Filesharing and online downloading cut out the whole physical experience of walking into a shop, picking up a CD and purchasing it as a lot of the time purchase isn't even necessary and it's a file so not really something you could pick up and carry to the check out anyway!
On Myspace, Bebo and Facebook alot of artists/bands have their own profiles or groups and as it is online it is easy to share links with your friends, so if I came across one and liked it I would most likely email the link to friends I also think will like it or tell them to google them. These sort of actions spread so fast online.
However, with filesharing there is the whole issue of the legality of it. Legal online music retailer I-Tunes is one of the leading music retailers out of online sales and music in actual shops. But that doesn't mean there isn't illegal filesharing happening.
http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article2504723.ece - this website says that since 2000 CD sales have fallen by 23% I personally would have expected it to be even more than that. Would anyone else have guessed that figure or woul you think higher/lower?
It also says that surveys suggest 14% of web users till file share for free, I would also have expected ths number to be higher considering the number of people who have like Limewire and similar programs.
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/technology/article3353372.ece - this website discusses some figures which to me seem more like it. It suggests that 8 million people are on file sharing networks at any one time and that there are more than 900 million illegal music files available for download on file-sharing networks. Do these figures surpise anyone? To me, 900 million illegal files sounds like loooooooads!!
It also sounds like loads, when you consider that according to this website (http://www.thecheers.org/news/Americas/news_158_963-people-sued-for-illegal-file-sharing.html) when 963 have been sued for file sharing. That seems like a relatively tiny number compared to 900 million! However, I can't find a date from that article and it doesn't say over ho long it took to catch the 963 people, so it may not be a very reliable source.
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yeah these figures do suprise me i would have thought it would have been more. As so many people now are always downloading music everytime i walk past people in the street they are always listening to ipods or mp3 playes so obviously they have been downloading songs. When i am on the internet often talking to my friends they are always downloading the latest songs off the internet and sharing them with me and other people.
Its so easy and not costly to sit at home and download music in the comfort of your own home. Does this mean we are becoming lazy as a society as these days everything can be done via the internet?
yeh, i reckon it is a lazier way to do things than in days gone by, but it's just the way r society has evolved. we do just live in a digital age.
I thinka lso the capacity mp3 players, etc have to store files is an appeal. Like years ago there wer those, were they 6 tracks? or 8 tracks? or something small like that anyway. But now weve got like thousands of songs on r ipods and even photos and videos.
i love the fact that we can store so many songs on MP3 players now it is the man appeal, when i used to go on long journeys i used to have to take my portable cd player, which was big in it self and a cd wallet full of the cds i wanted to listen to and this used to take up so much space. Now Ipods areso slim and compact you dont even notice that you have them in your pocket half the time and therefore it is so much more conveniant and easier to carry stuff around. It is not very often you go down the street these days and dont see people with ear phones in there ears!
yeah, but its not even like just ayoung person thing, you see older people with headphones and stuf. my friend got her nan an ipod 4 christmas and they put like podcasts and stuff on of her favourite radio shows and added on like all the CD's she owned.
I personally don't use podcasts, but I can see how they are agood idea. I think I just don't because I don't listen religiously to any one radio show. Do you use podcasts? and if u download them, so u put them onyour ipod or listen then delete them?
I dont use podcasts, I dont think I have ever been told how to get hold of them etc? And it seems pointless too me? It just shows how not everyone grasps the new media that is out there now!
Alyson,
I was really interested to see your comments on music sharing, as this is a subject of great interest to me. The sites you use and summarize the key points of are very useful. If people are downloading a lot of music legally or illegally, does this have an effect on the fan-base of the groups? Does this have an effect on their careers? How do they make their income? Could this be contributing to the fact that many groups, don't seem to stay around for as long as groups in the past?
I thought that your comments about podcasts were useful.
All the best
Emma
Those figures were interesting to see.
Thinking about it, 900 million does sound like a huuuuge number, but if you consider just one song and look it up on limewire to download, there will be at least 40different files of it. Then consider how many actual songs there are in the world.... 900 million does sound a bit extreme, but it maybe along the right lines.
And as for the first article, where you mentioned some percentages of people downloading, i agree - i thought these figures would be much higher! I know soooo many people who download music and surely this must be a reflection of the rest of the country, or even world! I know it's illegal, but it doesn't stop people doing it!
Also - what Kayleigh was saying about the efficiency and appeal of i-pods and MP3 players. It's crazy to think how many songs you can get on those little things! And it made me think of me carrying a walkman around with all my tapes!! Hahaha!!! Thankgod technology has developed!
Yeah, in one of the other discussions...on kayleigh's or Sarah's maybe..I wondered if online downloading is one of the reasons for popular bands replacing eachother so often¬ having as much staying power ad in past times. I reckon it does have quite a lot to do with it, as through the internet there's more and more opportunities for artists to make it and become well known and therefore the music is developing and tastes are developing and people are keen for new stuff
yeah audiences' demands are so high now as they have such easy access to new genres and new bands. It must be hard for bands to keep up with people's changing tastes. I agree with emma that maybe this development in music sharing is leading to bands not staying around for very long and being forgotten as soon as another new band is made popular by the internet.
i think when we see how much music can develop due to technology and we get a slight taste for it people want to see how far it can go and they develop things in that direction and becuase it is different we're interested
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