Music rights iPod warning: ThePost.ie


TCH Archives > Sunday Business Post > 2005/01/16 > Music rights iPod warning

Music rights iPod warning
Sunday, January 16, 2005 - By Adrian Weckler
Up to 30,000 Irish people using Apple iPods and other digital music players face legal minefields and hacking dangers in downloading music from the internet.

And owners of the small personal digital music players - which hold up to 10,000 songs - may soon face prosecution, according to a senior Irish music industry executive.

The Irish Recorded Music Association (Irma) has sent out almost 10,000 cease-and-desist letters to “serial file-sharers'‘ in universities and institutions.

Dick Doyle, the managing director of Irma, told The Sunday Business Post that it was “against the law'‘ to copy music onto iPods and other devices. “People should know that private copying from one medium to another is illegal,” he said.

“There is no private copying exemption in Irish law. You cannot burn downloaded music onto CDs. You cannot transfer it onto an iPod.”

Thousands of iPods were bought in the run-up to Christmas by people hoping to download music onto them from their CD collection or internet sites. But Irma's Doyle said that anyone doing so would be breaking the law.

“People think that if there is no commercial gain that they can do it,” he said. “They can't.”

Last month, Irma and the gardai raided markets and private households, arresting individuals and confiscating computer CD-burners. However, Doyle said that IRMA would carry out further consultation with music labels in Ireland before deciding on a course of action.

The warning comes a week after the Irish launch of the world's biggest music download website, Apple's iTunes (www.itunes.com). Tens of thousands of Irish people are expected to download music from the site, which registered 130,000 visits in its first week.

iTunes is one of very few legal music download websites and accounts for 70 per cent of all songs legally downloaded from the internet.

Last month, the service was endorsed by U2, who released their new album, How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb, exclusively for download on the website.

The iPod and iTunes have been Apple's salvation. The company last week said it shipped 4.58 million iPods in its first quarter (and more than ten million to date), which contributed to record revenue and profits at the firm.

By contrast, the company once known for computer innovation shipped just over one million Mac computers in the quarter. Apple chief executive Steve Jobs also launched the iPod Shuffle, a tiny digital music device that will cost as little as €99.

iTunes is now so powerful that the British music industry recently began incorporating iTunes downloads in compiling the official British Top 100 pop music chart. Songs cost 99 cent to download and albums cost €10.

However, industry executives remain concerned that the majority of music downloads continue to occur on illegal websites. “In the last two years, we've lost a lot of money because of piracy and pirate websites,” said the Irish country manager of a major music label, who did not want to be named.

“Look at the industry's figures.

“They're down year on year. But the problem is how to fight it. The industry has had little choice but to sign up to iTunes.”

Although illegal websites such as Kazaa, Limewire and iMesh provide free music, security experts consider them to be highly dangerous for novices to use because they spread viruses and pop-up spyware afflictions. However, even legal websites are not without their problems.

Last week, Apple moved to fix a security flaw in iTunes that could have allowed hackers to gain control of an iTunes user's computer.

Profile of a music downloader

Name: John

Age: 26

Music collection: Over 8,000 songs, including 3,000 downloaded from illegal music websites.

“I use ‘soulseek' and it's grand. I haven't gotten any viruses or anything from it. It's not wise to go onto Kazaa or any of those high-profile illegal sites. I went into one a year ago and it almost destroyed my PC.

“They're riddled with spyware.

“It's easy to download illegally.

“Just type the program or website into Google and it comes up. Then it asks you to download a program. You just have to decide which folder the MP3 songs go in. Then you can start browsing around.

“If you have no songs then you can't share, obviously. But some people will let you download from their collection anyway. Once you build up lots of songs it gets easier.

“As long as you don't leave your computer on all day and all night, you can stay clean.

“To be honest, there's more chance of a tree falling on you than anything legal happening to you.

“They caught a few people in the States, about 50 or 60, but for record companies it's like trying to invade China by killing two soldiers a day.

“I'd say the chances of you getting caught are about one in 20,000.

“You'd have to be spectacularly unlucky.

“Why should I use [iTunes and other legal download sites] when I can grab [music] for free? The music industry has had enough of my money over the years. I've spent, oh, I don't know how much on music. If they want me to pay €25 for a new album with two or three good tracks on it, they can get lost.”