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Effect of music piracy on piracy as a whole
Digital music piracy
Effects of the internet digital downloading on the music industry
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Digital music piracy has been a worry of the music industry since the creation of Napster in 1998. Piracy is the act of stealing something that does not belong to you which has been outlined in our society as something that is bad or against the law. There are many articles out there that highlight music piracy but four main important ones include: “The Music Industry on (the) Line? Surviving Music Piracy in a Digital Era” by Jelle Janssens, “Neutralizing Music Piracy: An Empirical Examination” by Jason R. Ingram, “The Impact of Digital Piracy on Music Sales: A Cross-Country Analysis” by Mark T. Bender, “Charismatic Code, Social Norms, and the Emergence of Cooperation on the File-Swapping Networks” by Lior Jacob Strahilevitz and many other articles. “According to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), CD sales have been falling continuously from 2.5 billion units in 2000 to 1.8 billion in 2006. This decline is without doubt hurting the music industry since CD sales still account for a crucial part of the recorded music sales” (Ingram 335). Napster also changed the way computers were made. Before the music downloading craze, computer did not come standard with disc burners, now in almost every computer manufactured it is almost a must that computer comes with a burner and the newer models even come with DVD burners. All of these gadgets now come standard in computers. The convenience of digital music piracy has record sales low with an alarming rate of free music. With technology on the rise it was only a matter of time before digital music piracy took effect. Napster came into the world and changed the way music has been distributed ever since. Music piracy involves the act of making available, transmit... ... middle of paper ... ...eersharing/a/torrenthandbook.htm>. Ho, Kevin, Wu Jie, and John Sum. "On the session lifetime distribution of Gnutella." International Journal of Parallel, Emergent & Distributed Systems 23.1 (2008): 1-15. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 5 Apr. 2011. Ingram, Jason R. "Neutralizing Music Piracy: An Empirical Examination." Deviant Behavior 29.4 (2008): 334-366. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 16 Mar. 2011. Janssens, Jelle. "The Music Industry on (the) Line? Surviving Music Piracy in a Digital Era." European Journal of Crime, Criminal Law & Criminal Justice 17.2 (2009): 77-96. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 16 Mar. 2011. Strahilevitz, Lior Jacob. "CHARISMATIC CODE, SOCIAL NORMS, AND THE EMERGENCE OF COOPERATION ON THE FILE-SWAPPING NETWORKS." Virginia Law Review 89.3 (2003): 505. Academic Search Complete. EBSCO. Web. 5 Apr. 2011.
We have all watched over the last year and a half as the controversy over the digital music provider Napster has clogged our television screens and lined our floors in the forms of newspaper articles. We are also well aware of the implications and revenue losses that the service either directly or indirectly causes. What I am going to investigate more in-depth in this article is, more specifically, the effect that Napster has on the operations of record stores worldwide. I am going to try to describe the most profound effects that Napster has on this industry.
Throughout time, people have resorted to stealing in order to obtain items instead of buying them. It became a problem so consequences were made. Even dating back to the Ten Commandments there were laws against stealing. Recently, theft has become a problem over the internet. Musicians and music companies have lost millions in revenue. Websites such as Napster, The Pirate Bay, and Pandora have made it extremely easy for people, specifically teens, to illegally download and or listen to music for free. Pirating music has become a problem especially because “91 percent of all new music was downloaded illegally over the Internet instead of purchased,” says Logan Lynn from Huffington Post (Lynn). Many, such as the RIAA claim that music piracy is “an ongoing and evolving challenge,” (Who) while others suggest that it is “keeping the music industry alive,” (Issacson).
Recently, there has been a series of copyright infringement litigations against Internet businesses that are involved with unauthorized distribution of music files. The US recording industry claims to lose three million dollars per year because of piracy. A report predicted an estimated 16 percent of all US music sales, or 985 million dollars would be lost due to online piracy by 2002 (Foege, 2000; cited from McCourt & Burkart, 2003) Even though this claim has to be taken with caution, as it is based on false assumption that if copyright laws were strictly enforced, audio pirates would become buyers, it is apparent that audio piracy grew to a worrisome level for the record industry. (Gayer & Shy, 2003)
In this case, there are three main effects of Napster on the recording industry. The first one is that it caused a large decline in record sales in a short time. According to this case, the spending on recorded music in U.S dropped 4.1% in 2001 and the industry’s top 10 albums also sold much less compared to the year before. The second effect is that it cased the sales of CD burners, blank CDs and digital audio players increase and nowadays, most new computers come with CD-RW drives installed, which means people can easily store downloaded music, share music with friends and take it with them anytime as well. The third effect is that it increased the cost of recorded music. Once people can download free music through peer-to-peer software services, they have less incentive to buy original editions, which will make recording industry spend more to fight against copyrights and invest more in new artists and new music. Overall, these three effects make the recording industry go through a hard time.
A Worldwide Problem Software piracy is defined as the illegal copying of software for commercial or personal gain. Software companies have tried many methods to prevent piracy, with varying degrees of success. Several agencies like the Software Publishers Association and the Business Software Alliance have been formed to combat both worldwide and domestic piracy. Software piracy is an unresolved, worldwide problem, costing millions of dollars in lost revenue. Software companies have used many different copy protection schemes. The most annoying form of copy protection is the use of a key disk. This type of copy protection requires the user to insert the original disk every time the program is run. It can be quite difficult to keep up with disks that are years old. The most common technique of copy protection requires the user to look up a word or phrase in the program's manual. This method is less annoying than other forms of copy protection, but it can be a nuisance having to locate the manual every time. Software pirates usually have no trouble "cracking" the program, which permanently removes the copy protection. After the invention of CD-ROM, which until lately was uncopyable, most software companies stopped placing copy protection in their programs. Instead, the companies are trying new methods of disc impression. 3M recently developed a new technology of disc impression which allows companies to imprint an image on the read side of a CD-ROM. This technology would not prevent pirates from copying the CD, but it would make a "bootleg" copy differ from the original and make the copy traceable by law enforcement officials (Estes 89). Sometimes, when a person uses a pirated program, there is a "virus" attached to the program. Viruses are self-replicating programs that, when activated, can damage a computer. These viruses are most commonly found on pirated computer games, placed there by some malignant computer programmer. In his January 1993 article, Chris O' Malley points out that if piracy was wiped out viruses would eventually disappear (O' Malley 60). There are ways that a thrifty consumer can save money on software without resorting to piracy. Computer companies often offer discounts on new software if a person has previously purchased an earlier version of the software. Competition between companies also drives prices low and keeps the number of pirated copies down (Morgan 45). People eventually tire or outgrow their software and decide to sell it.
The United States of America is a free country, then why shouldn’t the internet be free? Why should we have restrictions placed on what we can and cannot do on the internet? Every day, millions of users share files on the internet through numerous online sources. Whether they download music, movies, or software, online file-sharing can give people access to a plentiful amount of information. These files are often free and easily accessible by anyone. The practice of distributing or providing access to digitally stored information represents file sharing (Peer-to-Peer File-Sharing and Copyright Infringement: Are You Vulnerable?). Conversely many people see file sharing as unlawful. The reproduction or distribution of any copyrighted digital media or information defines internet piracy. Many people see downloading copyright files such as music, movies, books, and software as illegal. Music files, some of the first types of files to be reproduced and distributed through internet sources, contain the file extension .mp3. Several popular file sharing programs were developed in the 1990s and facilitated internet piracy. Big industries try to combat file sharing to help increase their revenue, however internet piracy actually increases revenue of industries and has numerous other benefits (What Is Internet Piracy?). The copy and distribution of digital files increased due to technology (Torr). Internet piracy, considered a problem all over the world, stands as difficult to stop along with other kinds of piracy (What Is Internet Piracy?). Anything can be digitalized and once something becomes digitalized it will be shared all over the internet (Torr). Canadian and European laws allow for the downloading of copyright files for personal us...
Along with the development of a file format (MP3) to store digital audio recordings, came one of the new millennium’s most continuous debates – peer-to-peer piracy – file sharing. Internet companies such as Napster and Grokster became involved in notable legal cases in regards to copyright laws in cyberspace. These two cases are similar in nature, yet decidedly different. In order to understand the differences and similarities, one should have an understanding of each case as well as the court’s ruling.
Physical piracy-the copying and illegal sale of hard-copy CDs, videotapes, and DVDs-costs the music industry over $4 billion a year worldwide and the movie industry more than $3.5 billion. These numbers do not factor in the growing (and difficult to measure) problem of Internet piracy, in which music and movies are transferred to digital format and copies are made of the resulting computer file. Journalist Charles C. Mann explains why Internet piracy has the potential to be vastly more damaging to copyright industr...
paid for. The pirate has a set of excuses for his actions: prices are too high;
The PC industry is just over 20 years old. In those 20 years, both the quality
In today’s technological age and consumer-driven economy, there is no doubt that media piracy and file sharing are in demand and makes a big business. Not only the so called “bootlegged” materials cost less, but most of it also managed to completely imitate the quality of the original materials. It is much easier to people to download movies or music online or buy bootlegged DVDs for 5 dollars than to watch the movie in theaters or pay for the whole CD when there is only one song that the person likes. People know about the possible consequences of these actions, but they do not have a choice especially in these times of economy recession, plus everyone nowadays is doing it, so it would not be considered such a big deal at all if they illegally download or purchase copyright materials. On the other hand if everyone is doing it, why there are still some people getting caught? Not that they should not be punished, but being put into jail and paying a fine that is ridiculously impossible to pay are just practically harsh. Maybe if those people are business tycoons of counterfeit materials, but the fact that most of those people getting caught are just ordinary people trying to be practical and doing what the rest of the world is doing which is doing these “illegal” downloading or purchasing bootlegged movies and music. The government and the entertainment industries are using ordinary people as scapegoats and have been doing draconian methods in moms, children and maybe even old people by suing them for downloading or sharing pirated materials for free, because of the fact that they are having a hard time pursuing the big time “master minds,” who are making a profit out of someone else’s work.
Production companies took a bold step forward by uploading their content online. People now are not obliged to buy a full album to listen to one song, for a minimal fee you can buy the track you want, the same goes for movies and electronic publications. The downloaded files though will be digitally protected so that only the person who downloads them can use them, and he can’t share them at home or with friends. Even with this step from production companies, a large portion of people who download music still do it for free. Moreover hackers came up with new ways to remove the digital copyrights so the same as before one downloads music and distributes them around.
The term "software piracy" covers different activities: illegal copying of programs, counterfeiting and distributing software - even sharing a program with a friend.
Music piracy is a developing problem that it affects the music industry in many different ways including being responsible for the unemployment of 750,000 workers, as well as a loss of $2,5 billion; therefore, I want to explore ‘To what extent has music piracy affected the music industry market in the United States over the last 10 years?’
Napster is a company that developed the so-called peer-to-peer technology that lets people search and retrieve music files directly from one another's personal computers. When Napster first came out, millions of internet users worldwide were illegally downloading and distributing copyrighted music, videos, images, and software for free. After being vilified by the entertainment industry, which claims that Napster and any similar programs could make piracy of almost any digital work unstoppable, and many court battles, Napster was ordered by court to be shutdown in 2000. The technology has been praised as a revolutionary development for the Internet—unaware of the problems that would arise from such practices. However, the termination of Napster was not enough, months later, dozens of new, like programs were being developed and used. And since Napster, not much has been done to stop these latest downloading programs.