# Study shows file sharing doesn't hurt music sales **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 31, 2004, 8:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-shows-file-sharing-doesnt-hurt-music-sales/237494 "2004-03-31T08:39:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![Yookeroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yookeroo/32/323_2.png) [@Yookeroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yookeroo)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2004, 7:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-shows-file-sharing-doesnt-hurt-music-sales/237494/161 "2004-04-16T07:37:40Z")
> [@yosemitebabe](#): > > Pardon me for saying so, but that’s a really crappy attitude. Even if you end up not liking their music, it’s really no excuse to screw them out of accurate web logs. It might seem like such a small thing to you, but it can be a big thing to them, and it can help them understand how to cater to those potential listeners who _do_ end up enjoying their work. > > _One_ download, from you, is going to be “misleading” enough to skew their web logs, Is my download significant or not? If it’s this insignificant, why should anyone care whether I get the song at the website or not? What I’m trying to say is that when I download something I don’t like, that gives them a “false positive”. Why would an artist want to count my download as a positive if it really isn’t? Is there something I’m missing about how the weblogs are read and interpreted? > [@yosemitebabe](#): > > and yet you are not at all concerned about the (potential) multiple downloads that _others_ make of _their_ MP3 (because you have it up on P2P)? All these P2P downloads from people who perhaps _do_ like their work? And they’ll never have the web stats to tell them that? If I don’t like their work, I’m not sharing it. It gets trashed whenever I do my housekeeping. > [@yosemitebabe](#): > > That makes no sense. > > That’s dandy—it really is. But it still sucks that you don’t give a crap about their web stats, _unless_ you happen to like their sound. There are lots & lots of websites that I don’t give a crap about. Why should an artist whose music I don’t care for be any different? > [@yosemitebabe](#): > > That shows a definite lack of overall respect. And I’m not talking about respect for their music, because you don’t owe them that if you don’t like their music. I’m talking about respect for them as people who are working hard on something and merely want to know how they’re doing, and how well their work is being received. I think it’s pretty inconsiderate to take that away from them, merely because their style doesn’t appeal to you. I just don’t get this. Should I go visit the site of every musical artist out there just to give them respect? Is there a difference in the way my web hit is counted that tells them I didn’t care for the music? What am I missing here? How does my web hit or download help them in any way? ---
**Author:** ![yosemite](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/3ab097/32.png) [@yosemite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yosemite)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2004, 7:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-shows-file-sharing-doesnt-hurt-music-sales/237494/162 "2004-04-16T07:56:04Z")
> [@Yookeroo](#): > > Is my download significant or not? If it’s this insignificant, why should anyone care whether I get the song at the website or not? One “false positive” is insignificant if it is counteracted by a lot of “unrecorded” positives. If you share their MP3 on P2P with a lot of other people who do like it, the original artist won’t know this—it will go unrecorded in their logs. > [@](#): > > What I’m trying to say is that when I download something I don’t like, that gives them a “false positive”. And they take that into account when reading their logs. A certain percentage will be false positives. For instance, on my web site (not a music site), I get a lot of hits to my main page. I assume that most of these are people who drive by, see that I don’t have what they’re looking for, and move on quickly. But they’re still logged. Also, I’ve seen where people have swiped my images and uploaded them to their site. I don’t appreciate this at all, for a myriad of reasons. One time I “caught” a person doing this, only because it was on a message board and someone else recognized my images and linked to my site. (It’s a convoluted story. Someone took a bunch of my images, superimposed text over them, and “republished” them, without once linking to me or giving credit to me. Was I pissed? Yes.) On the flipside, I also get hits from people stealing my bandwidth (hotlinking an image onto their blog, etc.). This annoys me because it records as a hit, when in fact no one actually visited my site. They didn’t even know they were seeing something that was from my site. This is one of the reasons why I hate hotlinking. > [@](#): > > If I don’t like their work, I’m not sharing it. It gets trashed whenever I do my housekeeping. Okay. Fine. But you will share work of theirs that you do like? That means that they aren’t going to have any way of knowing that these other people are downloading their songs. Because people are downloading it from you, instead of from them, where their logs can offer a report of the activity. > [@](#): > > There are lots & lots of websites that I don’t give a crap about. Why should an artist whose music I don’t care for be any different? “Not giving a crap about” isn’t the same as actively screwing up their web logs. Like the examples I gave above. Taking away the copyright infringement part, do you see why I might be miffed at someone copying a bunch of my images, republishing them on their own server, and never linking to me? And then people see the images, and if they enjoy them and enjoy the message that I am trying to convey, I have no way of knowing that. And if they like certain images more than others, I have no way of knowing that either, do I? And I’d like to know that. I have gotten much enlightenment from reading my web logs, and also reading comments about my site from other sites (and message boards) when people _link_ to me instead of just swiping my content and putting it on their own servers. I am able to produce an “improved product” when I know how people really feel about what I’m trying to do. Keeping me out of the loop denies me that opportunity. > [@](#): > > I just don’t get this. Clearly. > [@](#): > > Should I go visit the site of every musical artist out there just to give them respect? No. Just don’t actively sabotage their web logs by distributing their content _for_ them. They usually appreciate knowing what files are most popular, from where the files are being linked to (and what countries, etc.) and when you distribute their files for them, they no longer get an accurate picture of how their work is doing. Granted, not every artist peruses web logs, but many do. That’s why many web hosting plans boast having web logs. Because a lot of us care. And unless you know that the artist _doesn’t_ care about the web logs, you are doing a disservice to them by sharing their files for them on P2P. ---
**Author:** ![World\_Eater](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f04885/32.png) [@World\_Eater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/World_Eater)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2004, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-shows-file-sharing-doesnt-hurt-music-sales/237494/163 "2004-04-16T19:02:34Z")
> [@Yookeroo](#): > > I just don’t get this. Should I go visit the site of every musical artist out there just to give them respect? No, but next time you want to sample something, take a minute to see if the artist has a website instead of going straight to kazaa. It won’t really make an immediate difference to you, but to the artist it’s very helpful. > [@](#): > > Is there a difference in the way my web hit is counted that tells them I didn’t care for the music? What am I missing here? How does my web hit or download help them in any way? It’s pretty easy to determine if someone likes your music, they download more then one track. I see lots of IPs that download one song, and I see some IPs that have grabbed _every_ song. Pretty easy to tell who likes you and who doesn’t. ---
**Author:** ![CanvasShoes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/74df32/32.png) [@CanvasShoes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CanvasShoes)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2004, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-shows-file-sharing-doesnt-hurt-music-sales/237494/164 "2004-04-17T15:44:02Z")
[QUOTE=“Now how do we define what makes a piece of music shitty? We don’t because we can’t. To someone, else track 1 sucks and track 8 is the best on the album. You should realize that if you think 90%+ of the album completely sucks, perhaps you don’t like that artist and should buy something else.”[/quote] Just to reply to THIS one comment/mentality. And I’m not commenting on it in relation to online/offline/record store, OR past, present or future. No. Just hell no. There ARE sucky albums/musical groups out there. And sucky music DOES get recorded. Are those of you with the “all music is subjective and it’s just the CONSUMER who is wrong” mentality really trying to say that, never in the history of recorded and saleable music has there ever been a bad or mediocre album/CD? This is just arrogant and deluded. Now, onto the illegal downloading aspect of the thread. Yes, it’s illegal. Period. And it’s not very nice either, as in it’s wrong to take food from the mouths of artists. Now that we’ve established that. Exactly HOW does the music industry plan on correcting the downloading problem? By continuing to wail and gnash teeth and trying to force people to stop downloading and return to the stores? Right or wrong, it isn’t going to work. The horse is out of the barn. Locking the door after it, (again, HOWEVER morally and legally right they are), is NOT giong to work. Do they want to be right? Or do they want to get their money? I strenuously disagree that “most” people download because they want to steal? Someone else in this thread made an absolute statement that that is what is indeed happening. I hate to say it but “Cite”? As in, please DO provide the psychological studies of all downloaders showing that that is the motivation. And as for the statement “it’s because they are lazy” (they being the downloaders). Um, HUH? People buy things off the internet QUITE frequently. Other industries have been able to capitalize on this. A LONG time since as a matter of fact. Technology has plenty of room for the music industry to come into the 21st Century and ply their wares by internet also. All of the “but it’s SOOOooohoooo wrong, the downloaders are SOoooOOOhoooo evil” is doing them no good. This is a purely logical problem, and the music industry is dealing with it only through their sense of indignity and outrage, not with common sense, logic, or more importantly a desire to solve it. They are so stuck on “it’s wrong, they’re illegal and immoral” and in trying to force everyone to simply stop downloading from this day hence and returning the industry to their comfortable hold on consumers, that they refuse to explore any other options. ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2004, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-shows-file-sharing-doesnt-hurt-music-sales/237494/165 "2004-04-23T12:26:28Z")
> [@](#): > > I strenuously disagree that “most” people download because they want to steal? I have never heard anyone say this. I am yet to hear anyone suggest that that the major motivation of downloaders is a desire to steal just for the sake of stealing. They download because by doing so they get stuff they want without paying for it. You actually want a cite for the proposition that if people can get what they want for nothing without sanction they will take advantage of that? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/study-shows-file-sharing-doesnt-hurt-music-sales/237494.md?page=8)