Pew Study Says RIAA Tactics Are Working

Furd writes "The Pew Internet & American Life Project has posted a new data study that purports to show that the RIAA lawsuit strategy has successfully reduced P2P filesharing. While the presentation of the data is weak (poor graphics and weak statistics), the report does suggest that there has been a change in the usage of P2P tools."

Comments

Correlation does not equal causation

[Taboo]

1. 2003 has seen the biggest emergence of legitimate pay-per-song services to date.
2. The 4 p2p application listed in Pew's report (KaZaa, WinMX, BearShare and Grokster) will naturally lose marketshare due to the availablity of newer, more sophisticated applications.

Re:Correlation does not equal causation

[epiphani]

Just out of curiousity, short bittorrent - which requires a web-based torrent, what other 'more sophisticated' applications are you speaking of?

I'd also like to add number three to that list:

3. December is also a very busy time for just about everyone. Expecting people to be downloading mp3s just as much during the holiday season is just .. stupid.

Sidenote: as a Canadian, I dont plan on buying a single CD or paying for a single song from the major labels while I'm paying a music industry tax on my blank media.

Re:Correlation does not equal causation

[TPFH]

why such a story is posted when this is self-evident than someone is going to refute the very content of the story ?

Common sense isn't all that common, and understanding of statistics even less so. Sure, we know the statistics of the mainstream media, let alone the RIAA puppets, is a joke, but what about "regular people."

Then again, even if the "regular people" believe this statistic, what good would it do the RIAA? Well, it might put more of the fear of lawsuits into them. My girlfriend worries that I might get sued, even though it is about the same odds as winning the lottery and I don't share RIAA music. Maybe the RIAA is hoping for a self-fulfilling prophecy.

It seems futile to refute RIAA propaganda, but as they say, the price of liberty is eternal vigilance.

Or is it just meant to allow us to put some more sarcasms to the RIAA ? I still wonder.

Sarcasm of the RIAA can be entertaining.
Articles about the RIAA attract readers.

Is this new?

Re:Correlation does not equal causation

[Ryosen]

I must have missed the memo...when did purchasing music become compulsory? If he doesn't want to buy a product, that is his decision as a consumer. But you raise an interesting point, one that I think underlines the basic problem with the music industry today. It seems that you, as a representative of the music industry, feel a sense of entitlement. It is apparent that you are under the impression that it is our civic responsibility to purchase your product without regard to whether we want your product or not. This is an unfortunate position but just goes to illustrate a fundamental and continuing flaw with the recording industry: not listening to and addressing the needs of its customers.

You accuse the parent of "sticking it to" and "shafting it to" "the rest of the world" as if he is some sick, depraved individual whose actions exist with the sole intent of causing harm to everyone else. "How dare you not purchase my product!" you seem to say. You even go so far as to admit that you are in favor of legistlation mandating the subsidizing of the music industry by leveling a tax on people.

Until you modify your attitude of entitlement and lose your contempt for your target market, your product will continue to become less relevant and desired.

bad statistics

[cyberwave]

People who are stupid enough to respond to those surveys are also stupid enough to respond to the RIAA lawsuits.

What really matters

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

From a smart business point of view (which is not necessarily that of the RIAA) it is not if there has been a reduction in freeloading downloads, but rather if there has been an increase in people paying money for music (physical CDs or paid downloads). Since those numbers are not being hyped all over the news, I'm willing to bet that the actual dollar numbers are still declining or at the very least not increasing in anywhere near the proportion of the decreased freeloading downloads.

My opinion...

[SB5]

I know that Kazaa has been flooded with tons of bad song files. The popular ones at least. Record companies have found out that for a hash on a song it does the first 300kb or something and then uses it exponentially.

I don't know of any other fairly popular file sharing program that you can find anything with, also it seems to be that there have been success with online music purchasing, specifically iTunes with 25 million songs downloaded.

Not really big news, everyone knew if the companies offered a dollar per song, and this is years ago, napster-era stuff, that people would buy it, but the record companies wanted to buck the consumer and squeeze that last few pennies out by not changing the industry despite what the people actually wanted.

People are weak.

[DroopyStonx]

It's truly sad to see so many people buckle under the pressure of the RIAA. It just makes the RIAA think they're getting what they want and makes them that much more delusional.

Oh well, just a matter of time before highly encrypted and anonymous P2P hits the masses. Then we can all lean back and smile as they scurry about trying to stop it.

The real question is...

[narratorDan]

Which tactic is working? Suing the crap out of d/l'rs or the rise in legitimate sources of online music?

Or it could be the other reason, I've got all the songs I want.

NarratorDan

Biased

[CelticWhisper]

Call me paranoid, but is it really that far-fetched a notion that the RIAA may have had considerable direct influence over what was written in that report? The more people write that the RIAA's tactics are working, the more other people will begin to believe that it's true, and it could potentially mean more people being scared away from using P2P to acquire music.

Of course, this says nothing for uncopyrighted, public-domain, or non-RIAA music, but given that the RIAA has had a history of using sledgehammers to swat flies, I daresay they'd be happier just stomping out P2P altogether than they would be with just getting their own music off of it.

Inevitable?

[Kobayashi Maru]

I hate to admit it, but I do think that the RIAA will ultimately win this battle. Much as consumers accepted a higher price with the arrival of casette tapes, then CDs, some form of DRM will probably win out.

I've heard the argument that consumers will not accept paying for an intangible (that is, no physical object). But the iTunes model allows the consumer, in a limited way, control over the physical. From their purchase, they burn their physical dividend. One could argue that the consumer gains *more* through DRM/license-ware, as some plans allow the consumer to burn multiple CDs.

Most of the people I know (by that, I mean average, largely non-technical) still buy the occasional CD. They hate the RIAA in the abstract for Napster, but it does not stop them from buying. More and more have given up on P2P. Whether it's fear of a lawsuit or general hastle of finding Top-40, it just isn't worth their time anymore.

The RIAA doesn't need to destroy P2P, that would be impossible. All it needs to do is break it sufficiently to make their "alternative" more attractive. I personally believe thing will reach an equilibrium, eventually. P2P will always be around, in some form, for the dedicated. The RIAA will be sure to quash anything before it reaches critical mass. While on the other hand, DRM-ware will evolve into something more accomodating.

What about non-centralized networks?

[GrandCow]

I still download music without paying for it. I probably download more now than ever. The funny thing is I still buy the music that I think is good enough to hear more than once or twice.

Do I use Kazaa? hell no! I have to download 10 versions of a song just to get the "real" version of it... the one without some weird sound effects or just being the first 10 seconds repeated for the 4 minutes that the song should really be.

Welcome to bittorrent land. I'll not post the URL from the server I use regularly for obvious reasons, but rest assured I can get more there than I could with Kazaa anyday. Now I download whole albums at a time instead of just 1 or 2 songs in order to determine if a record is worth buying.

The great thing about bittorrent is that if people find that a song or album is fake they just stop sharing it. All of a sudden that album that should have 2000 people sharing it because it's so good only has 2 people sharing it (and they'll stop as soon as they unzip it and listen). That tells me to pass and find the real version.

I hope the RIAA realizes that instead of ending the problem they just made it burrow deeper. This time there is no centralized network that they can shut down in order to maximize profits from the unsuspecting consumer. If they kill one, 5 more will show up in it's place. I hope they are happy with what they have caused to be created.

Right now, the networks are small. Remember how small Napster or Kazaa began as? What happened a few months to a year later? Exactly... Expect 2004 or 2005 to be the year of bittorrent (or another decentralized network)

Re:What about non-centralized networks?

[GrodinTierce]

While 2004 or 2005 may be the "Year of BitTorrent", you seem to be mistaking BT for a decentralized network. While it may be more difficult for the RIAA to locate the servers that host the trackers, and new ones will inevitably pop up, the hassle of keeping up to date with BT servers is really all the RIAA needs; I doubt they've ever seriously imagined stopping all filesharing, but simply making it too much of a hassle/complicated for Joe Sixpack.

Also, I think that there is a common misunderstanding, particularly in the (big, scary) world outside of /., that America's youth (in general) are simply guaranteed to grow up computer-literate. While they may be more comfortable with computers than their parents, they're rarely much more knowledgable.

Although BT itself is pretty transparent, just click the link and download, actually finding usable torrents for content can be surprisingly difficult. With Kazaa, it's just open it up, search, and get many, many results (which used to be generally good, in terms of quality and authenticity, but the probability of success is decreasing), and then click. The fact that Kazaa (and Napster before it) was so transparent and simple was part of the reason so many college-students left it on, without even bothering to limit their upload.

However, to be fair, I think you're right about the trend towards decentralized networks, and I must admit, I'm not very familiar with eMule/eDonkey, but it does sound promising.

RIAA tactics are like antibiotics

[IshanCaspian]

They have the effect of imposing natural selection on our P2P networks. Those that have vulnerable infrastructure will fall, and ones that do not will prosper. Sure, they are accomplishing their goal in the shortest of short terms, but they're creating the motivation and inspiration for unstoppable, anonymous pirate networks. It may look like the music industry is getting healthier, but they're just encouraging the creation of a bigger, badder bug.

Two flaws in the research model

[the-banker]

Though it doesn't completely discredit the research, there are flaws (one large, one not so large) that are immediately evident.

1. It was a telephone survey, which by law excludes the sampling of minors. All anecdotal research I have seen is that minors make up a significant population of online file traders. It is my opinion that this segment of the population could have a serious impact on the results.

2. The fact that the research is conducted during a time when the RIAA is efectively criminalizing file sharing will motivate people to answer dishonestly for fear of being "tagged" a copyright violator. When a survey relies on an honest answer to be an admission of criminal activity, people will not be as forthright with their answers.

I don't think that this would change the overall answer, that copyrighted file trading is down, but I think it would sigificantly impact the degree of its decrease. I think the Pew Internet research is most likely overstating the impact of the lawsuits.

Which actually raises another issue - how much of the decline can be attributed to other factors, such as:

1. Poor music released in 4th qtr 2003

2. Increased self-regulation of file sharing in the University/College segment

3. Filesharing becoming "old news" - basically the idea that everyone gets a TON of music when they first discover file sharing, then taper off as the previous 3 months of new music is no where near the volume of multiple decades of music people were grabbing at the outset.

4. The proliferation of licensed online music distribution, such as iTunes, Napster 2.0, etc

All in all I would conclude that the research has limited usefulness in measuring the effects of RIAA subpoena activity.

Re:It worked for me

[Anonymous Coward]

In this context, "Lossy" and "lossless" refer to the compression algorhythms, NOT as you seem to impute, the original encoding of the material. A mp3 (lossy compression) ripped from a 44.1 pcm stream will sound worse than a flac, shn, or ape (lossless compression) taken from the same stream.

That quibble aside, yes I agree with you. Taken to its logical conclusion, the best way to listen to great music is hearing great musicians play it live. So get out there and support them, dammit!

Surveys also find....

[91degrees]

That instances of jaywalking are lower in a police state.

I don't doubt the statistics, but are threats of disproportionate punishment really the way a civilised society should behave?

Re:In Boolean Algebra, Logic Tests You!

[Spock the Baptist]

---Methodology---

The Pew study was based on a poll.

I believe that one might be forgiven if they were skeptical that the change in the data is due to 'lip service' rather than representing an actual change in downloading habits. It may be that RIAAs lawsuit strategy has not altered downloading behavior so much as it's influenced the respondents forthrightness in answering questions about downloading.

Great..Encourage them

[nurb432]

Just what we all need. Helping them "prove" what the are doing is just and effective.

Anything can be 'proven' if you extrapolate out of context, even when the ultimate conclusion is false.