Posted by Cynic on 11/15/05 12:47

On Tue, 15 Nov 2005 02:50:59 -0000, Mike Archer <mikearcher@gmx.co.uk>
wrote:

>I'm under the impression that this is how the law stands in the UK,
>though I'm not 100% definate on that. I'd be interested to hear other's
>opinions on what I have said...

One point that I rarely see discussed when the subject of pirating
music comes up is its eventual effect on the industry as a whole.

When pirate copies consisted only of tapes made from a record borrowed
from a friend or recorded off-air, the pirating did not seriously
impact on record sales. The number of pirate recordings made from
each 100 copies sold was pretty limited, and few people were prepared
to sit at the radio with a tape-recorder for hours on end waiting for
a few songs that they wanted to tape to be broadcast. Easier by far
to buy the single or the albumn.

The Internet and broadband has changed that. It is now far less
hassle to download a pirate copy of the music you want than to buy it
in a music shop. This must already have impacted severely on record
sales, and will probably continue to increase, especially with the
advent of portable MP3 players that cuts out the trivial step of
needing to burn a CD. For the first time this year I have heard
youngsters saying that they do not want a CD album for Christmas
because they have got all the CDs they want from the Internet.
Indeed, it is often possible to get a CD from the Internet before it
is available in the shops.

The music industry gets a huge percentage of its money from record
sales. If that disappears or decreases significantly, there will be
less money to be made out of music. That will either mean that less
money will be spent in order to produce it, or the music industry will
come up with different ways to make money on its products.

At present, ISTM that the music industry is grossly over-funded. The
amount of money paid to artists is grotesque, and events surrounding
the industry are also ridiculously extravagent.

So the short-term effect may actually be of benefit to music, as the
emphasis comes back to the music itself rather than the associated
lifestyles, and the people involved do the job because they like
making music rather than because they like money. Perhaps we will see
an end to the era of the "superstar"?

--
Cynic

[Back to original message]