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Sunday, August 10, 2008

How Often Do You Illegally Download Music?

Here are the results to last week's poll, "How Often Do You Illegally Download Music?"

"Every time I want to hear new music." (30%)
"Just when I want to preview something at my leisure before I buy it." (38%)
"Occasionally, for hard to find or out-of-print albums." (15%)
"Never. Piracy is wrong!" (15%)

I'm not really surprised by these results, and as I stated in my rant a few weeks back, piracy is a problem but it's currently one of the only viable options for people who want to experience and discover music for free. As it turns out, most of you tend to feel the same way.

Feel free to discuss these results in the comments section, below.

There's a new poll question up right now.

3 comments:

Stephen said...

I voted for "whenever I want to preview something." Like many other people, I delete it if I don't like it and buy it if I do (eventually because I don't have a lot of money). I think that downloading music and keeping it is right, even if you're poor like me; back before music downloading, if you couldn't afford music, you were stuck listening to the radio.

At the same time, though, the price of CD's is ridiculous. I used to buy old vinyl from the local record store because the prices were generally $5 for a single LP and $10 for a double, so I wouldn't hesitate to explore into classic rock that I wasn't familiar with because the price was so low. It's a shame that new vinyl of modern artists is so expensive, because if they all included a free MP3 download and were a tad cheaper than CD's, then that's what I would buy. But that won't happen, as vinyl is more labor intensive to make, costs more to ship, etc.

-Stephen

Megan P.I. said...

Like the commenter before me, I download stuff to check it out. If I don't like it, I delete it, and if I like it I'll buy it at some point.

I've become obsessed with so many bands because I've downloaded a song or album first. Not only have I then purchased the album I downloaded, but I've purchased past albums, I've purchased albums in multiple formats [vinyl], and I've purchased merchandise like stickers, posters, and t-shirts. I then also get my friends into the band who at the very least purchase the album. Then, in the future, I purchase the artist's next album.

I also have an extensive collection of cassettes, and also have cds that have been scratched or cracked, so I've downloaded those albums I've already purchased.

Sure, not all downloaders are the same, and I probably don't own the albums that every single song on my computer originates from. But I try to support the artists as best I can, and maybe we'd all buy more CDs if the record industry didn't charge $15.99 for something that costs 5 cents to make.

Cale said...

I'm with you on that one, Megan. Take, for example, Of Montreal. I first heard them in 2003 and if it weren't for illegal downloading, I wouldn't have ever fallen in love with them the way that I have.

But like you, I've eventually bought everything they've put out over the years...which is a HUGE amount of money spent when you consider their giant catalog. And yeah, sometimes a CD will break or get lost or stolen, and downloading it just makes sense.