b.cognosco

We all know at least half those blank CDs are used to pirate copies of Windows and have absolutely nothing to do with music. Half the remaining CDs are used to pirate video games and other software, and have nothing to do with music. That takes it down to 1-in-4.

Half of those CDs are probably used for legitimate file transport and backup uses, and have nothing to do with music. Now it's 1-in-8. Half of those CDs may well be used to make legitimate music backups -- like MP3 copies by legitimate users who want to re-order songs for their preference or time- or device-shift their listening.

Of course I'm being facetious, but I'll bet the actual music piracy rate for blank CDs (disregarding large-scale Asian criminal operations) is a lot closer to 1-in-16 than 1-to-1. That's a far lower cost ratio than the average US citizen pays in taxes, and it's certainly less than the average Euro pays in taxes.

Everyone I know who's over 30 now burns several CDs a week that have nothing to do with music -- CDs have become the new floppy disk. Equating the presence of CD burners with the rate of music piracy is just one more indication of the paranoid schizophrenia afflicting the music industry -- they've convinced themselves theirs is the only business in the world and that everything must be related to music.

Do you think, for even a minute, they might consider music sales are shrinking because the youth population is getting smaller? In every developed country the primary market for music -- youth -- is shrinking. And it is going to get worse.

The music industry is on the Green Mile -- dead man walking. And it couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of people. I can't wait.

Music industry hurt by piracy.

[...] Pirate's feast

The greatest threat to the music business in Germany came not from the Internet but from copies of legal CDs, he said. Last year German consumers bought 182 million blank CDs, more than the 177 million CDs with pre-recorded music.

"I think the German market has the highest penetration of CD burners," he said.[...]

USA Today Aug 17 2002 1:47AM ET [Moreover - IP and patents news]