Newsglobal

Entertainment Media Research recently released figures that should give the music industry something to smile about, for a little while at least. A survey of 1,500 UK consumers reveals that legal downloads have finally overtaken illegal alternatives with just over half of the respondents (51%) saying that they get their tunes from by-the-book websites. It suggests that a big reason for this is that fact that ISPs have been sending warning letters to people caught nicking tunes, with 75% of respondents saying that they’d stop if they received a threatening letter. Chief Executive Russel Hart says “It is quite evident that an ISP-led strategy has bite, because illegal downloaders are fairly convinced that ISPs are currently monitoring their activities and are more likely to act against them than the courts.” Let’s not underestimate the impact of services like Play.com and 7Digital offering DRM-free tunes though, perhaps a product that doesn’t make consumers feel like they’re being ripped off might be helping some? Still, despite these encouraging signs we’d still like to see cheaper downloads. Plus a price-drop would encourage kids to start spending their pocket money on music; 58% of illegal downloaders were aged 13-17 despite the fact that 61% knew their activities may be monitored. - Paul Lester [WebUser] music downloads DRM

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