• by Kelly , March 28, 2008

and no one is there to see it happen . . . is anyone affected? Yes.

By no means is this a new topic, but it was recently discussed in one of my Telecommunications classes and it peaked a lot of students' interest and was quite controversial. It's the topic on file sharing and pirated music (I don't know which term is more appropriate). More and more people still choose to share or steal their music instead of buying it from a store or somewhere like iTunes. After a class debate (that lasted about 20 minutes) it really got me thinking about the issue.

Yes, I have shared or stole music before (I'm not proud of it) and did so more than I bought music. What was even more interesting about the class discussion was some of the students were justifying stealing music by saying they spend more on band merchandise and tickets than they would on a CD or song so to them, it all balances out. Interesting...

My take on the situation...it's stealing, no matter how you look at it. People don't feel bad about it for three reasons. One, it's "free" and it's easy to share files, Two, the likelihood of getting caught is pretty low and the fact that everyone is doing it (yes, we're in high school again) makes it seem more acceptable. And third, and this applies to a lot of things, a majority of people tend to have an attitude of if it doesn't directly effect me, than why should I care? Well, ya should...

I have read some articles that say although file sharing/stealing is negatively effecting CD sales, somehow file sharing hasn't impacted the music industry as dramatically as they thought it would. More or less, the music industry has adapted to it and they will continue to find other ways to market music successfully. On the other hand, I have also read some articles that say the music industry is taking a big hit and something needs to be done to correct the situation because people are losing money and lots of it.

Bottom line...don't steal. Didn't your mother teach you anything?