Free Downloads why not?

Yar in "The rhetorics and myths of anti-piracy campaigns: criminalization, moral pedagogy and capitalist property relations in the classroom" notes the many ways in which copyright industries attempt to challenge what they call "copyright theft" especially via the internet.
This highlights just how powerful the internet has become.
Why would people decide to leave the comfort of their homes to go watch a movie when they can do it in the comforts of their homes and if lucky in high quality without spending a cent?
There are two reasons why people would choose otherwise.
1. Is the experience achieved at the cinema which you can not get at home
2. Is peoples choice to not watch illegally downloaded movies
Yes copyright issues especially on the internet are getting worse and companies are losing Billions of dollars but is it mostly due to young people?
A UK based poll in 2004 found that 18-29 year olds owned pirated intellectual property of some type have young people really lost all morals? do they not care about the creative process, time, money and labour gone into making a movie, song or even game?
Most would say that they dont have enough money to buy the physical item from a store so do it illegally via the internet others would argue that everyone else is doing it so why not?
There is also the issue that when you download something from the internet the link is still there, others can download the same file an infinite number of times however when you take a physical object it no longer exists unless ofcourse its replaced but that particular movie or cd can no longer be purchased.
The truth is, downloading property of the internet has become not only easy but people can do so without being punished, why is it that people are less likely to steal a physical object from a store than download information off the internet...its simple there are less risks involved so why not??
Yes downloading other peoples property is bad, illegal and not moral does that mean people will no longer download files from the internet? No.
So until industries find a way to stop people from downloading illegally of the internet copyright issues will be a problem for a long time coming.

The Price We Pay to Enjoy Media

In my tutorial this week, we discussed (or argued) on the topic of copyrighting. However, someone in class made a good point about the pricing of CDs and DVDs being quite ridiculous and I definitely agree. I never really thought about it but now that it was mentioned, it has been bugging me.

On my usual trip to my favourite technology-filled store, I would enter, my eyes light up at all the new pretty gadgets, I look over the laptops, cellphones, games...to put it simply, it is my version of the Willy Wonka Factory to Augustus Gloop.
I end up at the DVD section. This is my favourite section of the whole entire store because I love collecting DVDs. I will immediately get sucked into the obvious marketing scheme of "Cheap DVDs!", "Sale!", "Everything under (a price that is actually quite expensive when you think about it)!" and that dreaded yellow sticker on the cover that has been placed over another sticker to make you think that the DVD is on sale - when it isn't!!!
Yes, studying FTVMS has made me aware of these blatant schemes but for some unknown reason, I still get sucked into buying an over-priced DVD.

But back to the tutorial...the person in my class mentioned that it is cheap to produce a CD or DVD, a few dollars maybe. All that is needed to be done is copying the movie/music onto a cheap CD and then printing out the cover and sticking it into a case. I mean, how expensive can it really be to make?
However, Luke made a good rebuttal that made me realise that it isn't just the making of the product that has costs. Things like transporting the product, paying the people to transport it, paying for the gas, paying for the truck, paying for the packers who put the product onto the truck....I could go on and on. It is like a vicious cycle.

When I think of these costs, it does make me feel that I am justifying the throwing away of my hard earned cash on a cheap CD. And on the topic of copyrighting, at least I'm paying for a genuine copy of a movie, right? So I would like to think that I'm paying to enjoy this over-priced DVD for the greater good because no, I don't steal people's handbags, I don't steal from the video store and I certainly don't steal cars because "downloading pirated DVDs is stealing."
Oh wait, did I just get sucked into another marketing scheme?!? :P

I'm joking. No, I'm not going to stop buying genuine DVDs just because downloading pirated movies are free. People should be buying genuine copies because firstly, it makes you feel better about yourself, secondly, it's a much better feeling when you're exchanging money for a physical object and lastly, I'm sure you're taking this paper because you enjoy films and media so you should be supporting this industry, not ripping it off. How would you feel if your film was being distributed illegally? It's sort of an insult, as if your "fans" are saying that your film isn't good enough to be paid for.

Bottom line, pay to enjoy media the proper way, I say!

Piracy of music considered as stealing?

"You wouldn’t steal a car" "You wouldn’t steal a handbag" sound familiar? Most people would have heard of it. This is the starting to any modern film which strongly emphasizes on the issue of piracy as a crime. Well I have a different point of view when it comes down to downloading of music. For me I think downloading of music is not stealing because it is an intangible property and by downloading you are just duplicating copies of music. By downloading, it does not stop other users from getting access to it and you are not taking the one and only copy of the original music and having it entirely to your own. Since it is a digital content it can be copied over and over again. I think it is fine to download music from the way I look at it because it is widely known that most recording artists earn their living from concerts and piracy helps to promote and widely circulate artist’s music all over the world. As mentioned in the lecture, those people who download free music are also the ones who are purchasing more music thus generating more profit for the artist. Tangible properties such as Cars and Handbags are limited by nature as to their use and can be used by one person at a time and be in one place at a time. If you steal my car, I’m denied of the usage and unlike music it cannot be copied and since the car is an original property it is a crime when you steal it. As for music downloading since it is an intangible property, I would not consider as same as stealing a person’s car or a handbag. I think of it as more of a sharing as the reading mentions that pirates are 10 times more likely to buy music, which shows people like me and others who download free music are more likely to buy music than the ones who don’t download it for free.

Music Companies Need to Shift Their Thinking

The world is constantly changing and music companies need to acknowledge that fact and look into other methods of monetization. Music is no longer the one or two good songs amongst 12 mediocre tracks on a $29.95 CD. It's now the mp3's, the iTunes, the iPods, the digital media track. People have more options now. They don't need to pay for an entire CD to get the one or two good songs. Record labels always cite how many "millions" they've lost in CD sales. Have they not figured out that the CD is a slowly dying medium and that those who do buy it are perhaps more dedicated fans or those unfamiliar with iTunes or other online music outlets. It's time for them to look into other ways to monetize on their stars.

Personally, I see singers now actually have more viral exposure, and isn't it exposure, getting the music out there that will sell tours, merchandise and create lifelong fans? Companies like Universal Music have already tapped into the power of YouTube. Once upon a time, this company fought against the likes of YouTube and have since turned around to embrace the technology. Free on demand music videos helps upcoming artists to gain exposure in markets where Universal Music may not have thought of marketing to. If you've ever uploaded a video onto YouTube, you'll find that there are demographics for the video. Universal could see where (geographically) people may be viewing the video and focus on targeting the particular artists' music in that region.

Music companies also argue that piracy destroys the artists' creativity and motivation to make music. I don't know about you, but most of the musicians I know don't exactly think, "millions of these kids are going to pirate my track and I'll make small sales, I'm not going into the music industry". It's more like "I'm going to produce this awesome song, become famous and everyone will hear my music." Welcome to the 21st century music companies.

As a side note, if illegal things like this become a long and downhill battle, eventually I think music companies will give in to the battle and accept the fact and find some other methods to make money. I believe this was a similar case for Prop 19, the legalization of cannabis.

Can technology really change the world?

One laptop a day...
will that really make a huge difference in peoples lives?
would it be more important than food, shelter, clothes?
yes education is important..thats the only way to get yourself out of poverty..but how worthy is a laptop when your too weak from starvation to use it...
Negroponte has a point in trying to civilize and educate third world countires..but I would have to take Winstons side in this case.. yes technology is important but I would not classify it under a basic neccesity...
being a SST activist (this basically means that technology changes due to social needs, therefore it is not technology which changes us and technology is not a product of our society like technological determinist's assume)
I would have to agree with this concept...yes technology is important in our lives but we must also not forget that we are the reason why theres technology in the first place we play a MAJOR role in why technology is so advanced in the world we live in.
This makes the Marxist view a lot more appealing, it is true that people around the world benefit on behalf of those that suffer through exploitation and free labour the rich get richer while the poor get poorer.
We are living in a society where we think that technology is so important in our everyday lives...we are made to believe that we can not function without it however in truth we are living in a superfical world and at the end of the day money can't buy all your hearts desires (also ideals from the Frankfurt School for social research).
This brings us to another point Google and Privacy?
there have been many moral arguments around Google's right to information online..who's property is it and who has the right to that property?
moral judgements would suggest that no one is allowed to use another persons property without permission of the provider while others would say that information online has become so normalised and once it is posted or put online it officially becomes public property.
I would have to agree with the second idea... at the end of the day google has made people more aware of other peoples websites, information, even books...yes that can be a bad thing sometimes but in reality it can also be a good thing..for e.g. google books which provide users online the oppurtunnity to flip through snippets of the book online, this can encourage users to go out and buy the book which is the case on my behalf on numerous occasions.
Lastly is the idea of downloads such as films and music..
Everyone has to admit that they have downloaded something for free over the internet, whether its an mp3 song, a film or even an entire album we all fall victim to the appealing notion of free downloads. So is downloading a song online the equivalent of going into a store and stealing a physical item??
In a way yes it is.. the creative individuals involved backstage do deserve to get rewarded for their hard work (as RIAA have stated, it is the creative people involved who are being stripped from their rights, the record company comes 2nd however this is because it is the artist who does most of the work at the end of the day)
so is downloading free media online bad? in reality yes it is but will that stop people from doing it? I highly doubt it..the internet allows individuals to do almost anything which can be detrimental to those putting great amounts of effort into their work.... However I do know a lot of people who will download the song free first and buy it from iTunes later if they like the track.

Music downloads - Paying and not paying with social capital

Image source: Author's photo

For those who download music illegally, what is the value of a paid digital download? Recent studies seem to suggest a highly subjective moral value, but is that the same economic value we once attributed to CDs, cassettes and vinyl?

I've heard various people suggest that the experience of purchasing and listening to a physical album (discussions with record store employees, looking through the liner notes and artwork, listening with others) does not compare to a digital download. Yet there is a culture associated with downloads. People derive social capital from sharing music for download because others respond, discussion is generated, and people are exposed to new music.

The music industry isn't going to be able to turn the social capital of music into premium content, but could they monetise it? Ping, iTune's inbuilt social network, is Apple's attempt to derive sales from the social value of music. It doesn't introduce any new premium content, but it does provide a new arena for digital music culture to play out, one where social content is linked to legitimate downloads.

Because it doesn't eliminate illegal music sharing or introduce new premium digital content, Ping is not a premium paywall but a "paycorridor". The social capital generated by Ping users guides them away from illegal downloads and towards the iTunes store.

Importantly, artists (or at least their PR) are users of Ping. The point of connection betweens fans and artists is a potential site for future premium content.

Can the music industry dance to the Club Penguin boogie?

Image source

The music industry says that P2P hurts artists (and the industry), but P2P users have become accustomed to downloading music for free. Is freemium a potential compromise?

In this week's lecture we briefly discussed a hypothetical music business model that balances unpaid digital downloads with ticket sales for live concerts... Hmm... Sounds like freemium! You get unrestricted access to the main course – songs, in digital form – but you don't get dessert – live gigs, standard and limited physical releases – unless you pay.

Compare this pay-for-concerts model to the Club Penguin model and you see an immediate difference. Where's the premium digital content? Club Penguin's physical merchandise can be equated with the concerts and physical albums from our music model. However, Club Penguin's subscriber content constitutes an additional digital-only category of premium content. If you give away digital songs, what do you have to offer as paid-for digital content?

Perhaps the music industry needs to find something other than songs to offer as premium digital content. How about a live stream of a studio performance that can only be accessed with a unique code that you receive after purchasing songs? This example may not be the best (someone could record and distribute the stream!), but my intention is to suggest that this way of thinking merits further investigation.

Our hypothetical model seems to come close to the current reality of the music business, with one major difference: people are paying for digital downloads. The Norwegian research discussed in lecture and a 2006 Canadian RIAA study both seem to indicate a self-mediated freemium among P2P users, whereby each user determines what they personally deem to be content worth paying for from the pool of free content. Maybe this shows that services like Spotify and KKBOX, which separate song content into free and premium versions before reaching the consumer, have a valid place in the market.

Compromise seems increasingly necessary, but the music industry would prefer access to digital songs to be completely locked down. If Apple found a way to block all illegally procured content from your iWhatever-you-use, would you continue to use it or seek out an alternative?

Indie rock and roll for me

But what is 'indie' music?

In my mind, independent music can be two overlapping things:
1. Independently produced music (in opposition to major record labels)
2. A style of music

What's interesting (and perhaps most relevant to this paper) is how these two aspects of indie music relate.

At a basic level, the style or 'sound' of music is influenced by the way it is recorded. Home recordings sound different to studio recordings, simply because of the equipment used, just as low-budget setups sound different to high-budget setups. Essentially, the music is influenced by the technology used to record it.

Interesting then, how 'indie-rock' has become a catchphrase associated with style, and not so much with production. It's as if independent, often low-budget production had a tonal quality in recordings that became liked enough to be emulated by high-budget, mainstream production labels.

Then again, it is possible to record to a very high standard using relatively inexpensive home-studio equipment (Check out the 'indie-darling' that is Beirut, first album recorded mainly in the bedroom). The price of recording has dropped hugely since digital equipment has become mainstream in recording use. So why the lo-fi aesthetic? Why are artists purposely including hiss and background-noise, using sub-par equipment and procedures? (If you want to hear main-stream recordings hiss, just listen to the White Stripes.)

Of course it comes down to artistic taste. The 'imperfections' that are a part of the indie aesthetic are not imperfections at all, but part of what makes the music. The way in which a song is recorded becomes embedded in the song itself, it becomes part of the message the artist is conveying.

Anyway, it's still (mainstream) indie rock and roll for me.