‘Sharing an infinite resource’
p2pnet news view | P2P | Music:- Filesharers are all too often characterized as lawless neanderthals who “just want things for free,” says Michael Castello on mistypedURL.
“Of course, the evidence shows that in fact, digital sales are increasing and many studies have suggested that sharers actually buy more. Unfortunately, two of the most popular conclusions from this completely overlook the nature (and power) of global information exchange,” he says, going on »»»
The first common reaction finds an excellent example in the words of Geoff Taylor from BPI (Britain’s RIAA), where he says, “…these new figures show how the market could explode if the government acts to tackle illegal peer-to-peer filesharing.” In other words, “if only these people would stop sharing music for free, our physical/digital sales would go through the roof.” Or even better, “if we could just go back to the time when we were making tons of money from recorded music, we’d be making tons of money from recorded music.”
The other option is taken by many who feel they are being progressive. They focus on the sharers who “try before they buy” and the people just looking for the right convenient digital store to make their music purchases, completely ignoring free sharers. In their mind, unauthorized sharing is good only when it converts to sales, and would ideally be replaced with a nice store or streaming service where people could hear songs and then buy.
Both of these attitudes misunderstand the mindset of many, if not most filesharers. Rather than trying to get something for free instead of buying it, they are sharing an infinite resource with interested peers that has marginal replication cost.
Regardless of how one may feel about the cost of making the recording or supporting the artist, it is a fact that digital files are a freely replicable infinite resource. It’s also fact that many sharers will indeed buy the same material as physical discs, or even as digital files. But what about the people who will never buy another CD or fork over cash for an mp3 file?
Instead of ignoring these people, it is critical to understand that they are just as willing to part with their money as anybody else, provided you are selling them something they want.
They love music, and while they do not place monetary value on recordings, their position is just as valid as those who still do. Selling recording music still works so long as somebody still values physical media, like LPs or CDs, or enjoys the convenience of a digital store like Amazon or iTunes, but it’s a shrinking market. While promoting these avenues, however “progressively,” may work in the short-term, it’s a stopgap measure at best.
The true way to build a successful business model in a sharing-centric culture is to market unique, non-replicable things to fans. To move forward in the long-term is to stop marginalizing sharers based on what they won’t buy and start thinking about what they will buy. In this scenario, it becomes irrelevant how much recorded music sharers, or anybody else, for that matter, go on to buy
“While only a subset of sharers have the potential to be converted into ‘record sales,’ selling the unique can reach sharers and nonsharers alike,” says Castello, adding:
“Developing this as a model for the 21st century isn’t radical — it’s simply good business.“
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win ~ Mahatma Gandhi
mistypedURL – Paying Attention to Filesharing, November 2, 2009
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November 3rd, 2009 at 10:56 am
One needs a bit of care in the terminology here if one isn’t to get the wrong idea.
Music, as a product of musicians, is definitely a finite resource.
Digital copies can be made without loss in quality. Therefore, given an infinite medium, music can be infinitely copied or replicated throughout that medium.
So, music is not an infinite resource, nor does it supernaturally permeate throughout the universe the moment it is created.
If you consider the universe is finite, then even copies are finite given a limited amount of matter/energy with which to represent them.
If music was an infinite resource we wouldn’t need musicians any more.
So, music remains expensive, whereas copies are extremely cheap – too cheap to meter unless you’re talking HD DVDs.
Unfortunately, most musicians are still giving their music away because all the revenue mechanisms are currently geared to the sale of copies instead of the sale of music… doh!
November 3rd, 2009 at 12:14 pm
Whenever I talk about an “infinite resource” I am referring to actual digital files, not the work itself. Of course, every resource described as infinite has limiting factors (certainly the universe if nothing else). I think a better term is “public good,” but it’s sometimes harder to grasp. Digital files are non-scarce as they are freely replicable, and they are non-excludable in that it is next to impossible to prevent individuals from possessing them once made public.
The modern business model should focus on what fans will buy rather than what they won’t. In a world where “old” music is spread around near-evenly, I would argue that original music becomes even more valuable. Even though music, once released, will be freely shared, the privilege of being “first” is worth a lot. In this same line of thinking, many will pay for things that make the music experience unique to them. Many would pay for a poster signed directly to them, especially when they know the money is going directly to support the living of an artist whose work they enjoy.
November 3rd, 2009 at 12:38 pm
As I wrote recently in IP: Rivalrous and Excludable, it doesn’t really shed much light to talk about excludability. Digital files are excludable. I can stop you accessing my digital files (in my physical possession). Software is also excludable. I can stop you accessing my software (in my physical possession).
Art is only non-excludable if you first accept the supernatural idea of intellectual work, that a work once created instantly pervades the universe whether fixed in a medium or not, and has a single supernaturally powerful owner (IP maximalism). As soon as an indistinguishably similar work is fixed then it becomes a spooky emanation of this supernaturally pervasive work.
That supernaturally pervasive work is certainly non-excludable, but then that’s unsurprising given it’s supernatural. Unless you drink their Koolaid, it doesn’t exist except in the superstitious minds of IP maximalists.
November 3rd, 2009 at 3:09 pm
Once a digital file makes it into the public sphere, there is no excludability. The RIAA and others have been trying to prevent people from sharing files between themselves for years, to no avail. As you say, the work is excludable so long as it remains within a closed loop, either in the artist’s head, on his personal computer, etc. Once that file is shared with the public, such as a fan digitizing a store-bought CD, the ability to exclude ends. A work “pervades the universe” through sharing, a process that is more or less unstoppable – once it starts.
November 3rd, 2009 at 4:06 pm
Slightly off topic but nevertheless concerning filesharing, people no longer want to ‘wait’ for a product and that is why some of them fileshare so readily. I have witnessed it myself by noticing the mindset of the ‘filesharer’. A film is advertised on TV as being out at a cinema and you can bet there is already a copy of it available on a p2p site. These early copies are very frequently bad, cammed copies of the film but all the same, the film is there and people leave comments who have downloaded it. In alot of cases they say they want to be pointed in the direction fo a better copy of the film. Now you can look at this in two ways; the filesharer is just a thief who wants everything now without cost or future repercussion or you can just take on board the behaviours of the sharer, embrace it, utilise and then make money from it. As soon as a film is advertised on TV people want to see it and whereas there is always the argument of going to the cinema to see the film, people just truthfully want the product straight away to watch at home. If these companies who keep going on about new business models had any sense they would create such a website service that enables people to download and keep high quality versions of the newly released movies for a ‘fee per film’ or a ‘fee for a months membership’ to the site. This is so blatantly logical but will sadly probably never see the light of day because then companies will start moaning about lost DVD sales. In my opinion, if the MPAA are so hellebt on curbing illegal filesharing of their movies then they should just accept losing DVD sales as a sacrifice if it sufficiently reduces piracy.
The same applies with the music industry, give the consumer a place to download and ‘keep’ mp3s that they want on a website service (no DRM restrictions or streaming services). In this case have a fee per month for unlimited mp3 downloads and you would see a dramatic fall in filesharing. Again i doubt this will happen due to companies being too scared to take the risk but if they really want to stop illegal filesharing as much as they say they do, they will embrace a similar service in the future!
“When millions of people steal from a business, its the business that needs changing, not the people!”
November 3rd, 2009 at 5:51 pm
SteelWolf, you’re still referring to an intellectual work as a single supernatural entity. The fact that multiple indistinguishably similar copies of an intellectual work exist still doesn’t cause the intellectual work to lead an independent existence, nor does it cause all copies to collapse into a single object.
Let’s say you have a Tom Jones CD and I have one that is indistinguishably similar. I can exclude you from mine, and you can exclude me from yours. The abstract pattern of this particular ‘Tom Jones CD’ does not actually exist, despite people being comfortable thinking of it as if it did. It only exists in the physical copies, those realised representations of the pattern. One could say that the pattern was non-excludable, but it is a little crazy to talk about something that doesn’t exist being non-excludable, especially given that unless you have access to a physical fixation of it you can’t access this ‘non-excludable’ pattern.
Only IP maximalists have fallen in love with the crazy idea of owning the abstract pattern – something that doesn’t exist. But, like religious people invoking a supernatural deity in order to claim a privilege over others, IP maximalists claim ownership of that pattern in order to claim ownership over all physical manifestations of it.
Ultimately, there is art and there are copies, and that’s it. Every copy is as excludable and as rivalrous as the original. Similarity is only an illusion of identity.