HEADLINE:Music industry's
aggressive tactics tune out fans on Net
BODY: Today's debate: File swapping
Our
view: A better plan is to improve commercial sites for online music.
Users of popular Internet systems for music copying
are getting a new and unwelcome surprise: ominous instant messages from the
recording industry warning that "distributing or downloading copyrighted
music on the Internet without permission from the copyright owner is
ILLEGAL."
The messages are the latest
tactic in record companies' reinvigorated war against Internet music
copying. Always quick to verbally attack those who use file-sharing systems, the
industry now is adopting more tangible tactics. Call it virtual warfare.
Except the industry's messages contain a real
threat of legal action. They also warn those tempted to share Internet
music that doing so opens their computers' hard drives to unsavory
characters who may be looking for more than free music.
This is classic recording-industry recalcitrance: heavy on
threats against breaking the law, light on incentives to obey it. And it's only
the first volley. The industry is developing computer viruses that would attack
the computers of people offering pirated music. On the legislative front,
it is pushing for a national law that would make such hacking by copyright
holders legal.
Talk about adopting enemy
tactics. By proceeding with its plans, the recording industry would join the
ranks of Internet spammers and hackers. It also would waste creative efforts
alienating the very people it needs to lure back to legitimate music
sites.
The strategy raises questions about
the business rational behind destroying an audience to save it -- especially an
audience that has proved itself hungry for a reliable, convenient way to record
music online.
The growth of
Internet-file swapping has exploded in the past two years. Ratings services
estimate that users of Kazaa, one of the services targeted in the recording
industry's campaign, number almost a quarter billion worldwide. That's triple
the number of people who used Napster before an industry lawsuit shut down the
file-swapping service in 2001.
The
industry says it needs to step up its efforts because piracy has become readily
accepted. But its aggressive stance isn't working. Napster, the once-dominant
fileswapping service, no longer exists. Verizon Communications lost a pivotal
legal case and now must provide the names of suspected music pirates who
use its Internet service. Colleges, fearing litigation, have stepped up efforts
to police music theft on campuses.
Yet the efforts have failed to get people to pay for music
recorded off the Internet. One reason is that legitimate music sites
remain unappealing. Most are cumbersome and offer fewer services to paying
customers than illegal sites provide for free.
That could be changing. After months of courting by Apple Computer CEO
Steve Jobs, five major recording labels agreed to a less-restrictive approach to
selling online music. Unveiled last week, Apple's iTunes Music
Store allows customers to buy music a la carte rather than pay monthly
subscription fees. It also lets them copy music on up to three computers
and burn up to 10 CDs.
At 99 cents per
song, the service still faces a major marketing challenge in luring people away
from illegal sites. But it is a tentative move in the right direction. Now, if
record companies could be more aggressive in pricing and less so in threatening
customers, they might make real progress.
Music's growing medium
Online file swapping has become hugely popular. Some
facts:
* Number of downloads of the
file-sharing software Kazaa each week: 2.8 million
* Files shared over the Internet each month: about 2.6 billion
* Drop in CD sales last year: 10%
* Rise in blank CD sales last year: 40%
* Share of adults with Internet access who
downloaded music for free: 17%
Sources: Recording Industry Association of America; USA
TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll
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