Marcel Weiss's Library tagged musicbiz →  View Popular

The first clue of where all those downloaders are really spending their money came in searching for games statistics: year after year ELSPA had hailed "a record year". In fact if you look at the graph above, you'll see that games spend has risen dramatically - from £1.18bn in 1999 to £4.03bn in 2008.

Meanwhile music spending (allowing for that * of adjustment in 2004 onwards) has gone from £1.94bn to £1.31bn.

DVD sales and rentals, meanwhile, have nearly doubled, from a total of £1.286bn in 1999 to £2.56bn in 2008.

If we assume that there's roughly the same amount of discretionary spending available (which, even allowing for the credit bubble, should be roughly true; most of the credit went into houses), then it's clear who the culprit is: the games industry. By 2009, the amount spent in games and music is almost exactly the same as 1999 (though note that the music industry changed its methods from 2004).

Yes, downloaders aren't spending money on the music industry, and in that way they are hurting it. But I'd argue that the true volume of "lost" sales is nowhere near the claims made. Assume that music couldn't be copied (as many games can't). I don't think that the volume of music sales would equate to all those downloads. At best, it would be £600m larger.

The most infuriating thing about being lectured to by anti-copyright groups about how songwriters need to get a new 'business plan' is who gave them the right to tell us how to make a living? Who are they to say we shouldn't fight to defend our rights? In truth, I find their suggestions are unbelievably arrogant and self-serving.