Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

The File Sharing Report

Posted by michael on from the same-old-song-and-dance dept.

An anonymous reader writes "In July, Slashdot posted an article about the file sharing experiment, which was a database where users could report items they've purchased as a result of file sharing. The author has completed the experiment and written a report outlining the results. He offers the philosophy that file sharing is a result of the industry's failure to meet the business models demanded by today's consumer, and provides many suggestions to the various industries on how to take advantage of the market emerging from file sharing to generate revenue."

16 of 306 comments (clear)

  1. Files they've just taken and not bought or deleted by jakek101 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    What about all of the files that these people continue to listen to, but don't delete or buy legit copies of? How much of their music do they actually own? My friends like to tell me that they wouldn't have bought the CD anyway, so downloading it doesn't hurt anybody. This may be true in some cases, but I think most of the time people just decide that they wouldn't have bought it post download.

  2. One more recent trend... by datastalker · · Score: 4, Interesting

    ...and the reason that I'd, uh, consider downloading a movie - ADS. I *HATE* going to the theatre, paying $10 to see a movie, and having to sit through three or four commercials before I can watch a movie. I just paid $10 to see the movie (which will be full of enough "product placement" as it is) - I don't want to see ADS too! It becomes so much more tempting to download since the movie industry is making it obvious that they're trying to squeeze out every last dime.

    --
    Find out about the Lexus Rx400h Hybrid!
    1. Re:One more recent trend... by Chess_the_cat · · Score: 5, Funny

      I hear you brother. I hate waiting in line at the bank. So instead of getting my cash from the bank I just steal it from old ladies. Works great and saves me TIME!

      --
      Support the First Amendment. Read at -1
    2. Re:One more recent trend... by jakek101 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Actually, the first ads (besides trailers) were from the L.A. Times. What happened is that the L.A. Times said that the theaters either run ads or they'd stop listing them. This opened the flood gate.

    3. Re:One more recent trend... by Izago909 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You can't seriously be comparing the MPAA to helpless old ladies. Of course you can't, because that would make you a complete tool. To make things more realistic, we can say the old lady is in line so she can get another mortgage on her house to cover the RIAA lawsuit from letting her granddaughter use the internet.

      Sorry, but when I must choose between the large, heartless, monopolisitc corporation and an individual, I'm going to pick the individual no matter what the crime they stand accused of. All of this contreversy is related to the dilema in American politics: Group rights/corporate rights vs. personal rights. There used to be a day when corporations carried a larger burden of taxes than families. That ended around the time of Reaganomics, when families started to pay a larger percentage of taxes than corporations. Since that time, we've seen a politicians take rights away from people to make corporate life easier. The DMCA added few new laws and protections. It just made enforcement easier, at the expense of personal rights and privacy. It makes me seriously question who is lazier, the downloader or the people charged with protecting copyrights.

      Every person who downloads a song is protesting, regardless if they know what message they are sending. People are voicing their complaints about an aging business model that produces merchandise of questionable quality. If yoiu buy a CD that has 1 or 2 good tracks and the rest is crap, you can't return it. Almost any other type of merchandise can be returned if it doesn't meet the customers needs. You also can't send in a damaged CD and get a new one for the cost of the medium and S&H. You have to go out and buy a new one at full price, which means that you have two licenses but one medium. They are also protesting unfair practices that buy politicians and remove personal rights (like fair use) and privacy. Instead of seeing the writing on the wall, the music industry has decided to sue thousands to prove a point. They are proving that, in America, it is cheaper to settle than to defend yourself. They are proving that business can force consumers to stay within a decades old business plan to spare the pain trouble of evolving. They are proving that the idea of the free market is inferior to a planned economy. They have proven that you don't need to listen to your customers as long as you have lawyers.

  3. Re:Files they've just taken and not bought or dele by Randy+Wang · · Score: 5, Insightful

    But how are you supposed to make an educated decision without downloading it? ;-)

    --
    --- Egads, I glow in the dark!
  4. Greed blinds all by rudy_wayne · · Score: 4, Insightful

    "file sharing is a result of the industry's failure to meet the business models demanded by today's consumer"

    This is true, but the music/movie/computer software industries are unable to grasp that concept. They are so consumed with greed, so consumed with an unquenchable thrist for more money -- even when they are already taking in record profits -- that they believe there is only one way to do business:
    An iron-fisted, totalitarian control of everything, in a world where there is no such thing as "fair use".

    Their thinking is so clouded by a fog of greed that they can't even begin to grasp the idea that selling a good product at a fair price will bring in more money than all the lawsuits and copy protection schemes combined.

  5. Ok by cubicledrone · · Score: 4, Insightful

    There is demand, and demand creates market.

    And when there is complete disregard for the investments of the companies that worked to make the supply, there is bankruptcy and mass unemployment.

    The television industry is obviously benefiting from the consumer's ability to download a few episodes online.

    It is doubtful the industry would complain about "a few episodes."

    Making the media available in a much more timely fashion may increase revenue.

    Agreed. Entertainment companies in particular are the undisputed champions of foot-dragging when it comes to the requests of their markets.

    There is a significant market of users who would download software should they find it useful to them, however these same users refuse to pay for software that won't run on their system, is poor quality, or misrepresented.

    There is also a very large group of users who refuse to pay for software at all, no matter the price or the quality. Oh, they'll download it and make full use of it, but they will also categorically refuse to contribute a single dollar to the purchase price.

    Quality must be paid for. This is no less a fact than any of the other statements in this argument. The economy depends on the ability for artists, producers, retailers and all of their vendors, suppliers, etc. to invest time and money and make a profit on these products.

    If there is no demand (demand requires sales) there will be no supply. If there is no money, there will be no products.

    --
    Business isn't willing to pay for products, innovation and careers, so we get brands, mortgage commercials and layoffs.
    1. Re:Ok by a+whoabot · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The filesharers know all that. Don't treat them as half-wits, not everyone is as stupid as you want them to be.

      But, they also know something else, which apparently you don't. That is, with the production of these media products also comes the production of the desire for them. There's no natural demand for these things: people can get entertainment almost anywhere, at least they are certainly no where near a position where they have to worry about running out of it.

      So if they take advantage of Britney Spears and her producers so much that they stop releasing music. Will the filesharers care? No. They'll just listen to something else. If Britney Spears never existed no one would ever want Britney Spears, and they know that. People are happy with whatever entertainment is handed to them. Even in the face of the most insipid productions, they'll consume it. "There's never anything good on t.v." is the eternal complaint, yet everyone still watches it. Why? Because it doesn't matter, it's good enough, and fucking easy to get. So if everyone stole television until driving it's supply into oblivion, they wouldn't care, it sucks anyway. They'd do something else. What did people do before television? Read? Listen to the radio? Maybe go to a play? People weren't dying left, right and center then because of the inexistence of television or Britney Spears and they wouldn't be now. And, with the new information technologies of today, they certainly don't fear a world without television proper.

      And most of them certianly don't feel forbidden to take advantage of others for moral reasons. They understand what Nietzsche meant, even if they haven't read him, well enough to know what slave morality is.

  6. The other side by tverbeek · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Where is the database for us to report the stuff we probably would have bought, but didn't because we could get it online?

    Without that side of the situation also investigated, this "research" is pretty much a bunch of useless self-selected self-reported anecdotes from people who - let's face it - have plenty of motivation to exaggerate how commerce-friendly their activities are.

    --
    http://alternatives.rzero.com/
  7. Re:Files they've just taken and not bought or dele by extra+the+woos · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Yeah and once they find that perfect way of making it so you can only listen to it once that's how they'll start selling things...

    now for a little redundant ranting...Tapes, cd's, minidiscs, vinyl albums... its all THE SAME thing.. a little different in quality or size or portability... But very similar to each other.

    And on that note why dont they at the very, very least /whines make all those albums that have been recording in very high quality analog or digital available as 192kbps/24bit surround sound dvd-a stuff? There's like no dvd-a's out there. If alkaline trio's record label put out re-releases of their best stuff on really high quality dvd-audio discs I'd be in my car right now to buy them... Give me something cool to buy!!! Something I can't just download for free!

    Has there ever been a time when you were listening to something and you were like wow, I wish I could turn the other instruments off and just listen to the piano here, or just listen to the singing there, or just listen to the background vocals there... Why dont they make some dvd-a discs that let you do that? That'd be *COOL*!!!

    Or make it so that when you buy a disc it includes a code that lets you go to the web and...guarantees that since your a buyer of this disc the band will let you ask them a couple questions which they promise to respond to.. Or they will grab their digital camera, take a pic *just for you* and send it. I'd pay a few extra dollars on top of a cd's usual cost for that, and I think any big fan of a band would too...

    Even better would be that you dont *hafta* pay, but if you go to their web site and enter the code, you get the ability to pay the band a few dollars directly, for that one time specialty (that way the band gets the money instead of it being filtered through retailer, distributor, label, etc).. I'D BE ALL OVER THAT SHIT!!!

    Instead we just get some cd-audio disc thats the same exact thing as I can just have in my hands without having to move in 5mins by using bit-torrent...It's not a moral issue here people.. Its a common-sense issue.

    If mcdonalds sold a pasta dish that was as good as the olive garden, and was an exact copy... Yet offered it for half the price and delivered it to you for free... well shit... it might be a copy but damn.. thats some convenience... If corporations are allowed to make decisions based on economics not morals.. then I get to make decisions based on economics not morals when I'm dealing with corporations... fair.

    --
    replacing it with NEW Folger's Crystals! (lets see if they notice the difference)
  8. Re:Files they've just taken and not bought or dele by poptones · · Score: 4, Interesting
    What about all of the files that these people continue to listen to, but don't delete or buy legit copies of?

    What about it? Unless they stole the CDs to get those rips, it costs no one a penny except the guy who bought the hard drive and the bandwidth.

    How much of their music do they actually own?

    Unless they are a music publisher, none of it. You think those CDs you bought means you "own" that music?

    You bought a CD. You can sell the CD. The CD only happens to contain the music - scratch it so it doesn't play, then see how much you can get for it.

    Now, where there is no tangible good, there is no "loss" and no ability to deprive others - and, therefore, no ownership. As someone who just lost about 40GB of music to the brain-dead mandrake partition manager, I can personally attest to this - the "loss" was entirely my own.

    My friends like to tell me that they wouldn't have bought the CD anyway, so downloading it doesn't hurt anybody. This may be true in some cases, but I think most of the time people just decide that they wouldn't have bought it post download.

    I'm sorry you missed this, because that's the whole freaking point!.

    Think about that part again...

  9. About purchases... by poptones · · Score: 4, Interesting
    You know, since the ho-town crackdown on "internet reedom" I have resolved not to buy anything from them. This is in spite of the fact I left virtually all my music cds behind but I still have the sleeves and CD jackets - hey I wonder if they would just GIVE me the CDs since I already bought them?

    I have avoided making purchases in spite of the fact I used to spend - literally - thousands of dollars a year on records, tapes, CDs and DVDs. Through most of my life, in fact, because I'm one of those "artsy" types who likes to have lots of the good stuff around. You think I don't miss my Smashing Pumpkins collection? My Alice Cooper discography? Sgt. Peppers?

    You think it doesn't suck boycotting these motherfuckers? You really think none of us are making sacrifices? You think I can't tell the difference in sound between the MP3 rips available most places and the CD? I wish these motherfuckers would pull their heads out of their asses and get it together to the point I didn't feel like a traitor to my ethics (not to mention my Constitution) when I entertain the notion of giving them my money to replace the tangible items I have lost.

  10. There are very few cases where it is sampling by ShatteredDream · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Most of the time you can find 30 second clips on Amazon or CDUniverse, even for small bands. I can see downloading copies of songs from bands that you cannot find any legit means to sample, but stop using this bullshit excuse of "oh they're just sampling" to justify most peoples' use. They don't delete the music and they keep listening to it in most cases. One of those little inconvenient logical twists is that you can also argue that many people wouldn't have bought the album anyway, because with Kazaa, et al. they don't have to.

    The reaction of the people I lived with at my dorm when they saw that my music collection was not only legit, but that I had almost as many MP3s from my used CDs as they had taken off of AudioGalaxy was just... shock. I'm not rich, by any stretch of the imagination.

    And you know what the irony of it is? Many of these "kids who couldn't buy them anyway" were driving much nicer cars than my 11 year old Honda Accord. It's nothing more than a bunch of rich brats who don't want to spend $10-$15 on a CD so that they can upgrade their beamer, at least around here. I just got Draconian Times by Paradise Lost in the mail today from Amazon's used products market. It cost me $5 before shipping and handling for a total of ~$7.50.

    I have even more contempt for the RIAA than most of my geek peers because unlike them, I actually own all of my music that the RIAA wants to control. I didn't get it off of a file sharing network, I bought it either from a store or from the iTMS. That is also why when I bitch about those bastards that older people will actually listen to me. File sharers are free loaders, people like me have paid our dues to the RIAA and are getting shafted anyway.

    --
    Click here or a puppy gets stomped!
  11. Re:Files they've just taken and not bought or dele by hazem · · Score: 5, Funny

    You know, I accidentally hear music all the time. The radio plays, and my neighbors play their stereos loud. In the office, people play their cds and mp3s.

    I also feel really bad for the RIAA. They are just losing so much money to my unauthorized listening. So I send them money. First, I tried to count the songs and send them $0.10 per listening, but it got overwhelming.

    So, I started just sending my pay check directly to them. But then I got kicked out of my apartment and lost my job because I never washed my clothes.

    But now I get an unemployment check and a welfare check, and I just send these directly to the RIAA. The poor guys, they're really hurting these days.

    It's getting colder outside now, but I'm warmed on the inside knowing that the executives at the RIAA are getting their due and are no longer being harmed by my illicit listening activities.

    And here's the cool part, we can all do it!

    Here's the address to send the checks. I always include a note apologizing for taking out the cost of postage. I know I'm hurting an artists, but I can only do so much.

    RIAA
    1330 Connecticut Ave N.W., Suite 300
    Washington, D.C. 20036

  12. Re:Files they've just taken and not bought or dele by d34thm0nk3y · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If corporations are allowed to make decisions based on economics not morals.. then I get to make decisions based on economics not morals when I'm dealing with corporations... fair.

    wow, I just wanted to re-iterate this. If i wasn't busy whoring my project I would make this my sig. Really, it is one of those things you read that kinda give you the shivers becaue they are so friggin right.

    P.S. check out Crackpot They are really good, on an independent label and give away songs for free hehehe.