I download music I can't find in stores. I don't buy things on line and the stuff I like is particularly elusive. Such as blue oyster cult albums or led zeppelin. Any type of old album. However Backspacer just came out. I bought that and downloaded it as well on the same day. I'm anal about how my music is labeled and for some reason Windows media read the backspacer disk as the "pearl jam" album and all the songs were mislabeled. Kinda bummed me out, really nice cover though, I love buying CD's when I can.
So my friend thinks that internet piracy not only doesn't harm the music industry, but helps it
- Thread starter Inarticulate_Underachiever
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saying you steal music because you are too young to earn enough money means you are accepting you are too young to use the internet responsibly
In this case I'm blaming idiots on computers, but thats not the point.Pirate1019 said:
Piracy is a problem that I think is not as bad as they make out. Sure some bands don't do so well, but look at Trent - he has his gear online and still makes his money.
The other way of doing it is the iTunes way - a short sample and then you buy if you like. Some sort of guarantee that "play once, then buy" would probably be ok. The issues arise when DRM tries to ensure it, rather than just making it happen once, in the music download program.
The argument for this position is strong, but it really does depend on the people who are pirating. I mean, I'll download stuff sometimes, but if it's good, I'll buy it anyway. But most people don't do that. It really depends on the person pirating: it would be interesting to see the various pirated vs. sold ratios of different genres: maybe the kinds of people that listen to different kinds of music behave differently with pirated music.
Piracy probably does hurt the industry.
Maybe the artists are actually hurt less than you think. In the old days, money was made through single and album sales and tours often made a loss. Nowadays, that's reversed - gig tickets have increased in cost a lot, whereas music is much cheaper (the listed price is slightly higher compared to the late 1980s, but inflation since then means the real terms price has gone down).
However, I believe the majority of signed bands don't make a profit for their labels: ten years ago about 90% didn't, and it may be similar today. What piracy will do is decrease the profitability of music publishers. Their reaction may be to cut risks by only supporting "safer" music. That in turn may decrease the amount of music we are likely to have available, which is everyone's loss.
That said, in the old days people had tape recorders, and mainstream radio played a wider range of music: most people just recorded radio shows onto tape, so it's not like piracy is new. Also, there's the reality that the music companies were absurdly slow to realise the potential of the internet, and when they woke up they tried to stamp on it rather than use it. Consequently, they created a generation of people who resorted to illegality and got used to it. If they had provided something like iTunes immediately, more people would have been able to get 30-sec samples, and make impulse buys instead of pirating.
Maybe the artists are actually hurt less than you think. In the old days, money was made through single and album sales and tours often made a loss. Nowadays, that's reversed - gig tickets have increased in cost a lot, whereas music is much cheaper (the listed price is slightly higher compared to the late 1980s, but inflation since then means the real terms price has gone down).
However, I believe the majority of signed bands don't make a profit for their labels: ten years ago about 90% didn't, and it may be similar today. What piracy will do is decrease the profitability of music publishers. Their reaction may be to cut risks by only supporting "safer" music. That in turn may decrease the amount of music we are likely to have available, which is everyone's loss.
That said, in the old days people had tape recorders, and mainstream radio played a wider range of music: most people just recorded radio shows onto tape, so it's not like piracy is new. Also, there's the reality that the music companies were absurdly slow to realise the potential of the internet, and when they woke up they tried to stamp on it rather than use it. Consequently, they created a generation of people who resorted to illegality and got used to it. If they had provided something like iTunes immediately, more people would have been able to get 30-sec samples, and make impulse buys instead of pirating.
This is a flawed argument because not all illegal downloads would be credible retail sales. The fact is that the majority of people who pirate would not otherwise purchase the music, not unless the content had a much lower price point.Venatio said:
Due to the nature of digital content and it's near limitless reproduction at the 'pirate's' expense it's not the same as stealing a physical product. Copying does not deprive a retailer of the ability to sell a physical product.
I am not condoning piracy, merely pointing out the misunderstanding of lost earnings for the content producers.
Speaking from the point of view of someone who has a sister and a good friend who pirates music I can say that's not the case indeed.Inarticulate_Underachiever said:
Neither of them buy any music. Pretty much every single one of the thousands of songs they own were downloaded off of a p2p program.
I have to say, you have a point.xplay3r said:
On the topic however, if one person says "Oh, I'll just download one song, it won't make such an impact" imagine the entire population thinking that, it adds up to massive impact. Think about leaving a can in the gutter, what if 600,000 people left cans in a city's gutter? What then?
I personally can't see it helping. Radiohead's little thing of pay what you want for the cd works out because ticket prices are high.
An interesting point. Your last paragraph is particularly insightful. Indeed, had the industry looked into these new business models earlier they would probably have reduced the effects of relatively widespread piracy.Agema said:
As to whether it is bad for the industry, I disagree. If record companies and artists are only interested in profit then that doesn't bode well for music as an 'art'. There will always be music because people love to make it. With creation and distribution now so simple there's no reason music can't be a passion alongside your regular life. There are many people who photgraph, sculpt, paint and create art for no other reason than it is their passion.
Not entirely correct. Record companies sure as hell sufer due to piracy since people don't really need to buy CD's in order to listen to their favourite artists.Inarticulate_Underachiever said:
But then again why on earth would you want to support companies who don't really do anything but profit from the talents of musical artists? Not to mention the fact that record companies decide what will be the most heard music and what won't be heard pretty much at all. Meaning that they basically sieze a sort of monopoly on musical evolution.
Piracy takes away that control from these companies and make them lose money. Sonner or later they will go bankrupt, and I for one will piss on their graves when they're gone.
Sure, Piracy hurts the music "industry", but it doesn't really hurt the artists themselves... Unless they were stupid enough to sign a contract with a record company that didn't favor them at all, which means that they will probably go down with the record label in question. But that's their mistake.
Smart musicians keep in touch with the development, and promote themselves online, as well as letting their fans download their songs for free. That way more people will show up at concerts and pay for tickets, if the band or artist in question is any good that is...
Hail Piracy! Death to the wicked media giants!
Everyone downloads now and then. Unless your permanently downloading everything new that pops up it will hardly do anything to the internets.
Pirating music does not hurt artists.
It hurts the INDUSTRY, sure, but who gives a fuck about millionaire fatcats?
If you want to support a band, go to gigs.
It hurts the INDUSTRY, sure, but who gives a fuck about millionaire fatcats?
If you want to support a band, go to gigs.
It's not the specifics of their job, or duty, it's the nature of your argument. insanelich was pointing out that it's not valid because it can be similarly applied to people who commit atrocities and still be relevant.Venatio said:
Your appeal distracts from the real matter at hand.
True I suppose. Fact is, most of the time (if not all the time) they actually download the entire album for free instead of spending money. Also, thats why the artists allow it to be played on the radio and sometimes allow the music video to be shown on YouTube, to attract people to their songs for them to enjoy it and to increase album sales.Radeonx said: