BPI: File-sharers finding alternatives to P2P

Not reading their own survey

First comment on this one.Ok lets start the ball rolling.It looks like the BPI are not reading their own survey.On the one hand it shows that illegal music downloaders are going away from P2P for their downloads.On the other the BPI wants to bring the clampdown on as fast as poss.Have they not thought about the significance of their own survey.It show's that the clampdown will not work as P2P will cease and music sharing will go elseware.Thus subverting their own clampdown.It is like trying to hold water in your hand.you may hold a bit,but most of it will find away out.

By Jaberwocky on 18 Dec 2009

Why is music expensive?

The music industry would do better if they dropped their price to compete. Why does an album from the high street nearly cost the same as on itunes? The high street has a physical shop and staff and sells Real CDs. Itunes has a website to maintain so who is getting the extra money? Why is the industry not being investigated as a monopoly?

By M_Hamer on 18 Dec 2009

How UK Government spun 136 people into 7m illegal file sharers

From PC Pro: "How UK Government spun 136 people into 7m illegal file sharers"

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/351331/how-uk-governme
nt-spun-136-people-into-7m-illegal-file-sharers

By red3dwarf on 18 Dec 2009

I just can't stop laughing. "The more we try to hit them with a big stick, the more they try not to get beaten up! Not fair! Not fair!"

Is human stupidity really endless?

By Josefov on 18 Dec 2009

Love to download legit movies

I'd love to legitimately download a movie every now and then. I don't want to subscribe to sky or other services nor do I want to buy a disk to sit on my shelf. I just want to download a movie, watch it on the telly at my leisure then delete it. I am sure this is what most people want yet the studios won't let us have this. They want us to subscribe to sky movies, buy through sky box-office or other subscription tied packages or rent a physical disk. Little wonder P2P is so popular.

By darkhairedlord on 18 Dec 2009

Love to download legit movies

I'd love to legitimately download a movie every now and then. I don't want to subscribe to sky or other services nor do I want to buy a disk to sit on my shelf. I just want to download a movie, watch it on the telly at my leisure then delete it. I am sure this is what most people want yet the studios won't let us have this. They want us to subscribe to sky movies, buy through sky box-office or other subscription tied packages or rent a physical disk. Little wonder P2P is so popular.

By darkhairedlord on 18 Dec 2009

you can buy movies through iTunes. I don't know about other sites. Admittedly the iTunes downloads are pretty poor however.

By TimoGunt on 18 Dec 2009

@timoGunt

Yes, you can, but they are in a DRM'd proprietry format.
You cannot stick them on a USB stick and play them on your DVD player in the front room.
These days I buy a film on DVD then download a copy in a portable format. If the "industry" doesn't like that, they should make a better product (and charge less for it) after all, DRM costs more than no DRM and we've all seen how MONUMENTALLY copy protection has always failed.

By cheysuli on 18 Dec 2009

The discrepancy between the static level of peer to peer file sharing, the rise in the use of other methods of sharing, and the overall amount of sharing comes from the BPI's report at http://www.bpi.co.uk/press-area/news-amp3b-press-r
elease/article/growing-threat-from-illegal-web-dow
nloads.aspx and not from PCPro. Presumably it means that people are using the other methods as well as peer to peer rather than instead of it.

There is no mention of how one knows whether a site selling music is legal or illegal.

Also "Other findings highlighted that nearly half (47%) of users of P2P sites and software used them as a source for acquiring music on at least a weekly basis, with a third (31%) of respondents who obtain music illegally doing so on a daily basis. Whilst some other sources – such as overseas MP3 pay sites (72%), newsgroups (70%) and forums / blogs (54%) – are used more frequently, P2P accounts for a much higher volume of illegal downloading with an average of nine tracks per month, compared to 4.9 for overseas MP3 pay sites, 5.3 for newsgroups and 6.0 for forums / blogs." The number of tracks seems incredibly small compared to the amount of time the people spend looking for stuff to download. It goes to show how poor the quality of music is if people can't even be bothered to download much of it for free.

Interestingly, immediately next to the link to this story on the BPI home page is on entitled "2009 Is Record Year For UK Singles Sales"...

By ngc001 on 18 Dec 2009

@M_Hamer

I think that this has never been properly explained by the industry.

It would rather say that by downloading a file illegally, you are leaving Elvis, Paul McCartney or whowever a few pence poorer than admit that the industry has historically had to massively overcharge for the popular stuff in order to subsidise the vast majority of their products that made a loss.

In the past, the idea was that if a company signed ten new acts, it didn't matter if nine failed miserably if the last one made enough profit to cover its own costs and those of the other nine acts.

By ngc001 on 18 Dec 2009

"you can buy movies through iTunes. I don't know about other sites. Admittedly the iTunes downloads are pretty poor however."

I don't want i(dio)tunes on my computer though, not to mention the quality issues and the stigma of owning an apple product.

By dodge1963 on 18 Dec 2009