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P2P drives higher sales
Author: Gareth HalfacreePublished: 2nd November 2009
The music industry might fight for tougher laws against file sharing - but could they be doing themselves harm?
According to an article over on The Independent, the latest poll - commissioned by Demos and carried out by Ipsos Mori - indicates that those who download music from illegitimate sources such as newsgroups or peer-to-peer networks spend an average of £77 a year on music from legitimate sources, compared to just £33 a year for those who stick to the right side of intellectual property law.
The results of the survey - which questioned 1,000 respondents aged between 16 and 50 - saw an impressive 10 percent of those questioned readily admit to downloading music without permission of the copyright holders. However, it was this group that also spent the most - over double that of Internet users who stick to legitimate sources such as iTunes and Amazon's MP3 store.
The move flies in the face of the industry's concerns regarding file sharing on the Internet - and shines a light on plans to introduce a three-strikes rule to the UK that would see persistent file sharers disconnected from the Internet.
With the results of this survey - which plainly suggest that file sharing actually benefits the creative industries - adding their weight to prior surveys which found that P2P file sharing had little or no effect on sales of music, it could prove difficult for the music industry to continue their campaign of high damage claims and lobbying for tighter controls.
Demos' Peter Bradwell believes that the government's plans - at the behest of the music industry - to introduce a three-strikes rule for file sharers in the UK "will not help prop up an ailing music industry," and claims that "politicians and music companies need to recognise that the nature of music consumption has changed, and consumers are demanding lower prices and easier access" - something that the legitimate download industry is slowly starting to offer.
Do you believe that file sharers could actually increase revenue for the industry, or is every single download a lost sale as the lawsuits so often claim? Share your thoughts over in the forums.
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Comments (19)
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Without hearing something first, eh. Sod the whole thing, typically.
When I did pirate though I definitely spent more. I used to get all sorts of random rubbish which meant I heard a far more diverse range of music, and upon discovering an artist I liked would happily part with cash for CDs when seeing them cheap in HMV. Now I don't listen to too much, I tend to stick to artists I know and only get select tracks. Plus of course things are free on spotify!
Didn't you just describe spotify, :D
No it doesn't. You're seeing a correlation as proving causality. They don't necessarily spend more money on music because they download illegally.
The government will push through the three strikes rule. They are even publicly ignoring reliable evidence now (the cannabis fiasco) so the rise of the admin class from managing necessary paperwork to being the dictators of society is almost complete.
QFT :D
However being locked out of the internet at the behest of the music industry may cause them to rethink their spending priorities.
and maybe they will actually do their research on this, only to find that if they went ahead with the tsayo (three strikes and your out) plan, then all that people will do is just find workarounds so that no one will find out that they are downloading content illegally...
in the modern digital age labour just can't keep up, we certainly need a party without so many old pensioners running it!.
The survey results say that the people who acquire the most music illegally also acquire the most legally. THAT DOES NOT IMPLY CAUSE AND EFFECT! It does not mean that "getting lots of music illegally makes them get lots legally too" as your headline and the article's 'analysis' claim. It just means there's a correlation. Which is simple enough to understand - the biggets music lovers tend to acquire the most music, from both legal and illegal sources.
When I do buy CD's it's all in FLAC anyawys.