Copyright Laws: Grokster V. Napster

Advancements in today's technology have allowed users to access and use computer programs, movies, music and other multimedia for which they have not purchased. Technological advancements are coming along at such a quick pace that the enforcement of copyright laws cannot keep pace. Music piracy exploded in the late 1990's and caused groups such as the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) to crack down on companies such as Napster that provided that provided free music downloads. The number of lawsuits against individuals who illegally download music has escalated to the point that people are now switching to legal internet sites that sell music downloads. The ethicality of this issue has touched many people throughout the world
The courts ordered Napster to stop allowing users to download copyrighted material. Napster subsequently shut down its service and filed bankruptcy, giving rise to peer-to-peer computing. The major recording companies filed a lawsuit against two companies offering peer-to-peer software in their pursuit to stop music sharing. In April 2003, the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles ruled in favor of Grokster Ltd and Streamcast Networks, Inc. because they did not have the ability to control or monitor how the users of their product were exchanging files (Vance, 2003). This ruling has since been overturned by the US Supreme Court. The parties settled the lawsuit and both services agreed to stop offering the free file sharing software (RIAA,
CD sales were said to have dropped anywhere from 5% to 10% in 2001 and 2002. Critics of the recording industry all have something to say. Some critics claim that sales fell only slightly given the falling economy during that time period. They also claim that those who use free file sharing software are more likely to spend more on music than other music purchasers. Other critics point out statistics such as falling industry releases and higher than average CD price increases compared to other consumer prices (Laudon & Laudon, 2006). The music industry's efforts to switch illegal music downloaders to legal sites seem to be working. A recent press release by the RIAA claims that at mid-year 2005, CD releases were down 6.5%. The RIAA blames most of this decline on music piracy. The statistics in this press release lead me to believe that more of this decline may be contributable to legal online music sales and downloads. The first six months of 2005 compared to the same period in 2004 shows a 154% increase in legal digital sales of singles. According to an analysis by the NPD group, 29% of music obtained by listeners in 2004 was burned CDs. The growth of online music sales speaks for itself though. According to a June 2005 survey by Public Opinion Strategies, twice as many adults ages 18 to 54 paid to download music in 2005 than in