Music Piracy Literature Review

2 Literature Review

2.1 Conceptual Framework

“It is obvious that the issue of illegal downloading is not going to be resolved any time soon, despite endless attempts at doing so, since the problem is far too vast and difficult for any one party to monitor” (Bonner & O’Higgins, 2010, p.1352).

The focus of this research is on music piracy, we will start by looking at what literature has been collected from the music industry relating to music piracy and independent artists, what has been done and what past research has been able to bring to the forefront.

There is not a lot of research that has gone into the area of online piracy and music piracy to date. The government has been overwhelmed by the ever-advancing technology and has often

Michael Smith and Rahul Telang assert that piracy does have a negative effect on revenue. On the other hand Oberholzer-Gee & Strumpf 2007, showed that there was no harm to music sales due to piracy.

In 1998 the Department of Arts and Culture, Science and Technology (DASCT) assigned the Cultural Strategy Group (CGS) together with other consultancy agencies to among other things stimulate the constructive discussion between the music industry and stakeholders. This CSG report is still the most in-depth publication available that answers and gives a picture of where the industry stands

“Revenues from the retail value of sales are expected to total R811million in 2017, less than half the equivalent revenues in 2008” (pwc). The tackling of music piracy still remains a priority in South Africa.

2.3 Category 3

The impact of music piracy on the morale of new music artists.

Piracy is capable of halting creativity, as well as stunting the growth of the music industry (Higgins & Markin, 2004). As an artist if your first product that you have invested in is not successful due to it being pirated and you having no control on how it is being distributed, then there will be no incentive to work on a second project and you may decide to change your career. Villarroel (2010) asserts that piracy leads to economic losses and infringements on the moral rights of copyright owners. This leads to a loss of respect for cultural works and a threat to indigenous culture and identity.

2.4 Category 4

What has is being done by Government to control music piracy

The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry’s (IFPI) Digital Music Report 2013 reported that major inroads have been done to deal with this threat. South Africa still lags behind due to the country being behind technologically and relatively poor internet