Motion: P2P programs, downloads from Internet: piracy or simply justice?
Presented by Jesús Cases
Currently there’s a worldwide huge controversy: are P2P programs something to be persecuted? Are the users of these programs criminals?
GAE from Spain says that downloading from Internet programs, movies, music, books must be punished and forbidden. They argue that it makes authors lose a lot of money.
Let’s see and think. Bustamante, however, has been on business for five years, or maybe less time, and he has just bought a house which costs 500 millions of ancient “pesetas”.
On the other hand, groups, which have spent years touring from small pub to small pub, which have had extreme difficulties to record a 1000 CD edition, hoping that they would not lose money, see their work on Internet and maybe they won’t see enough to pay their debts.
Do you think that’s fair? If prices were cheaper, do you think downloads would increase or not?
Comments»
I don´t know anything about music, but I think that in general, musicians and artists are accustomed to a high standard of living. Nowadays, well-known singers are rich.
I don´t think that if the prices of CDs and DVDs decreased, artists would be poor; what only happened is that they would have to reduce their way of live. I believe that they not only love music, they love money too.
What is more, some of them gain a lot of money in advertising, or appearing in TV programs, or celebrations where they don´t have to sing.
In my opinion they have to work because they love their profession not in order to be millionaires. If they really mattered that people known and enjoyed with their music, they would reduce the prices of the CDs, in order to do them more available for the audience.
The amount of money that artist earn by selling their music is very small.
Most of their incomes come from concerts. They are the owners of the powerful discographic companies that earn a lot of money with the sale of CD or DVD.
It is for this reason that I don’t consider the P2P system for downloading music from internet is a serious crime.
I totally agree with Tarantula. The problem is that maybe artists don´t earn enough to have a high standard of living but enough to have a normal life YES!! maybe if record companies reduce the prices of the CDs, DVDs, tickets for concerts or I earn MORE MONEY, I could afford buy a CD and not download it on the Internet.
I agree with you three!
It´s a pity if Alejandro Sanz can´t afford a new mansion in Miami or if any other famous singer can´t buy the last Ferrari.
The real problem is that most of us can´t afford to buy as many CDs as we really want.
So, getting music from internet is our only way
I don’t think this is about if the artisy can live or not without the money he lost with the downloading. For me if you download a CD is like if you were stealing. The worst part is that not only the artist lose money, but also the workers in the music industry, who maybe need it more.
Although record companies denied reducing prizes some years ago, nowadays, at the same prize, we can buy their products with extra videos, or extra photos etc…
In my opinion, the prize of a cd is excessive, I mean, not everybody can’t afford buy it.
I agree with blick, it is a pity if famous artists can’t afford their whim, but they should realize that not everybody can work in in something so gratifying
It seems to me that all of you agree, but do you really thing that reducing prices will stop piracy? In my opinion that won’t happen, because people will prefer having an ilegal but free CD rather than having a cheap and legal one. When we download thing we are not “fighting against the sistem” or something like that, we only do it in order to save money.
I do not think that by reducing prices the problem will be solved.
Programs to download music can be find easily on the internet, so it is much more hadly for us. Sometimes people only dowload the new hit single of some famous artist they hear on the radio but they are not really interested in this singer so they do not buy the Cd.
People tend to buy the Cd of those groups or singers they are really fans of;at least it is my case!
It is true that reducing CD prices won’t stop downloading music from the Internet, because we prefer having it for free. The fact is that, as Alea said, we only download the songs that we want. So it isn’t worth, at least for me, buying a complete CD if I only like one or two hits from it.
The point is that, music industry should change its commerce concept, and stop blaming us for using P2P programs. From my point of view, it has never happened that music is so alive as nowadays, even though producers say it is in crisis.
In my opinion download archives shouldn’t be punished because people are only sharing music, videos or other things, they don’t make money with them so you don’t harm music industry. I think it’s unfair you have to pay for whole CD if you only like one song.
Maybe people aren’t making money, but they are saving money, which is almost the same. About what Koby says I think that you can decide if you want or not to buy a CD with only a song you like, but that don’t justify the downloading.
As some of you have said, I only used to buy those CDs that I really liked. I love music, but the last CD I bought, costs near 20 €.
When I didn’t have access to the Internet and I liked one or two songs of an artist, I used to record them from the radio or to borrow the CD from a friend. Is this a crime or an act of piracy? I prefer paying 20 or 30 € for a concert. From my point of view, a live performance is worthier than a CD.
I don’t want to seem a bit blunt,but it’s piracy and we all know it.I must admit I don’t feel bad before downloading,I just believe cds are too expensive and everybody deserves the opportunity to learn.I have discovered some great bands because of the internet,otherwise I wouldn’t have enough money to buy so many cds or attend so many live performances.Internet gives us new information and it’s also good from the point of view of artist,who get promoted by the internet sometimes.
Furthemore,when you do love a cd,you just feel like buying it.It happens to me quite often,specially with some ‘underground’ bands (we have to keep in mind that despite the fact that they are great,they’ll never sell so many cds to survive,so we have to support them…I’m mainly talking about folk bands of our region or new young bands,for instance.)
I´m going to talk about Diana Fernandez´s opinions. On one hand, the fact that workers in the music industry are losing money as a consequence of piracy, is guilty of the singers and producers. If they had distributed their profits giving more percent to the workers, piracy wouldn´t have had so negative influence in the workers´ benefits.
On the other hand, If the CDs were cheaper, I´d prefer to buy them than download them. The reason is that an original CD is more complete, it has the lyrics and some photographs of the singer. Besides, to buy is more quickly than to download. I know that it´s impossible to stop piracy, but cheaper CDs can reduce it.
Finally, I totally agree with people who think, that is a waste of money, to buy a CD, which only has two or three good songs.
Agueda, you don’t seem blunt. You’re right. It was piracy when you copied a cassette, and it’s piracy when you download music from the Internet. But nobody paid attention to it until now. Why? Perhaps because in the previous years to the Internet boom, CD prices rocketed, so the Internet turned into a new way of getting what you can’t afford it. Perhaps because they earn in a few months more money than you’ll earn during all your life. Perhaps because it’s unfair that they own four mansions and three cars while we manage to pay a little flat. All of these reasons have made people react. Now it’s their turn. What I mean is that they should give incentives to people: cheaper prices, more concerts, extra material in CDs, etc.
I agree with you Mofli, making photocopies from a book is illegal but all people do it. People think it’s different from downlading CD but in the end it’s the same. When Internet wasn’t so popular all people record cassettes of videos normally, and Music Industry didn’t complain, but nowadays they complain because Internet makes things easy to piracy.
As I said before, sharing files isn’t illegal so it isn’t piracy. From my point of view, If CDs were less expensive piracy wouldn’t reduce, because people prefer having things for free than paying.
I confess I’m a pirate, jajaja. XD
Talking about piracy and P2P, I think that it is justice because nowadays everything related with music, films and PCs is too much expensive. Having the possibility of downloading it on the internet is perfect, especially for people who don’t have enough money to pay their prices.
Some singers and groups say that they can’t live without selling their music, but if they reduce their prices in half, perhaps they sell more. But if they are thinking that they need to sell a CD in order to improve their way of life and their wealth, they are quite mistaken. People are not here to pay their caprices.
On the other hand, I agree with those people who buy CD’s because they are really fans of one group or singer but buying them only for two or three good songs is a waste of money, in that case is better to download only the songs you like.
This is a very controversial Topic. I’m not sure what is exactly good or bad, but I’ll give you a similar example about books.
Maybe you have heard about bookcrossing, the online community of readers and their passion for sharing books… And the beginning of the movement, they had a lot of problems with publishers, because, as the Music industry does nowadays, they said they were going to loose money… Years after that, they have discovered than, in fact, bookcrossing is better for them: when you find a “free book” that you really enjoy, you’ll probably buy your own copy. This happens with almost all bookcrossers… and there are thousands out there!
So now, a good number of authors and publishers give books for any of the special events bookcrossing does to celebrate “The book’s day” each 23 of April. Loosing some money at first, will give you a better opportunity to earn more!
So, talking again about music, what about sharing 1 or 2 songs on the Internet and them… just wait?!
What I think is a real robbery is the price of a music CD or a DVD movie. I can’t afford so much money to buy all the CD’s I like to hear because they are very expensive, especially those which are done by a well-known musician. It’s a crime to sell culture like this. When I go to a shopping center I usually find that there’s no extras on a DVD which has a capacity to burn another movie inside indeed.
Of course, things are changing, due to the piracy. Discographies and author are becoming more competitive with these new type of sharing facilities, so we can find more and more DVD or CD with a special cage, booklet or CD full of new trailers, alternative finals and interesting documentaries. Thanks to programs peer to peer we have the chance to see additional material that we wouldn’t probably see if these powerful tools didn’t exist.
So, I only have to say God bless p2p programs.
Well, Warlock, you probably can’t either afford a yatch, and I don’t think you are going to steal one. What’s the difference with the CDs? Maybe you can’t have a yatch, and maybe you can’t have all the CDs you want.
Since my point of view, for much time, singers have won a lot of money only with cds or cassettes, now everything has changed. In this time, they have to improve their live performances. Is that a lot of job for them?
Also, I have to say that Piracy and internet have helped some beginner groups. They have been listened to people by internet, and nowadays in their concerts, the stadium is crowded.
Koby, I’m also a pirate! LoL XD
I’m not going to steal a yacht obviously, although I’d like to ask one for Christmas. What I wanted to say is that buying the music you like is very expensive nowadays. I can only afford money to the groups I like very much but there are other groups that I’d like to hear which I can only find them in the shops with a very expensive price.
If I’d want to buy the complete discography of the Rolling Stones, for example, I couldn’t’ afford my studies at the University. So, I can only buy the most well-known CD’s in the shops and download the others from the net only to hear them, because you must erase them until 24 hours pass, if you don’t want to be a pirate.
Anyway, if you don’t still believe that piracy has many benefits, read this interesting article on where you can find a mathematical explanation about how necessary is to be a pirate when you don’t have so much money to survive.
http://opim.wharton.upenn.edu/wise2004/sat612.pdf