The New York Times (free reg. required) discusses a new study on file sharing, showing that music sharing via Kazza and other online services has no statistical effect on record sales. From the story:
“In an interview, Professor Oberholzer-Gee said that previous research assumed that every download could be thought of as a lost sale. In fact, he said, most downloaders were drawn to free music and were unlikely to spend $18 on a CD.
Say I offer you a free flight to Florida,” he asks. “How likely is it that you will go to Florida? It is very likely, because the price is free.” If there were no free ticket, that trip to Florida would be much less likely, he said. Similarly, free music might draw all kinds of people, but “it doesn’t mean that these people would buy CD’s at $18,” he said.
It may not be harmful but it is illegal
I have never downloaded any music files to which I did not have a right either through the artist or owner giving them out for free, or by having a legitimately obtained copy.
Downloading files in violation of copyright law is simply illegal. It does not matter if it is harmful or not, it is illegal. As librarians we should be outraged over these egregious violations of copyright.
Re:It may not be harmful but it is illegal
Absolutely. But, in the same thread, it should be legal for us (fair use) to copy our own CDs and DVDs for backup purposes. Currently, the media industry is still in denial of this right. They continue to attempt new CD copy protection schemes, and they sue the makers of software to backup DVDs.
I agree its illegal. Studies that have determined the impact of filesharing on sales figures appear to be valid, however they usually take great care to avoid looking like they support it. Is the media industry encouraging illegal use when they deny legitimate backup options, and are they holding back new distribution channels to stick with old methods?
I’ll take bets (I’m still addicted thanks to Google and Yahoo!) that downloadable movies that we can burn to disc are a good 5 years away. Any odds?
Interesting notion v: silly twits
I find Oberholzer-Gee’s proposition most interesting, and not alone because it is so contrary to convention. I see the opposition to his proposition stemming from the popular consensus of reality flying in the face of it. And I was heartily amused by Ms. Charneski’s statement, “There’s a lot of research out there that’s conducted with an agenda in mind.” She seems to say that as if the RIAA couldn’t possibly have an agenda of its own. Giving her the benefit of the doubt, however, I’ll assume that some qualifier was abstracted out of the article.