The Pirates Versus The RIAA

By
Christopher Kinnee

Mr. Paul Wardzinski
Expository Writing 111
December 7, 2005

      In this day and age, there are no smelly, eye patch-wearing, peg-legged pirates who say “argh” and sail a ship.  These days, pirates are generally teenagers armed with the knowledge of how to use the Internet to find music, videos, and other online content, for free.  This form of piracy, more formally known as copyright infringement, is defined as “the unauthorized use of copyrighted material in a manner that violates one of the copyright owner's exclusive rights” (Wikipedia.com).  Both sides of this matter, the Recording Industry of America on one side, the file sharers on the other, thinks they are in the right, and neither is budging.  Both sides have very good arguments, but there is no perfect compromise in the near future.

      In recent years, record sales have fallen compared to earlier times.  Mitch Bainwol, chairman and CEO of the Recording Industry of America, otherwise known as the RIAA, believes that “The root cause for this drastic decline in record sales is the astronomical rate of music piracy on the Internet.”  It is true that record sales are currently on a downward trend, but Orson Scott Card, a well-known writer, feels the file sharing lends only a small contribution to the downward curve.  He feels a larger part of this development can be attributed to most consumers having recently finished updating their records, tapes, etcetera, to CDs.  Card explains, stating

In all the ridiculously overblown “estimates” of how much the studios and record companies are “losing” from “piracy,” nobody bothers to calculate just how much extra money they made from consumers paying full price for music and movies they had already paid full price for only a few years ago.

Additionally, sales of CDs are down due to the legitimate online music market.  Websites such as itunes.com, napster.com, and even walmart.com are offering cheap, legal downloads on their sites.  Legal Downloading combines the efficiency of downloading with the legality of buying from a legitimate source.

      Though Bainwol has nothing to say regarding the accuracy of record sales being skewed by online music, he does agree that the stores are good for giving consumers an easier way to obtain music legally.  While most of those who are for file sharing agree that a legal online store is a good idea, there are problems with these stores that may keep some users away.  Many people feel that the protection imposed on the music files is too strict and creates problems, even in legal environments.  The protection can limit or even prohibit transferring the music onto portable MP3 players or even CDs.  Those who want a cheap solution to music but consider themselves audiophiles may not like that music downloaded from the Internet is not near perfect, like a CD.  An audiophile is a person who wants the best-sounding music they can have.  Many people feel that if they are going to purchase music, it should be in the best quality possible.  To make matters worse, some copy protection schemes are not compatible with Apple’s OSX operating system or their MP3 player, the Apple iPOD because the copy protection focuses on Microsoft’s Windows operating system (Berlind).  Due to this, many listeners of music are skeptical of legal download stores.

      Many proponents of the RIAA, including the RIAA themselves, insist that artists are completely against file sharing.  Even some artists take that stand.  However, many people, including some artists, believe that artists benefit from file sharing.  One such artist, Janis Ian, replies to the negative argument, stating,

One other major point: in the hysteria of the moment, everyone is forgetting the main way an artist becomes successful--exposure. Without exposure, no one comes to shows, no one buys CDs, no one enables you to earn a living doing what you love. (4)

Therefore, Card proposes, if music were to receive strict copyright protections, not only would artists lose exposure, but they would also lose their creativity.  Card backs up his statements by explaining that his income relies on copyright protection, and supports practical laws.

      Card argues that the real music pirates are those who buy or download music, create copies, and then sell it for a profit.  This major problem takes money from the industry because these real pirates are competing with the market.  The people siding with the RIAA contend that those who pirate music do not buy music, saying “that ‘among the heaviest downloaders, 48% say they no longer have to buy CDs because they could download music for free over the Internet’—an increase of 61 percent in just one year” (Bainwol).  Janis Ian, a professional musician, counters a similar statistic in an article, stating sarcastically,

I’m sure the sales decrease had nothing to do with the economy’s decrease, or a steady downward spiral in the music industry, or the garbage being pushed by record companies.  Aren’t you?  ….  A conservative estimate would place the number of “newly available” CD’s per year at 100,000.  That’s an awful lot of releases for an industry that’s being destroyed.

      The RIAA has lost many consumers’ trust throughout a number of issues: lawsuits and bad marketing, for instance.  To many people, the RIAA has taken on a “bully” image.  Card says, “Let’s keep this in perspective.  ….  No one’s life is put at risk.  In all likelihood, nobody is really losing any money they would have had anyway.  So just what kind of punishment is really deserved?”  Card goes on to give an example about Catholicism and making people loath it, to show a relationship to the RIAA and consumers.  Senator Orrin Hatch even went so far as give support in attaching viruses to MP3s, then uploading them to the file sharing community (Card).  This past late-October, Mark Russinovich, a blogger at sysinternals.com, discovered a rootkit installed by Sony to protect music from being pirated. Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia, defines a rootkit as

A rootkit is a set of software tools frequently used by a third party (usually an intruder) after gaining access to a computer system. These tools are intended to conceal running processes, files or system data, which helps an intruder maintain access to a system without the user's knowledge. Rootkits are known to exist for a variety of operating systems such as Linux, Solaris and versions of Microsoft Windows. A computer with a rootkit on it is called a rooted computer.

The rootkit concept is the dominant controversial aspect of the 2005 Sony CD copy protection controversy, which has made the previously obscure concept of a rootkit much more widely known in the technology community, and to the general public.

This rootkit came on Sony CDs that would install after accepting the very confusing End User License Agreement, or EULA.  Coupled with the RIAA’s trouble making, Sony’s rootkit software has created a collective of consumers who are uneasy about the music industry as it currently stands.  Sony maintains that there was no harm intended, and have since apologized.  They have also stopped production of the CDs containing the rootkit and announced a full recall.  Despite this, many people are still skeptical about Sony, as well as the general music industry.  It does not help, after all, that Thomas Hesse, president of Sony BMG, stated that “Most people I think don’t even know what a rootkit is, so why should they care about it?” (Kantor).

      Bainwol states that it is wrong to steal music because it is taking away from the artists the pirates love.  Moral or ethical concerns aside, he asserts that file sharers “are in clear violation of federal copyright laws.”  Card points out that the music industry is marketing towards the exact age group that is most likely to pirate music, which on average is less morally based than older adults.  Thos against file sharing persist in the view that it does not matter how old someone is, it is still wrong to pirate music.  Advocates of file sharing also make the argument that pirating is not as bad as shoplifting because there is no danger involved.

      In this ever-present controversy over copyright, there is no clear right or wrong, just as there is no clear winner.  While the music industry maintains that they are only looking out for the best interests of artists, consumers do not always agree.  They feel music should be an open forum, and for the most part, consumers will support artists they like, but the music industry will never completely block file sharing.

      For those consumers that participate in file sharing, they should think of only downloading or uploading a few songs from a CD, and if they like it, should buy it.  If not, they will have saved some money.  If friends want to listen to a certain CD, people should let them borrow the CD or give them a few tracks from it, so if they like the music, they may buy it, or decide not to buy it if they do not like the music.  The industry needs to strike a balance between copyright protection and giving consumers what they want.  If the industry is not so intent on protecting their paycheck by imposing heavy restrictions, it will find that giving a little bit of freedom will earn more money than can be made by said restrictions.  As Ian said, she offered a few tracks on her website free, and if consumers liked what they heard, they bought her CD.