This Post Was Downloaded Illegally

Are you familiar with names such as Bittorrent, Limewire, Napster, or Morpheus? These are names of either current or past online file sharing programs. With the amount of users of file sharing programs estimated to be in the millions within the United States alone, file sharing is hugely popular, but has caused a large amount of criticism and legal action. But why? What's wrong with sharing? And where are the facts?

Let's first understand how file sharing works. In a very simplified description, one user will upload a file to other users across the internet. These files can be anything, from an online book, a video game, a movie, or music. Other users will download the file in a single part or in smaller pieces. As information is transferred to their computer, they in turn upload the data they have to other users downloading the same file. Imagine a bunch of people sitting in a classroom. A large amount of text is posted on the board in the front of the room, and everyone starts writing parts of it down. As users get more and more of the text copied, they begin helping other users get the text written faster and faster, while continuing to write down what they don't have. The more people in the group that have parts of or all of the text "downloaded", the faster others can "download" the file. Those who have the entire file downloaded and continue to upload the file are called "seeds", while all others in the group still downloading are called "peers". Hence the name file sharing is also called "peer to peer" sharing, or "p2p".

The issues with p2p sharing arise when looking at the content that is being shared. There are no limitations, from the software point of view, as to what can and cannot be uploaded and shared online, as the software itself will allow the uploading of any type of file. But uploading and sharing music, movies, books, and software under copyright is illegal, although the file sharing software and the act of file sharing in general itself is not illegal. It is important to remember that it is perfectly legal to use p2p programs, and many of the files shared are totally legal, from game demos, to movie trailers, to software updates. It is left completely up to the user to decide what they should and shouldn't download and upload.

How much damage can this cause to companies whose products are being downloaded illegally for free? The answer is unclear, as it is hard to exactly pinpoint to what extent the market for music, movies, and games is affected by file sharing. In many cases, it appears the "numbers" given are not quite the truth. In one study, it was reported that the music industry was losing billions within years from their CD sales. But this case did not take legal downloading into consideration, with programs such as Itunes and Amazon MP3. The company was losing billions in CD sales, but gaining billions in legal purchasing and downloading of online music. Some studies have even come to the conclusion that it does not harm the industry, but may actually spur more interest from people who download a track, favor it, then buy more music online.

But just how large of an impact file sharing has had is impossible to determine, since there are too many factors that need to be considered, both positive and negative, such as how much interest it spurred or how many people downloaded music they would have bought, or how many people downloaded music that they would not have purchased anyway. It is possible that both sides of the argument of file sharing legality are reporting excessive conclusions, but in the end it boils down to you. It is up to you to consider if file sharing is morally sound, what you should download, and how much, keeping in mind that some users have been caught and fined thousands of dollars for every music song they downloaded.

In a small twist of irony, almost every recent, accurate source I attempted to locate facts from was not public information. Each one would have cost me anywhere from $40.00 to $150.00 to read, or in some cases, view for a limited time. I searched (but did not download) for these articles on file sharing websites and was surprised to find them there, available illegally for free. This is the same sort of position some people are in considering buying music.

I choose to not download the papers, but these events seemed very fitting for my file sharing blog post.