Who decides What?

Discussed in tutorial this week, the issue of piracy is very controversial and is hard to decipher what is considered “stealing” and what is “sharing”. This issue of pirating music has always been a main issue in not only the music industry but for basically any forms of media out there. Issues of piracy is often seen before a start of a film, although I understand maybe, “Yes, stealing a car or stealing a handbag makes me a criminal” the notion of “sharing” music or film never has. The fine line between stealing and sharing is always hard to find with different opinions that people have and the situations/time/place that is given when these acts happen. First of all, although I understand the effort/time and all factors in producing music, I disagree with the notion of downloading music is a criminal act. I wouldn’t think that bands or artists are losing revenue from this but are just not making anything off it (however, gaining popularity!). P2P or Torrent sites allow the world to share music through easy accessibility which I think allows the bands/artists to promote themselves to a wider market. We may not know the people on the other side of the world, but all it’s just a form of sharing through the web. I see that a band’s motive is promoting themselves to the many markets as possible, thus showing P2P/Torrents to be a tool in this process. This may also trigger the people into buying actual albums or records. As the controversy of file sharing/stealing (whatever you consider it as) is happening because of the digital age, more and more bands should take advantage in trying to promote them. I think maybe if it’s an upcoming band, they would wanna sell as much possible in order to profit, especially in small markets like New Zealand but for world renowned bands sometimes it is absurd with the statements they come up it. The issue of piracy in music is completely looked upon by the different perspectives of people and what social norms they acquire. We are not taking a Louis Vuitton bag and making a fake bag, which I would consider stealing or breach issues of piracy in this context, however we are just I guess consuming the music they have produce without altering the original form of the music. Downloading and selling is a totally different issue...

Michael