Even today, some people aren’t entirely clear on the legality of iTunes and other MP3 player programs. It basically comes down to this:

1. Legal - If you buy the MP3’s in your iTunes library, it is one hundred percent legal.

2. Illegal – If you go on a file sharing program like Bearshare or Limewire, or if you visit a website like The Pirate’s Bay to find your music, then you are breaking the law (in most countries), unless everything you download is in the public domain, is free content, or is open content.

There really should be no confusion. If you are taking copyrighted protected music that is not explicitly declared to be free for download, without paying the appropriate distributor for that music, then that is technically a form of piracy, and you can pay fines or even do jail time if caught.

The recording industry, around the days of Napster and other file sharing programs, is often said to have overreacted. By creating so much bad press regarding the incident, more people wound up knowing about sites like Napster than they did before. By pressing charges to the fullest extent of the law against teenagers who didn’t know that they were breaking the law, the record industry wound up vilifying themselves in the eyes of many, which actually wound up discouraging many from wanting to buy CDs legitimately, thus putting more money in the pockets of music companies.

Pirating Music

The plan was to scare others away from pirating music, but the end result was that more and more people wound up pirating music, and they wound up finding cleverer, sneakier ways to do it. For example, today, some people will go on YouTube, find the official website of a record label, and then download the music from the official music videos through a file conversion program.

Still, even though the actions of the record labels may seem excessive and might make it more tempting to not pay for any music and to just download it all for free, this doesn’t change the fact that doing so is illegal, and if caught, you are likely to be charged with piracy to the fullest extent of the law.

• iTunes has taken steps to actually try and discourage piracy by offering reasonable prices on songs per-download, and by offering iTunes exclusives, which cannot be found via file sharing programs.

It’s kind of funny that MP3’s actually had a sort of a negative label attached to them in the late nineties and early twenty first century. There is nothing wrong with the format itself, and there never has been. However, at a certain point in time, the record industry hadn’t really caught on to the potential of the internet to distribute music instantaneously, and at a more reasonable price, since there is no actual overhead with the distribution process, as there is with physical CDs and their packaging.

Again, this doesn’t really justify pirating music, but for a number of years, most of the music on the internet was pirated simply because you could not actually find very many places to download music legitimately.

Today, of course, we see that the exact opposite is true. Everyone and their brother is distributing music online, at lower prices than you’ll find in “bricks and mortar” record stores. MP3 players have become status symbols in themselves, capable of holding hundreds or thousands of songs, and are often times sponsored and endorsed by record companies. MP3 player manufacturers are often supported through special deals, advertising, and so on. MP3’s have pretty much shed their image as a pirate’s trade, thanks to the fact that record labels have finally caught on, and are trying to capitalize on the capabilities of the format to be distributed in mere seconds, and at a lower cost, which increases demand.

The Bottom Line

Apple’s iTunes, as well as WinAmp for Windows, are setting a good example, at least. It stands to reason that the record industry will never really “stop” software and music pirating, but by making the alternative more and more tempting, they can at least curb the desire to pirate. Wherever you stand on the issue morally, remember that the legality of pirating music stands at this; it is illegal, and you can get in serious, serious trouble if you get caught.