P2P File Swapping on the Rise Again? 319
asdf 101 writes "News.com reports today that 'After six months of declines, peer-to-peer usage recently climbed 14 percent.' Their bottomline: 'The decline came as the RIAA launched more than 300 lawsuits against file swappers. The reversal cast doubts on the music industry's claims that its lawsuits are working to deter people from illegally downloading music files.' I guess wake_up_and_smell_the_coffee time just gets that much more imminent for all the hacks at RIAA." There's also an AP story, and you might want to review this story from just a few weeks ago that has different conclusions.
What?! You mean (Score:3, Insightful)
It never really stopped (Score:5, Insightful)
What the RIAA doesn't seem to realize is that, people are able to block certain IP addresses in many of the client programs. Thus, when the RIAA goes online looking for traffic, they see fewer clients.
The other thing they don't seem to realize is that, there's more to "illegal file sharing" than Kazaa. It could be that people have cut down on their Kazaa use and have gone to other P2P programs.
reversal doesn't (Score:5, Insightful)
I think the legal reversal pertaining to Verizon having to hand over its members' information to the RIAA could explain such a rise. People are more likely to fileshare if they think the RIAA is less likely to be knocking on their door tomorrow. If anything, the lawsuits seemed to be "working" before that Verizon ruling.
Statistics are dangerous (Score:4, Insightful)
Statistics are dangerous in the hands of people who may have a certain agenda to push. For example, saying that filesharing goes up 14% could simply imply that more new computer and/or Internet users have signed online to find previews of their favorite music artists' songs. Also, it's very possible that the way these companies conduct these studies of the popularity of file sharing could simply have changed a bit. If one month they're monitoring seven different filesharing networks for their statistics, and they suddenly add an eighth to the mix, the numbers are obviously going to increase.
We need to stop worrying about these silly RIAA lawsuits and about the ethics of filesharing and simply realize that the current music distribution model is horrible. The CD/album is not popular anymore; artists are fueled by hit singles much more so than hit albums. Things like Apple's iPod/iTunes service, while expensive, are a good first step to delivering media content the way people wish to receive it.
Stop letting the media tell you what to do. If you want to use peer to peer software, use it. There's nothing wrong with sharing songs with friends/associates in my opinion, and it only helps to spread the word about music artists and make them and their merchandise more popular. Sharing file is as natural an act as sexual intercourse between a man and woman/man and a man/woman and a woman, so the days of prosecuting it are definitely numbered, and it'll be as laughable in 20 years time as the article 2 nodes down on the Slashdot front page about VCR taping regulations.
Have fun with life and be responsible, but at the same time don't worry about the evil bit devil at the other end of your cable connection reading your data that flows to and fro your machine. There will soon be better options, and hopefully moves like HP licensing Apple iTunes technology, as well as other things, will make the online movies/music environment better than ever.
Do all these statistics really show anything... (Score:5, Insightful)
Ask Your Candidates About Copyright Reform (Score:5, Insightful)
How about making copyright reform a central issue in the upcoming election?
Very likely most politicians don't know if the DMCA is fit to eat, feel Disney and the RIAA are important campaign contributors whose requests should be given priority, and music downloaders are simple thieves who deserve every bit of punishment they get.
You can change that. But it's going to take some work. There are enough people sharing music in America - more people than voted for George Bush - that if you get off your collective asses and get politically active, you can get laws passed to get the RIAA off your back.
In Change the Law [goingware.com], I explain that copyright is not a Constitutional right, like free speech. Instead copyright is allowed (but not required) to serve a useful purpose, a purpose which I feel has long since outlived its usefulness.
I suggest steps you can take to bring about copyright reform, ranging from speaking out [goingware.com] to practicing civil disobedience [goingware.com].
One thing I'd like you all to do today is to write your elected representatives [goingware.com] to ask their opinion of the current state of copyright law given its widespread abuse by organizations like the RIAA and MPAA, and to urge them to work towards copyright reform. Let them know your vote will depend on a positive response.
When you're done writing that letter, write to the other candidates for each office in the upcoming elections, to ask them the same question.
Sixty million American peer-to-peer file traders have the potential to raise a lot of Hell with the politicians. I want every candidate to be peppered with questions about copyright reform at every campaign stop and in every press interview. I want the repeal of the DMCA to be discussed in the Presidential debates.
People marched in protest when Dmitry Sklyarov was arrested. Dmitry is free now - but the law under which he was jailed is still on the books.
If you agree with me that something needs to be done about copyright, I need your help [goingware.com].
Thank you for your attention.
They'll never figure it out (Score:5, Insightful)
The first thing from the article that caught my eye was the timing. So the usage declined right around the time all the college students started exams and then went home. Then it picked up again in September...just in time for school to start again.
Next...just what is "usage"? It doesn't specify mp3s, video, documents...nothing. It just says usage. Yet the RIAA will assume it's all mp3s and go nuts again.
There will never be a way to truly determine why usage drops and rises. The RIAA likes to say "it's because we're educating the public", news sources like to say "it's because everyone is afraid of the RIAA's lawsuits", music download companies (ie, iTunes, Napster, etc) like to say "it's because of our services and people would rather get legitimate copies". Nobody knows. This battle will rage for years, we'll see different theories on why it rises and drops, and people will continue to download their files whenever and however they want.
Re:I, for one, have stopped (Score:5, Insightful)
the only new Cd's I buy have been from IUMA artist and other indie bands I have found online and at their concerts.
do I download music on a p2p netowrk? hell yeah. but then I buy that used CD to get a better copy of the recording.
I suggest that EVERYONE buy used cd's only whenever possible. it will help a small business in your area, plus it will smack the RIAA in a way that royally pains them but they can do nothing about.
Statistics can prove anything... (Score:4, Insightful)
70 % of people i spoke to agree to this post with 100% of them being imagined.
It ought to be on the rise. Goodbye RIAA. (Score:4, Insightful)
They have also critically damaged people's sympathy to them. If 100 year copyrights were not bad enough, threatening 12 year olds and grandparents was. Few people have any sympathy for publishers who are making money off dead artists, artists they hardly pay and stuff they could have recorded off the radio 40 years ago. Everyone knows that music recorded in 1902 paid for itself by 1903 and the big publishers are nothing but greedy control freaks.
The continued rise of file sharing spells the end of the 5 big dumb music publishers. Music is being libreated from it's comercial clutches and all sorts of wonderful acts will flourish and profit without those goons in the way. People basking in a variety of music and cultural service the comercial world never delivered will not put RIAA chains back on. They will understand they were right and when the money goes from the RIAA, so too goes their propaganda and fewer and fewer people will be mislead. Good riddance.
Re:I, for one, have stopped (Score:5, Insightful)
oh because nobody would ever buy your games again because of that inane attitude?
and you know buying a used car is only one small step above car theft, it steals money from the car makers.
Oh and don't buy anything off e-bay, as you are stealing from all those manufacturers...
I have heard this argument from software people before.. It's the same as how people that continue to use an old version of the software they bought 5 years ago are stealing from the programmers and software developers.
If you truthfully feel that way, then I pity you as you have a dismal outlook on life.
Out of sight out of mind (Score:5, Insightful)
Scare tactics only work when you are scaring people. That's why the law suits won't work in the long term. You'd not only need new lawsuits all the time but you'd need the press to continue to be bothered to write about them. Otherwise for 99% of people they effectively aren't happening and there's nothing to worry about.
Re:I haven't used p2p in months (Score:5, Insightful)
Why do we assume that P2P networks are only being used by college students who want porn and music... could there perhaps be professionals in the industry out there too?
The More You Tighten Your Grip... (Score:5, Insightful)
Your Public Library has CDs (Score:5, Insightful)
Your local public library has CDs that you can borrow, usually for a week or so, absolutely free.
Some of the more sophisticated libraries allow you to search and request titles online, so that a CD that's at a library twenty miles away, or currently checked out by someone else, will be sent to your nearest library as soon as it is available. Some libraries will send an email to let you know that your titles have arrived.
Library CDs are often pretty beat up, and many are missing the original booklets or jewel cases, but they will still play in a good player. You can even do your library a favor and use some of that CD repair glop on them so future borrowers can enjoy them as well (assuming that stuff actually works).
Now, I don't advocate that anyone go to their library's website, request a lot of titles that they want online, go pick them up, take them to their office with several networked PCs on a Saturday afternoon, rip the CDs to AAC, burn them onto a couple of blank CD-RWs, take them home, pop them into iTunes, and then transfer them all to an iPod. I couldn't support that. Especially since it's free.
Now that I've let that cat out of the bag, we can expect to see the RIAA confiscating CDs from public libraries across the country, as well as obtaining Patriot Act subpoenas demanding to know the names, addresses, phone numbers, and email addresses of every library patron who has ever borrowed a CD. Since librarians have about as much political clout as homeless people (actually a little less), Congress and the media will look the other way.
Or am I being exceptionally paranoid?
Re:How it all works (Score:1, Insightful)
lol no
I'm not sure if this is good. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:What?! You mean (Score:5, Insightful)
Assumptions (Score:5, Insightful)
P2P != music sharing.
Its used for many other things as well, like, eh, movie sharing and ISOs etc..
What about increasing broadband use? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Illegally downloading? (Score:4, Insightful)
Because your example doesn't match the reality of the situation.
Taping music off the radio is more like RIPing your CD to MP3. (ie "fair use") This is not (currently) illegal.
Taking that MP3 and giving it to someone (eg making it available on a filesharing network) is illegal. (because you just made a copy for the purposes of distribution, which is an exclusive right of the copyright-holder).
In the US, music licensing/copyright laws have explicit clauses for "fair use" (eg singing "Happy Birthday" at your kids party) while still defining as illegal other violations (eg public and/or for money performances of songs).
Think of it like this, if you bought a book and photocopied the entire thing 10,000 times, and gave those 10,000 copies to your friends (and their friends, and relatives, etc) - that's a violation of copyright and therefore illegal.
If you bought a first-edition hardcover signed book, made one single photo-copy, put the original in your book-archive storage room, and only even read the copy
Re:Ask Your Candidates About Copyright Reform (Score:2, Insightful)
Don't underestimate the value of what this guy is proposing. If the average American doesn't know about this issue, it's because we're not doing our job to educate them. Nobody I know is pleased that the industries are going to use this law to control what we're going to be able to tape off our TV sets, and most of them are pretty average people.
Of course people get bored or confused when we present them with a bunch of technical/legal bullshit, as has been our collective approach regarding educating the public about the DMCA. Do the same thing the good politicians do: make the issue relevant to the common person. Make them realize that they should be upset and point their ire at the schmuck they've been reelecting for a couple of decades that's been rubber-stamping industry proposals. That's how you make something an issue.
I think we'd get pretty far by keeping the people around us up to date on the issues and getting them out to the polls.
Re:How it all works (Score:2, Insightful)
While we all know what you mean, I want to be pedantic. Downloading is not illegal. Downloading, even when just restricted to music is not illegal. It is important that the perception that "Downloading from Kazaa is illegal" isn't spread any further.
There are many sites and services that provide access to music free for download, because the artist has released it as such. My current favourite is Machinae Supremacy [machinaesupremacy.com]. However, there are many more. I suggest you have a look at a couple of things. First is a program: iRATE which downloads music and adjusts to your preferences based on what other people like. (If you don't mind building code, get the CVS version, it is quite improved on the stable version). Another thing that makes for good reading is this article [goingware.com] which provides information on, among other things, where legally free music can be found.
Re:It never really stopped (Score:5, Insightful)
1) a sizable amount of P2P users even know that there is addons to block IP's.
2) those blockers work. RIAA just need to sit on a public network used by thousands of others and they'll either need to block an entire general network not solely intended for RIAA usage, or they'll simply miss to block RIAA's activities
Re:Your Public Library has CDs (Score:2, Insightful)
I go there first and then buy used on the internet.
I can afford full price, but I take pleasure in not giving money to the RIAA for no other reason then the way they have behaved.
Steve
Re:Count me among new file sharers (Score:4, Insightful)
I can remember a time when a town of ten thousand souls would have at least one, and usually two, independent record shops. They were usually run by music enthusiasts, and what they didn't have they would get. If you ordered a record and found you didn't like it, no problem, it just got returned to the distributor. Of course all this changed a couple of decades ago when the distibutors decided that they didn't like taking returns back.
Now small independents only exists in towns of at least twenty thousand, and they almost all rely on the sale of used records/CD's to remain viable. I'd love to support my local store, but there isn't one, unless you count the local superstore with its limited selection.
I'm afraid the dark days have been with us for years. The smallest stores have been disappearing for years. Now your size of store is now the smallest and likely to go next. I wish that were not the case, but it is. Unfortunately the music business is dominated by philistines who know how to extract cash from culture, but know not how to nourish culture.
It's the fear factor... (Score:2, Insightful)
Yet still.. (Score:3, Insightful)
So your music experience could be even *easier* yet. What if, instead of it taking to the end of the night to find and download Pitchfork's Top 50 Singles of 2003, it only took you a couple of hours, and you knew before-hand that everything you downloaded would be great quality and fully complete. Would you consider paying for that?
Now, on top of that, what if, once you'd downloaded a certain amount of Pitchfork, it gave you the option to download a free CD cover image and/or booklet to print out and go with your new Pitchfork tunes, would that be an incentive to have you purchase more Pitchfork tunes? And as you purchased more, other incentives would open up -- perhaps a discount code for Pitchfork merchandise, access to a mailing list that the artists themselves talk on once in a while, downloadable posters, exclusive interview tracks, etc.
What if, on top of that, after downloading a bunch of Pitchfork tunes, it started giving you the option to download a free single from a group somewhat like Pitchfork, to see if you want to try them out as well? Would that be a valuable service, one that might encourage you to keep spending money?
The media companies don't need to be screwed at all. They just need to realize that they can no longer be in the business of restricting access to music to those who can pay, and instead need to be in the business of selling what services they can add to make that music more valuable when it comes from them.
Socialists (Score:5, Insightful)
"Free market" in this country sure looks an awful lot like old soviet socialism. It's no wonder they can't put a dent in "piracy" when the companies claiming to be "victims" look just as evil as Ivan and Boris that run the Ukrainian pressing plants...
The fundamental flaw in all these studies (Score:5, Insightful)
All statistics based on self-reported data should be taken with a large spoonful of salt!
Two reasons swapping is down/up (Score:5, Insightful)
MOD PARENT UP (and.. why this matters) (Score:2, Insightful)
Personally, I think this is true, but I also think that these ~5 corporations should not control what is promoted and distributed to millions and even billions of people. If an album is released on any major label or affiliate, I try not to spend money on it, even if I like the artist. I still download at least a few tracks from any album before I make a purchase, even when I'm actually planning on buying products from people I have some amount of respect for. This is sometimes less necessary when I see an act live and can make some sort of judgement there, however, I've seen live acts whose albums I've downloaded and immediately deleted, thankful I didn't purchase them. Bottomline, If I don't think the album is worth what's being charged, I won't buy it, and I have yet to see a Compact Disc I would pay $15 for. For some I think $5 is too much.
Before I ramble on anymore.. twitter you are absolutely right, and I don't think that the record companies are going to let this happen if they can help it, at any cost. I'm curious to see how they attempt to implement points of control in digital distribution as they have already with distribution of CDs, Records, Tapes, etc. If there were no record companies, only artists, then the artists could concievably charge however much, or little, they felt was necessary. People wouldn't be contributing to their indoctrination by corporate giants, or at least not to such a degree. After all, you can take their distribution (maybe), but promotion... Well graffiti isn't as kindly taken to as file sharing, and without money, it's getting harder and harder to be heard on a large scale, while acting legally and/or morally anyways.
Not arbitrary at all. (Score:4, Insightful)
Taxation is something completely different. It obviously is arbitrary because a goverment just decides it needs to take some money and comes up with some rules to do it.
Article summary (Score:3, Insightful)
Wake up and smell the coffee for what? The realization that people are going to illegally pirate your product no matter how much you pursue them legally?
When they were trying to shut down p2p programs, all the Slashdotters went on and on about how they should be going after individual users. Then when they started doing that, suddenly the RIAA is the bad guy again.
When does pirating become so widespread that nobody can make any money anymore? Already, PC games sales are declining so much that everybody is moving to console games, and the PC is getting a bunch of ports as a result, some of them crappy (Deus Ex: Invisible War is the most recent example I can remember).
So, wake up and smell the coffee--and realize what? That nobody wants to pay for anything anymore and has justified it as a lame "culture movement" against the RIAA? What about the artists in this? Nobody gives a shit about the human beings who actually rented the studio, showed up, and spent weeks if not months recording the music people are now getting for free.
Re:The RIAA could kill piracy (Score:1, Insightful)
With a compliant media always willing to repost and repackage press releases as news, it's a foregone conclusion that the industry self-congratulations will continue indefinitely and the struggle against piracy will have had a definite beginning but never an ending.
how to decrease downloads (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Article summary (Score:4, Insightful)
If what you're saying comes true, then YES many people are going to lose money, but I don't think it'll be the (genuinely good) artists. Instead, I'm willing to bet that they'll be paid like they were for thousands of years in the past--as performers. Besides, in all honesty, doesn't that make more sense than them attempting to be the sole "owners" of an intangible object that can be copied and distributed for little to no cost?
I for one, won't miss the RIAA one bit, either way. They ARE the bad guy. They cheat nearly every artist that you've ever heard of. They piss money away on circumventing the laws via payolla. And then as if to add insult to injury, the money they do give the artists usually comes in the form of loans. Take TLC, for instance, here was a band making millions of dollars in profit (not gross) and the artists, after all of their record company's swindling, were making about 20,000 per year individually.
As for your last statement, I love PC games. I, in fact, almost exclusively play PC games, but you're right, I haven't bought a PC game in awhile. Reason being: MOST of the games out right now suck. Apart from Warcraft 3: Frozen Throne, I haven't played a PC game that isn't generic or bug-ridden for awhile. Just give it some time, though. I GAURANTEE you 2004 will be the year PC games make a huge return. Again, it's not because of a lack of piracy, but there's a bunch of GREAT games coming out. To name a few: World of Warcraft, Doom III, Unreal Tournament 2004, Half-life 2, Counterstrike: Condition Zero. These are games that are going to pwn, and I plan on owning every one. (And this is after not buying a PC game for about 6 months.)
These issues have less to do with piracy like the RIAA and failing gaming companies would have you believe. In a world where nobody takes responsibility, this can be expected. I mean, it's easier to believe that your product isn't selling because of theft than it is to say it sucked. And the former certainly sounds better to stockholders and the media.
Piracy is an excuse. Unfortunately, some people (like the parent poster) have fallen for it.
-Grym
Re:I, for one, have stopped (Score:2, Insightful)
I like the sound of this! if, by faulting his arguments, i prove that his views fall short of optimal, will you be more impressed by my views?
And as I pointed out elsewhen, buying used CDs leaves you in possession of a piece of personal property, roughly worth what you payed for it. You have reduced your liquidity, but actually retained net value, thus, in a sense, obtained the music for "free."
any economist could tell you that this is not the reason to buy something, this is: if you would derive more pleasure from a CD than from some of the money in your pocket, exchange the money for the CD, and your happiness will increase. The store that sold it to you would rather have the money than the CD, so their happiness increases. Thus you can see that trade (all trade, but especially free market trade) increases happiness in society. (This is part of what is called "utility theory")
Other minor points he got wrong: there is a significant bid-ask spread between buying and selling used CDs. You do not have something roughly worth what you paid, it is only more roughly worth it than the difference between what you can purchase a new CD for and what you can then sell it for used. But, new CDs offer you more choice and more freshness premium and a scratch-free disc that will last longer. Free markets come up with pricing differentials that exactly adjust for the differences in happiness supply and happiness demand.
Re:I, for one, have stopped (Score:3, Insightful)
remove the police and crime returns to the 'hood (Score:1, Insightful)
When you remove the police, crime returns to the neighborhood. That's the way it is, has been, and always will be.
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