Music Piracy

THE RECORDING INDUSTRY Association of America (RIAA) would have people believe that music piracy is the most heinous evil to plague the human race since leprosy. If a person “has a computer with a CD burner, which [he or she] uses to burn copies of music [he or she] has downloaded onto writable CDs for all of [his or her] friends” or if a person “joins a file-sharing network and downloads unauthorized copies of all the copyrighted music [he or she] wants for free from the computers of other network members” he or she is stealing music.

It is a crime to steal music.

Members of the music industry argue that this is contributing to the downfall of the musical economy. The RIAA reminds people that “since peer-to-peer file-sharing site Napster emerged in 1999, music sales in the U.S. have dropped 53 percent”; however, it is important to remember that, in the past decade, all of the U.S. economy has been struggling.

Although music piracy may be contributing to the decline of the music industry, there are certainly other factors.

Music theft is not as big of a deal as the RIAA claims; because the music industry continues to grow in spite of  illegal downloading.

The penalties for online music theft and file sharing are often excessive and unreasonable;  and because the majority of individual musicians don’t depend financially on song sales, there is no rational reason for online music “theft” and file sharing to be treated as crimes.

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In 2007, Jammie Thomas-Rasset, a Minnesota mother of four, illegally downloaded twenty-four songs.

The average song costs around 99 cents on the internet; but, the court charged her $80,000 for each- “a total of $1.9 million”.

Excessive fines steal from people to teach them that it is "wrong"; but make no mistake, this isn’t justice- it is purely punitive.

The fine is the result of Rasset’s second trial.

Time and court resources were wasted because of twenty-four 99 cent songs...

Jammie Thomas-Rasset is not the only victim of such over-the-top lawsuits. Joel Tenenbaum, a student at Boston University, was:

“told to pay damages of $675,000 for…downloading/sharing 22 songs”;

which equates to $22,500 a piece. Although his punishment was not as excessive as Rasset’s, it is still a ridiculous amount of money to pay for 22 songs.

Tenenbaum and Rasset are not devious criminals. They are not bank robbers or shoplifters. They are victims of an industry that is too eager to prevent its product being shared. Their trials represent an unnecessary strain on the judicial system. Twenty-four  “stolen” songs do not merit the time, energy, and cost of a trial. If everyone who shares a song was treated this way, the courts would be full of hardworking mothers and students who enjoy listening to music, and there wouldn’t be room for real criminals. Every minute of court time spent prosecuting music “thieves” is a minute that could be spent on real issues.

The criminalization of music piracy is a burden on the judicial system. It would be more practical to stop punishing people for listening to music, so that court time and resources can be put to better use.

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The potential alternatives to the current prevention plan that are being discussed by legislators are even worse. Lawmakers are considering the Stop Online Piracy Act, or SOPA.

“The bill requires every payment or advertising network operator to set up a process through which outside parties can notify the company that one of its customers is an ‘Internet site that is dedicated to theft of U.S. property.’ Once a network gets a notification, it is required to cut off services to the target site within five days.”

The bill has been very controversial. Many people fear that SOPA would do much more than crack down on online piracy. They fear that it will make it easier for the government to censor the internet and make it impossible for sites like Wordpress and YouTube to operate. Sites that allow people to upload or post things for themselves would have to monitor every post to make sure that they weren’t inadvertently contributing to the “theft of U.S. property”.