Scott Tibbs
blog post
February 09th, 2005
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The RIAA has filed a lawsuit against an 83-year-old woman for downloading music files. They are unlikely to win this case, since she passed away in December.
Bring on all the complaints about how the music industry is not being fair to people who download and share music.
Intellectual property is property just the same as cash, jewels or land. "Sharing" copies of that property damages the profit margins of both musicians and record companies. Why would I buy a copy of George Strait's greatest hits if I already have the songs downloaded as MP3 files?
Whatever you think of the music being "shared", musicians and record labels have a right to make as much money as they can from the sale of the product they created. If you believe music is overpriced, then do not buy music CD's. (Or you could search for a good deal. I almost never pay full price for a CD. Most discs I have bought were between $10 and $12.)
Plus, there are ways to download your favorite music legally. Services such as iTunes offer the option to purchase one song at a time, so you do not have to "spend $18 on a CD" to get one song you really like.
The RIAA has a right to recover profits lost due to peer-to-peer file sharing networks, and I support reasonable efforts to do so.