An Argument in Support of Illegal Downloading - Essay Example

?An Argument in Support of Illegal Downloading There was a time back in the 1980's when the Betamax was all the rage. It was a video player and copying machine that was meant for personal use. At the time, the entertainment industry screamed bloody hell as they proclaimed that the device would cause the demise of the entertainment industry because it allowed people to copy movies and television shows as it aired over the television screen. The machines allowed people to make copies for their friends for distribution. The same protests were heard even earlier with the advent of the tape recording machine for the radio and tape players. The opponents of the technology were convinced that the machine had to be crushed in order to save the industry from certain doom. People freely were sharing movies, television shows, and music with each other and not paying the artists and producers a cent in royalties. That was just plain evil in their book and it had to be stopped. As we can all see, the naysayers of then were wrong. Not only did the industry not die for the existence of betamax, but the industry flourished and, after learning to work the video industry, helped create machines that would make the experience even more enjoyable. You don't hear them complaining about how streaming videos and videos on demand via the computer would kill the industry do you? These days, the same shouts of protest can be heard about the so called “illegal sharing” of entertainment media such as movies, television shows, and music via file sharing services. These days, illegal downloading is the center of attention in both government offices and the hallways of the entertainment industry offices. While they claim that the entertainment industry is adversely affected and is on the brink of certain ruin due to the proliferation of illegal file sharing services, the reality of the situation is that while there are some admitted negative effects to be had from illegal file sharing, there are also a lot of good to be had from allowing people to continue to openly share files without fear of legal repercussions. This essay will shed light on what I feel are the two most important arguments in support of and against illegal downloading. We shall begin with the so-called negative effects of the illegal file sharing services. The music industry claims to be the most adversely affected by the trend in illegal downloading with lost profits amounting to billions of dollars according to the Recording Industry Association of America. Between the years of 2004 and 2009, an estimated 30 billion songs were file shared illegally even though legitimate download avenues such as Itunes and Rhapsody exist for song downloading at a minimal cost to the buyer (Adkins, Amy “How Does Illegally Downloading Music Impact the Music Industry?”). Leaders of the industry claim that this translates to around 12.5 billion in losses since Napster, the first free file sharing site first launched in 1999. Their only recourse in this situation is to try to track down the individuals who have illegally downloaded the music and then suing them for thousands of dollars in estimated lost revenue. Just thinking about the way that the music industry is trying to curb illegal downloading makes my head spin. There are not enough law enforcers in the country to monitor the online activities of all the Americans, not to mention that such an act on their part is a violation of the privacy of that particular individual. Those who are unlucky enough to get caught are sued for what? An amount that the RIAA knows the individual cannot afford to pay? What lesson is taught then? Does it scare others into stopping the illegal activity? There are other and more effective ways to get to these people. The industry also claims that these activities result in layoffs and loss of capital for new music investments. That is because the music industry has only limited financial resources with which they can cater to existing talent while developing new ones. There is believed to have been a 20 percent decline in album sales in 2002 as per data gathered by Peinz and Waelbroeck (qtd. in Shannon). This decrease in sales is being blamed on the illegal downloading of music. The music industry would have us believe that illegal downloading negatively affects them because the music that is downloaded for free through file sharing services does not give them a return on investment. They do not get any royalties for their company that produced the record, or the artist who made the record. Basically, this type of theft should be considered equal to economic sabotage in their dictionary. I will discuss how uneducated this assumption by the music industry is in a later portion of this essay. If one were to solely base his opinion of illegal file sharing on the doomsday scenario created by the movie, television, and recording industry, we would think that they are truly being hurt by the activity and, as caring and responsible individuals. Therefore, it would be in everyone's best interest to stop with the illegal activity since those who illegally download are directly participating in the economic demise of the entertainment industry. However, nothing could be further from the truth. Other sources of information have shown that the entertainment industry, whether they admit it or not also directly benefit, and benefit greatly from the illegal downloading of their materials. In fact, if there is anything that illegal downloading should be considered guilty of, it should be the act of forcing these industries to rethink their business models and retool it for a new age of business ventures. These traditional avenues of entertainment are fast becoming archaic and irrelevant in an age when independent production of both films and music are becoming the norm. In order to understand what I am trying to say, we must go back in time to the era in 1999 before the pioneering file sharing service Napster was shut down. Thanks to the existence of Napster, smaller and lesser known music talents found a platform where they could be heard by more people rather than if they had spent all their time trying to gain the attention of the big shot conglomerate music companies. In particular, the band Dispatch, a small town band from Missouri proved the power of file sharing when they released their tracks on Napster and went on to become successful concert artists, selling out Madison Square Garden for 3 nights without ever being tied down to a recording company contract (Castleman, Max “The Positive and Negative Effects of Illegal Downloading”). By successfully launching their careers through the file sharing service and allowing listeners to “illegally share” their files of the music from Dispatch, they grew their fan base far faster than if they had placed their recording future in the hands of the recording companies. Theirs is a success story based upon a new era business model. By allowing people to freely try / listen to their music, their listeners snowballed and created the image of the band through word of mouth. When it came time for the band to reap the rewards of allowing people access to their music for free, they earned it a thousand times over. People paid to see their concerts and buy other memorabilia from the band. Thus giving them the income that they rightfully deserved to earn due to their trust in the public's reception of their band. With that information in mind, would the music industry truly lose a significant amount of income when it comes to promoting new talent or existing talent by allowing the free download of their music? It would not seem so since (Biggs, Jacob “The Advantages of Illegal downloading”): “Musicians do not suffer from lack of album revenue because their profits are mostly derived from touring and merchandise sales.” Musicians do not make a lot of money from their recordings because the standard royalty rules apply. It is in this area of income that illegal downloading sometimes makes a dent in the revenue for the music companies. Currently (Biggs, Jacob “The Advantages of Illegal downloading”): Profits generated from music sales pale in comparison. According to Media & Culture by Richard Campbell, musicians receive a standard $0.09 royalty from a $0.99 iTunes download, leaving $0.33 for iTunes and $0.57 for the record company. So we can see how the recording companies, not the industry in general are affected by the illegal downloading of music files. Artists and the bands that accompany them will always make revenue from their concert ticket sales and other merchandise. They can exercise a profit sharing scheme that allows both sides to benefit from the tours and sales of memorabilia. According to other sources, musicians are not adverse to illegal file sharing even though their recording companies would like to have us believe otherwise. Their belief is that this type of activity can only help their careers. Their sentiment is that (Biggs, Jacob “The Advantages of Illegal downloading”): ... they did not think that lawsuits against song swappers would benefit musicians and songwriters." Illegal downloading is not harmful enough to musicians to warrant their support for lawsuits, which would yield little compensation for them. Instead, many artists embrace the internet as a form of advertisement. By allowing the free sharing of their music via file sharing, their music reach and fan base grows exponentially in the process. Allowing them to reach parts of the world with their music that they would not normally reach via the traditional promotional methods. So in effect, artists tend to benefit tremendously from illegal downloading. Further proof of this growing trend is the way that certain artists have chosen to “leak” out their music, hoping it would go viral and be shared among people in an effort to promote an upcoming single or album. The entertainment landscape has changed tremendously since the shift of entertainment media to digital content. These days, it is not uncommon for singers to offer their music online with some free songs thrown in. Up and coming musicians choose to self promote via the internet due to the relatively low cost of promoting their music via free file sharing which they feel enables them to make more money when the time comes to go on the road with their music. Something that they cannot achieve if illegal downloading is continuously hounded by the recording companies who do not understand that they are following an obsolete business playbook already. For all of the negative publicity being thrown the way of illegal downloading and file sharers, that does not erase the fact that there are actually notable names in the technological and entertainment business that have seen the light and agree that file sharing is the wave of the future. Apple Inc. the owners of the hugely popular online music store Itunes has chosen to set that pace with the advent of their Home Sharing utility for their laptop computers. This utility allows computers that are on the same network or within close proximity of each other to share their music libraries with one another without spending an extra dollar for the exchange (Biggs, Jacob “The Advantages of Illegal Downloading”). Gee, doesn't that sound like something familiar? Yup, It is illegal downloading shrouded in a legal cloth simply because it is a big name digital media company that is pushing for the technology and illegal file sharing. Nobody in the music industry is complaining about that are they? I wonder why. If Apple allows the activity within their network, then that negates all of the claims of the other members of the entertainment industry. Simply put, the entertainment industry now finds itself in unfamiliar territory and as such, they are at a loss as to how to conduct their business. They do not need to die in the process, we know they won't. They merely have to reorient themselves and create a new niche for themselves in a world where free sharing, or illegal sharing, is becoming the norm. Works Cited Adkins, Amy. “How Does Illegally Downloading Music Impact the Music Industry?”. Sales Promotions. Chron. n.d. Web. 6 Dec. 2012. Biggs, Jacob. “the Advantages of Illegal Downloading”. Column. The Rotunda. 24 Aug. 2012. Web. 5 Dec. 2012. Castleman, Max. “The Positive and Negative Effects of Illegal Downloading”. General Comments. Neon Goldfish Marketing Solutions. 14 Jun. 2012. Web. 4 Dec. 2012. Read More