Mp3 Piracy

Executive summary

It's only been about three years since a little known extension of an audio

compression technique-MPEG-2 Audio Layer-3 or MP3-opened the door to being

able to send large volumes of CD-quality music over the Internet by pack the

equivalent of several commercial compact disks onto the equivalent of one CD

platter (Lange 01). It also initiated the veritable floor of pirating

activity by an underground community students and hackers. Hundreds of MP3

Internet sites sprung up overnight. At these sites, everything in music from

Mozart to Marilyn Manson is being reproduced (Lange 01). Of course, it's

illegal, but it's free, which has a huge appeal.

Two men summarize the battle that is still raging over this new technology.

On one side there's Val Azzoli, co-CEO of the Atlantic Group, which has

numerous popular artists signed to their label; and on the other is the CEO

of the website MP3.com, which gives away digitized songs by new artists that

no one has heard of yet (Mardesich 96). While this may not sound like much

of a threat, what lies at the heart of this conflict is the concern of

recording industry that this new technology may chance the balance of power

and if allows the shipment of music directly to the consumer (Mardesich 96).

The five giant corporations that contr ol 80% of the global music

industry-worth roughly $60 billion a year-have taken notice (Wood; D'arcy

42). The following discussion will explore more fully why the record

companies, despite their obvious power, are scared.

Pros and Cons

It is the impressive 12:1 compression ratio of the MP3 that has made it so

popular. While 60 or so Mbytes are needed to store a typical song, once it

is converted to MP3 format it becomes a single 5 Mbyte file (Lange 01). "The

advantages are obvious," commented one executive, "CD-quality sound in a

small package" (Lange 01).

The drawbacks are all felt by the record companies. Artists are likely to

benefit, eventually, if they take advantage of the new technology and

deliver their songs to their fans directly via the Internet (Mardesich 96).

They'l l no longer have record companies making money off from their work

and by eliminating this "middle man" could conceivably earn a great deal

more then they do now. However, for the large record labels, this new

technology could mean real trouble in the future.

Right now, the loss are negligible. For example, Americans spent almost

nothing on downloaded music in 1998, but they spent nearly $14 billion on

music from stores (Mardesich 96). Nevertheless, the Recording Industry

Association of America (RIAA) said that MP3 piracy may have contributed to a

slight decline in music sold to the 15 to 24 age group (Mardesich 96).

Intellectual property issue and copyright contents/legal and illegal

duplication/ Piracy

In theory, the user can go to the Internet, type the name of an artist or

song into one of the many MP3 search engines, such as Lycos MP3, and find a

seemingly endless list of sites with downloadable music (Ashton 79). In

reality, it's difficult to get a good connection to these amateur sites and

the downloads take forever. However, even if the technology isn't ready to

be a real threat yet, the International Federation of the Phonographic

Industry is ready to treat it as such. This organization has begun

litigation against search engines because they state that they point users

toward sites with pirated music (Ashton 79).

Frank Crieghton, the head of the RIAA's anti-piracy unit, has said that the

"educational steps" that they have instigated to stop on-campus MP3 sites,

usually set up in students' dorm rooms, have been ineffective (Lange 01).

"The cease-and-desist letters we were sending were only so effective. So we

had to go to litigation. We needed to send a stronge r message," said

Creighton (Lange 01).

The RIAA unit has increased their collaborative policing efforts with the

FBI, US Customs, and the US Postal Service and Secret Service (Lange 01).

This activity appears to be paying off as a number of sites have shut down

in order to avoid being litigation targets (Lange 01). However, there are

still those in the underground that think the legal pressures will only

exacerbate the problem (Lange 01).

Distribution

Even as the recording industry takes on the pirates, the music industry ,

itself, is interested