Impact Of Illegal File Sharing On Music Information Technology Essay

File Sharing is about distributing and providing the digital information like computer programs, multimedia file like audio and video, documents and electronic books. File sharing can be private and can be public.Files can be shared through different medias as removable storage or through networking or by using peer to peer networking also known as P2P. there are two main types of file sharing

peer to peer networks

file hosting services

Peer To Peer Networks

In P2P different users (peers) are connected to a network . and a user can directly download his desired file or data form the other peers in the network. In P2P large files are broken into smaller chunks and divided on different peers. The chunks can be downloaded from different peers and then reassembled by the downloader. This is done by the technique that peers are meanwhile uploading the chunks and are available to be download by other peers. Some famous network that are involved in P2P network are GNUTELLA, GNUTELLA2,IMESH and eDonkey Network.

File Hosting Services

They are simply related to P2P. But sometimes internet tools are involved in file hosting services like email, blogs, forums and other internet link from where the desired file can be directly downloaded.

History Of File Sharing

First the concept of file sharing started from 1971, when file were firstly transferred through removeable media. Computer were able to access remote files using file system mounting.

File sharing become easier when the floppy disk was developed. Floppy disk was first medium through which u can carry file from one and transfer to other system.

After few years in 1978, new technique was developed for file sharing . Computerized Bulletin Board System become the first Bulletin Board system for sharing the files. It was a computer software program that was created by Ward Christensen that was created to exchange files between different computers. BBS (Bulletin Board System) is a computer program. BBS allow the user to log in to the system by using some type of terminal program after logging in user can upload and download data reading news and also send message to other users in form of mail or some board message.

After this in 1979, another technique was discovered by Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis and known as Usenet.in this system users can read and post public messages known as article or posts. In many aspects Usenet also ressembles with BBS.but the difference between BBS and Usenet is absence of a central server.and the dedicated administrator h.

And after that more and more techniques introduced for the purpose of file sharing.like after six year of Usenet , FTP protocol became standarized and was being used frequently after that in 1988 IRC was introduced but it was not being quiet popular.

But the more advanced and popular and common file shariing starts by the introduction of WWW World Wide Web in 1990.

Later on MP3.com, Audio galaxy were also established.

After that two big failing file sharing stars were introduced Audio galaxy and napstar the first fell in 2002 and second one fell in 2001.

After that BitTorrent was introduced through which file could be downloaded directly through downloader and a file can be downloaded in form of chunks.and then that chunks were again reassembled by the downloader ..

After that eMule arrives that was very frequent and famous and most popular client for eDonkey2000 network. After that isoHunt and The Pirate Bay were released in 2003.

Is File Sharing Legal Or Illegal?

When there is question that is file share is legal or illegal that after many research and questioning give us the answer that file sharing is not 100% legal.it is illegal to share the file that is protected by copyrights.their are many example from the real life that can show that file sharing is not 100 % legal like to share or download a copyright movie .to sharing of any copyrighted files songs to other people for free of cost just to advertise their sites or to get money by sharing and uploading those files. Similarly to share computer software or to download those software without purchasing them. Similarly to upload the files or to share those file that are copyrighted and people get them without copyrights of those files is an illegal act.

In different countries this act is an illegal act and is considered as a crime. Different countries have their own laws and regulations.

People have to pay fine somewhere if they r caught downloading movies or songs.they have to pay fine for each song and software. And even in Hong Kong a man was kept in prison for four for sharing files on BitTorent website.

Different countries have there own rules and laws for this act of crime.

Björn Ulvaeus from Abba has called young people illegally downloading part of  “the lazy generation” and wondered why it was “so damn hard to understand” that musicians and copyright holders must get paid for their work and compositions. 

Public Usage Of Illegal File Sharing

In 2004, it was estimated that over 70 million people were involved in performing this act of illegal file sharing.and 70% of these were teenagers whom age were from 18-22.

58% Americans call that file sharing is not illegal act under some circumstances.

Later on in 2006, 32 Million American downloaded full length movies .and it was majorly done using P2P.Later on in 2008, this act was being performed in whole Europe.

And this is going to be increased by passage of time. In February 2009, a UK survey found that 75% of English public was aware of legal and illegal file sharing. In that survey it was also found that 60 % of people reported downloading music because they have limited budget.

File Sharing- A Thread To Music Industry

There’s no minimizing the impact of illegal file-sharing. It robs songwriters and recording artists of their livelihoods, and it ultimately undermines the future of music itself, not to mention threatening the jobs of tens of thousands” (Cary Sherman, Recording Industry Association of America President, USA Today, 18 September 2003).

When in 1999,Napster was developed ,the file sharing became a very common practice. The sharing and uploading of songs ,movies and file files were really affected by this.

If u check network of Kazaa, any time you can see there are over 3 million users are available at any time. And three million people means that industry is having lose of those items that they can sell to 3 million people.

RIAA (The Recording Industry Association Of America) reveals that makers of music related product retailers and even music recording companies having great loss by this act of file sharing.people are not getting profit of their products.people just get one and upload it and from that one million of people can get that item.

File sharing is spread across all countries over the world.And RIAA is going to apply the law against those who are involved in this act. But it seems difficult to bring all that thousands of people to be caught and put in front of court. In 2005 supreme court ruling declares that instead of catching those people who are involved in sharing and downloading the online files like music , songs or movies it is more better to find the popular online file share companies who are using illegally the copyrights of such files. Such people should be declared as thief who are encouraging users to download that type of copyright work.

How to Avoid This Action

To avoid this action and to avoid the loss that is faced by the music industry and in order to make this act useless and if this industry want to adopt this environment Industry should adopt some techniques as it is done by some companies to avoid such act.like Keleb Kain of Warez.com states that the companies are trying to make this illegal file sharing useless by providing discount rates for upgrades of software and providing full demos . the music industry also do some techniques to prevail and they must provide more advantages to the online users .they should find certain ways how to deal with the online users if theses companies wants to recover their loss and to adopt this environment .

Thank you,

Done by

Faheem Anwers