I have a question for people who know about the politics of torrents.

[The Man]

If you could freely download music and videos, like on a torrent or something, do you think artists and directors would still make movies with such quality and abundance?

This is for a school essay.

[PhoenixAsh]

What do you mean?

You can freely download music. And they still do.

So do you mean when all music is freely available ever and stores would not charge for download??? Or do you mean when laws are retracted which state you can not freely download?

[The Man]

What do you mean?

You can freely download music. And they still do.

So do you mean when all music is freely available ever and stores would not charge for download??? Or do you mean when laws are retracted which state you can not freely download?

I am talking about if local, state, and federal laws were lifted that regulated the downloading of music and videos that cost nothing.

[#FF0000]

Literally nobody pays any attention to copyright laws when it comes to downloading shit. Lifting the laws will make no difference

And, either way, band make most of their money through shows (Explosive Situation reminded me of this point in another thread) and merch at those shows. Money from CDs and legal downloads = goes straight to executives. Mostly

Not to mention that downloads have limited impact on sales anyway. People who download wouldn't buy otherwise, generally.

It's a little different with movies. They cost more and they're doing a lot worse, as of late. However I think it's more because movies suck shit and are all the same nowadays so people aren't so eager to buy tickets to a theater where they can't even bring intheir own soda/snax

[Nox]

They make shitloads of money regardless. The majority of a film's revenue comes from Cinema & TV screenings, only a few percent if that actually comes from DVD sales etc.

In the case of Music, by sharing the songs online, you are doing smaller bands a favour by getting them more well known, as for the bigger bands - yeah I guess it does have a negative effect, but they still make shitloads of money so who cares?

[¿Que?]

If you could freely download music and videos, like on a torrent or something, do you think artists and directors would still make movies with such quality and abundance?

Quality is subjective. I personally think that despite the big budgets, all that hyped up hollywood shit is shit. I usually enjoy lower budget movies with three dimensional characters, interesting plot, good character development, nice cinematography etc etc

I also think that those restrictions to production that you're talking about existing if music and movies were free to everyone are economic restrictions and can only exist in the form that they do within this system of capitalism.

[#FF0000]

In the case of Music, by sharing the songs online, you are doing smaller bands a favour by getting them more well known, as for the bigger bands - yeah I guess it does have a negative effect, but they still make shitloads of money so who cares?

It has no/negligible negative effect.

[brawler5k2]

The only reason why downloading is illegal is because it ultimately hurts the executives that own the record companies; it barely affects (although may have either a slight negative or slight positive (through increased publicity) effect) those that actually create the music/movie/other blah. There's a good website called torrentfreak if you want to read more about this.

[xub3rn00dlex]

Usually I'm always arguing with people using the excuse that piracy killed the PSP, and it's evident that piracy is bad! No one ever thinks shit for games killed the PSP.

Fact is, piracy of any sort is minimally involved in sales losses, although the MPIA and RIAA would love to make you think billions of dollars escape the hands of the CEOs... I mean artists...

If someone really wanted to argue and implement laws ( I know it's contrary to what you're asking ) to stop piracy, you'd literally have to ban buying second hand items, sharing items, salvaging items, etc. since they ALL contribute to the loss of a sale.

[Zav]

What would happen is that while a few would still buy media, most would not. This would cause the collapse of the music and movie corporations. As a result art will no longer be created for profit, but rather for the sake of art and for the enjoyment of the artist. :thumbup1:

[#FF0000]

Usually I'm always arguing with people using the excuse that piracy killed the PSP, and it's evident that piracy is bad! No one ever thinks shit for games killed the PSP

This is funny because it is way easier to pirate DS games. Mostly because it's easier to get information on how to do it. Mostly because people actually give a shit about the DS.

(I don't know if it's shit games that killed PSP tho. It had some p. good ones iirc)

[xub3rn00dlex]

This is funny because it is way easier to pirate DS games. Mostly because it's easier to get information on how to do it. Mostly because people actually give a shit about the DS.

(I don't know if it's shit games that killed PSP tho. It had some p. good ones iirc)

Not all the games were trash, but IMO the majority were. But yes, the DS is way easier to pirate, and I personally prefer the DS so much more. Even with all the piracy the DS has, IIRC it still managed to outsell other consoles.

[RGacky3]

Most of the money in music nowerdays is made with live shows, as for movies, they still do pretty well dispite downloading.

[Thug Lessons]

If you could freely download music and videos, like on a torrent or something, do you think artists and directors would still make movies with such quality and abundance?

This is for a school essay.
The overwhelming majority of signed musicians make absolutely nothing from album sales. Unless you happen to be Madonna or Kanye West you'll be making most of your money from live performances, which obviously isn't going to be affected by intellectual property laws at all. As for movies, I don't think anyone would dispute that no one would pour hundreds of millions of dollars into filmmaking without a reasonable expectation they would make it back, but then again that doesn't necessarily mean that film would be any worse, though I suppose that would come down to a matter of taste. The only area where I'd expect much of a problem if the influence of money was removed or reduced would be software.

[piet11111]

The overwhelming majority of signed musicians make absolutely nothing from album sales. Unless you happen to be Madonna or Kanye West you'll be making most of your money from live performances, which obviously isn't going to be affected by intellectual property laws at all. As for movies, I don't think anyone would dispute that no one would pour hundreds of millions of dollars into filmmaking without a reasonable expectation they would make it back, but then again that doesn't necessarily mean that film would be any worse, though I suppose that would come down to a matter of taste. The only area where I'd expect much of a problem if the influence of money was removed or reduced would be software.

This

A lot of artists deliberately leak their work on the torrents to get more exposure to the public at the expense of their publishers.

[xub3rn00dlex]

The only area where I'd expect much of a problem if the influence of money was removed or reduced would be software.

Care to elaborate on that? I've run OSX, Windows, and Linux, and have found that for every piece of software that you had to pay for, an equivalent open source version was found for free.

[TelevisionIncarnate]

Definitely not, money should never be the motivator to create innovative and creative content. You can see the difference between content that is created for money and content that is created for artistic purposes.

Shit movies - money motivated
Good movies - aesthetic motivated
etc...