access to a label 's vast resources and connections. The company paid for the band 's studio time, … and got its music played on the radio, reaching millions of record buying Americans” (Majerol, 1). Now, anyone with talent can post a video of themselves and become an internet sensation, only to then receive a deal with a label to continue growing their career. The issue is, with the Internet came digital downloading, and with the growing popularity of digital downloading came illegal downloading, known as Digital Piracy, which has affected the music industry greatly. This issue affects everyone involved in the Music Industry. From the small CD store owner to the Artist on stage, everyone has and continues to be affected by the growing popularity of digital downloading services. Artists, producers, and songwriters lose an estimated 12.5 Billion USD every year to illegal digital music services. Further, the economic impact from [digital downloading] is an estimated loss of 2+ Billion USD (Storrs, 1). This money affects the “little guys” in the industry and the average worker within the industry.

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.

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.