12.Why piracy isn't such a bad thing for music

• The music industry, (which has been so concerned about free downloads that it has been suing customers) appears to be in a period of high sales, thanks to higher pre-Christmas sales and the hype surrounding the Brit awards.
• Millions of people are still buying despite an estimated 7m bands on MySpace alone offering cheap or free legal music, and the ability to sample 30 seconds or so of any track on iTunes or Last.fm or internet radio for nothing.
• The Music industry(BPI) claims there are 20 illegal downloads for every legal one, yet it is clearly not affecting the real world on that scale. So if a teenager downloads 20,000 tracks, what does he or she do with them? Sell them to others, who could download them for free anyway, or play them sequentially or randomly?
• And don't forget YouTube which you can log on and search and listen to any music video you want to all for free, surely that's piracy!?
• There is also the radio, with hundreds of different stations being offered who are also pumping out all popular tunes on an hourly basis.
• If the industry had spent more time devising a simple payment solution for the digital age instead of suing customers, it could have cleaned up. The younger generation supposedly nurtured in a culture of non-payment is the same one that pays £3.50 a shot for ringtones. Why? Phones have an easy payment system.