Problem-Solution Essay Draft 3

Combat Online Piracy: Governmental Controls and Public Education

            The burgeoning of social media platforms has created a problem: online piracy.  Online piracy has plagued the music industry since the creation of Napster, a peer-to-peer (p2p) file sharing Internet site in 1999. According to the Recording Industry Association of American (RIAA), online piracy of music is the infringement of music copyrights, and occurs when one procures music illegally without purchasing it. Other ways that infringe the copyright include sharing of such music and allowing others to download or obtain for free, whether through p2p sites or not. (RIAA, n.d.) As the Internet becomes more widespread and advanced, other p2p websites such as Pirate Bay and KickAss, have been established.       

            However, the bigger issue is that p2p sites normalize illegal copyright infringements. (Levin, Dato-on & Manolis, 2007) By creating a marketplace where people have access and ability to trade music without remuneration, p2p websites make it seem acceptable and commonplace for people to download music illegally without paying for it. Such infringements not only hurt the record company, but also damage the income and job security of the artist, producers, composers and others who are or may be employed by the music industry. Future creative and artist development would suffer due to damages caused by online music piracy and make the music industry less dynamic and vibrant. (Friedlander, 2010) Because of the threat online piracy has on the music industry, the music industry has to work with their government in ensuring stricter laws and enforcement, and better public awareness to control piracy, or the music industry will see their revenues fall and struggle to survive.

            Copyright laws protecting the music industry have to be enforced by the government. Such laws allow the government to shut down p2p websites as part of enforcement. This could be seen when Pirate Bay was shut down by the Swedish government (Zetter, 2014) and Kickass by the United Kingdom government. (Kamen, 2015) While such takedowns have been successful and the illegal music downloads have decreased slightly (Weiblinger, 2011), such p2p sites still persist. (Kamen, 2015)

            The reason why governmental controls are ineffective to eradicate such p2p websites is due to the borderless nature of the Internet. Websites put their content on domains, and any country can host these domains. Kickass, after getting shut down by the Swedish government, moved their domain to another host in Moldova. (Andy, 2015) This fluidity and ability of changing domains between countries makes it difficult for governments to enact effective laws and controls to take action against such p2p websites. Without inter-governmental laws and cooperation, p2p websites will continue to survive and thrive in the borderless Internet and continue to plague the music industry. As such, countries need to create specific copyright laws that enable them to combat these p2p websites.

            Another solution that has been explored is public education. By reaching out and partnering with schools, RIAA is able to create better awareness against music piracy. For example, tertiary institutes in America restrict access into piracy sites on campus Internet networks. Also, there has been greater education, detection and enforcement towards youths in American institutions done in partnership with RIAA. (RIAA, n.d.)

            Public education is a better solution than governmental controls because it is a bottom-up solution that tackles the root issue of music piracy, which is the normalizing of an illegal act. Through public education, users of p2p websites can be influenced and encouraged to stop downloading and sharing music illegally and pay instead. RIAA has created an online resource, called Music Rules, which can be used by teachers and parents to educate the youths and “help you promote respect for intellectual property and responsible use of the Internet in your home”. (Music Rules, 2009) As such, youths can be taught from a young age that music piracy is illegal and hopefully they will be dissuaded from engaging with p2p websites to satisfy their music needs.

            Public education is also better than governmental controls because it requires less concerted efforts between agencies. A government alone is unable to effective eradicate of p2p websites and require inter-governmental collaborative efforts, which might be administratively difficult and costly to be effective and efficient. Some nations, for example Moldova, might participate in such efforts, as they believe that such controls are against freedom of speech. (Andy, 2015) The government, music industry like RIAA, schools, teachers, and parents can use public education to target the younger generations, who are the main users of p2p websites, in their country.

            In conclusion, p2p websites like Pirate Bay normalize music piracy which damages the music industry. Attention and action is required to take down such websites and educate and pull people away from using such websites. I believe that public education, despite needing more time to see substantial results, is a more powerful force than governmental controls to achieve this goal and more efforts and resources should be channelled for this action. However, because online piracy is an universal problem, countries have to enact different laws and public education schemes that suit them in order to effectively counteract online piracy.

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Bibliography

Andy. (2015, January 15). Pirate Bay shows most significant signs of return yet. Torrent Freak. Retrieved from http://torrentfreak.com/pirate-bay-shows-significant-signs-return-yet-150121/.

Andy. (2015, February 5). The Pirate Bay left Moldova before government piracy meeting. Torrent Freak. Retrieved from https://torrentfreak.com/the-pirate-bay-left-moldova-before-government-piracy-meeting-150205/.

Friedlander, J P. (2010, March 3). Nobody stole the pie. Retrieved from Recording Industry Association of America website: http://www.riaa.com/blog.php?content_selector=riaa-news-blog&blog_selector=Nobody_Stole_Pie&news_month_filter=3&news_year_filter=2010&searchterms=nobody%20stole%20pie&terminclude=&termexact=.

Kamen, M. (2015, February 9). Torrent site Kickass seized. Wired. Retrieved from http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2015-02/09/kickass-torrents-down.

Kamen, M. (2015, February 23). Pirate Bay struggling to stay afloat since return. Wired. Retrieved from http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2015-02/25/pirate-bay-failed-resurrection.

Levin, A M, Dato-on, M C. & Manolis, C. (2007). Detering illegal downloading: the effects of threat appeals, past         behaviour, subjective norms, and attributions of harm. Journal of Consumer Behaviour, 6, 111-122. Doi: 10.1002/cb.211

Music Rules! (2009). Music Rules! Retrieved from Music Rules website: http://www.music-rules.com/.

Recording Industry Association of America. (2015, March 7). Who we are. Retrieved from Recording Industry Association of America website: http://riaa.com/aboutus.php?content_selector=about-who-we-are-riaa.

Weiblinger, C D. (2011, September 15). Do enforcement efforts make a difference? Retrieved from Recording Industry Association of America website: http://riaa.com/blog.php?content_selector=riaa-news-blog&blog_selector=Do-Enforcement-Efforts-&news_month_filter=9&news_year_filter=2011&searchterms=weiblinger&terminclude=&termexact=.

Zetter, K. (2014, December 10). Pirate Bay down after Swedish police raid. Wired. Retrieved from http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2014-12/10/pirate-bay.