The Washington Post’s Hayley Tsukayama says today fewer people are illegally downloading music as the availability of legitimate digital music is growing by leaps and bounds through new channels and subscription services.
"Music piracy is on the decline, analysts say, while an industry group said digital music sales in 2012 drove global music industry revenues up for the first time since 1999.
It’s not a very big gain for the music industry — just 0.3 percent to $16.5 billion — but even that small uptick may be a sign that digital music has finally put the industry on the path to recovery. Digital music and services, the report said, grew 9 percent in the past year. That comprises digital downloads, as well as newer subscription services such as Spotify and ad-supported services including Pandora."
It’s welcome news as more and more young people, including high school and college students, gain an awareness of the dangers of piracy and its threat to the
IPI’s 2007 publication, “The True Cost of Copyright Piracy to the US Economy” reported that widespread theft of copyright-protected products, including motion pictures, video games, sound recordings as well as business software, has cost the U.S. $58 billion in annual economic output and 373,375 jobs.