Thursday 14 March 2013

PEEL Paragraph - Keming


POINT: Increasing access to information on the internet has created more problems than solutions especially in the field of easily accessible information and media where many users exploit to sharing of copyrighted media content that poses as a threat to the record industry's earnings and profits.

EXPLANATION: As the web grows larger and larger due to the increasing number of users, free and widespread access to copyrighted media such as software, movies, music and games reaches out to more users on the internet each day. This easy access to media such as music has influenced and exposed many internet users to more genres of music, therefore serving an educational cause. However, many individuals download such materials for illegal means such as profit-making, which violates the law regarding the reserved rights that the producers who created the copyrighted material have put in place to protect their works. This act of downloading copyrighted media has increasingly caused deep impact on the economy of the record industry, causing damage to artists' and producers' profits and reputations. As a result of this act of sharing copyrighted media, the record industry is only earning an extremely small percentage of the potential amount they could be earning.

EVIDENCE: A good example to illustrate this point is the act of downloading music from the internet. The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) released a report which estimates that more than 40 billion songs were illegally downloaded in 2008. This huge figure equates to 95% of all music downloads and is the same percentage of illegal downloads which were made in 2007. the record industry is only making 5% of the money it could potentially be making. This five percent of legitimate/legal sales equates to approximately USD$3.7 billion, which is a pathetic amount compared to the potential USD$74 billion that the industry could be earning if it were not for this widespread sharing of copyright media on the internet. As a result, many musicians and producers earn only a fraction of what they truly deserve for the hard work they put into producing an album. Most users who have the choice between purchasing, for example, a legal and licensed music album on iTunes and a illegally downloaded, "pirated" version of the exact same album, would choose the latter as it is free and there is no need to use their own money.

LINK-BACK/WEIGHING: As such, the easy access to media on the internet is more of a bane than a boon as it allows a majority of internet users to exploit this accessibility to the illegal act of internet piracy, which causes artists and producers to not receive the full amount of their due credit and earnings for their hard work, therefore damaging the economy of the record industry.

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