Negative affects of piracy on the music industry Essay

Negative affects of piracy on the music industry - Essay Example Before the invention of blank tape, it was not yet possible to duplicate a record. If you want to hear music, then you either have to buy it or play it in a friend’s house. From the vinyl to cassette tape, it was really hard to copy music content. Then, initially, compact discs – the precursor of modern music formats - were hard to copy as well - when it surfaced in Europe and Japan in 1982 and in the United States. However, over the past twenty years, technology has advanced so drastically. Three technologies have emerged that have driven piracy to the top of the music industry’s agenda today: the writable CDs, the mp3 compression algorithms and the P2P protocols. The combined power of these technologies led to the proliferation of file-sharing applications that enable people to download music and other multimedia content from the Internet for free. Since the year 2000, studies have shown that music piracy has significant negative effects in the music industry.