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Report Claims 95% of Music Downloads Are Illegal
Un pobre guey writes "The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) press release claims that 95% of music file downloads in 2008, an estimated 40 billion files, were illegal. Oddly enough, digital music sales are up: 'The digital music business internationally saw a sixth year of expansion in 2008, growing by an estimated 25 per cent to US$3.7 billion in trade value. Digital platforms now account for around 20 per cent of recorded music sales, up from 15 per cent in 2007. Recorded music is at the forefront of the online and mobile revolution, generating more revenue in percentage terms through digital platforms than the newspaper (4%), magazine (1%) and film industries (4%) combined... Despite these developments, the music sector is still overshadowed by the huge amount of unlicensed music distributed online. Collating separate studies in 16 countries over a three-year period, IFPI estimates over 40 billion files were illegally file-shared in 2008, giving a piracy rate of around 95 per cent.'"
While iTunes is a really nice idea for those clueless enough to need some handholding to load their iPod with music, face it - iTunes barely breaks even with the costs between credit card transaction fees and what they are paying to the copyright owner. It isn't a model that anyone would want to emulate. Apple has to do it because otherwise the clueless wouldn't have any way at all to put digital music on their iPod, thus iPod sales would suffer.
I don't know anyone that actually would pay money for digital music. It is all free, free for the taking online - if you know how. And if you have some kind of broadband Internet connection.
For the folks that access the Internet at the library, well, they aren't going to let you download music there, are they? Similarly for people with dial-up. No music downloads there. There is also the over-30 crowd that doesn't understand the Internet, computers or how to program their VCR. So there are still lots of people that have to pay someone to help them get digital music.
Oh, and we can't forget the guilt-ridden. Yes, the RIAA is suing people that distribute music. They are not suing people that download and merely download without redistributing music. So if all you do is leech music downloads from the Internet you are perfectly safe from the rath of the RIAA. But there are plenty of people that will say "... but, but, but, ... it is just wrong!" Yes, in today's climate it is wrong. No question about it.
The "wrongness" of downloading is soon to be moot. We are training (and have trained) an entire generation of people that believe it is not wrong. Anything that can be done on the Internet is OK and it is all there for free. Destroying people'e lives is OK, as long as it is on the Internet - our favorite MySpace scammer is getting another shot. Taking anything that isn't nailed down is OK too. So I see we are coming to a reckoning about copyright, distribution and the Internet.
Yes, I think it is probably a dark future for people that want to "create" as apposed to those that want to create "mixes" and "mashups". Creativity better be its own reward in the future, because anything else is going to be pretty slim in the "reward" or "compensation" category.
All of my music starts life in CD form.
Snobby, sure, but no digital format's outpaced the old standards, and I doubt any will.
PS: I don't reply to ACs.