Pirated Goods, good or bad?

How many of us bought all the music on their computer?  How many of us bought any of it?  Some of us, a rare few, legitimately own every second of music that they have.  Yet the vast majority, most especially those raised in the internet era, do not have a troubled conscience for having stolen thousands of hours in music and, in unison with others, millions of dollars in sales revenue from the music industry.  

It is most commonly referred to as file sharing, yet this is a euphemism for the actual truth.  Though one is "sharing" a file with a friend or absolute stranger, the actual truth is that they are stealing from the industry.  

Yet all industries have commonly been hassled by counterfeit markets.  therefore this is not a novelty.  In fact this has been an ongoing problem since far before Napster.  Aside from music being pirated there exists the pirating of clothing, movies, computer software, and basically anything that can be sold.  In the U.S. it is possibly most common for people to encounter counterfeit products through the web and file sharing.  Yet in other places in the world other forms of counterfeit are more common place, and far more accepted.  This anecdote  might help explain.  I was in Jakarta, Indonesia.  I was visiting an old, and she takes me to a mall where we meet the head of the anti-counterfeit Indonesian office.  We have lunch with this lady and I told her that I was looking to buy some souvenirs and presents for my family back home.  She instructed that I shouldn't even bother with the mall we were in because that particular mall was for the wealthy who wished to spend money.  I should instead cross the street and go to the counterfeit mall.  The counterfeit mall was a large 6 story building filled with pirated copies of everything.  Now if the head of the anti-counterfeit office is telling me that I should cross the street to a massive mall where I will find cheap imitations of originals, then what hope is there in the fight to protect copyright laws?  This is the reality that all industry have to take into consideration.  

Of course some enforcement does exist, for example many Australians go to South East Asia and while there buy pirated products.  Yet many of them don't know that Australia enforces some serious punishment at customs.  This occurs all over the world, and there is not distinction in social class between those who will buy real or counterfeit brands.  So what does the future hold for us, if we live in a world where before a hollywood makes it to the big screen in America, it can already be downloaded on the web for free?  Well there is a need for innovation and enforcement where possible.  Two good examples of great innovation are Netflix and Pandora.  The most basic pandora package is free, and functions just like any radio would.  the difference is that it is customized where it becomes possible for listeners to skip songs and inform the website of their preferences by selecting artists they want to listen to.  Pandora listeners can even travel while listening to pandora so long as they have an internet connection on their phone.  Pandora makes money through advertisements on its website and in turn allows the industry to make money as well.  Pandora also makes music sharing much more convenient then say for example Lime-wire where through file sharing the user you are sharing with might transfer a file that contains a virus.  Another solution to this problem are programs such as iTunes, which enables a user to purchase songs and albums at a fraction of the cost. due to the fact that the expense of transportation and production of CDs becomes nonexistent.  Netflix on the other hand enables us to watch movies instantly and receive movies in the mail rather quickly.  What all three of these websites allow is the reduction of opportunity cost.  It takes time to what you want when you want it on the web for free.  yet this does not happen when you use one of these programs, as they are safe and dependable. Often times boot-leg copies end up being bad copies,  ruining the entire experience.  Therefore it is my opinion that a customers desire for quality will save these industries.  When one gets stuff for free its quality is never as good, as the competition has been eliminated.  With regards to the clothing industry, many famous brands have of late been producing poor quality clothes, therefore the counterfeit industry might actually serve the industry well as it will restore the need to produce better quality products.

So, is counterfeit bad?  my personal judgement is that it ends up balancing out, as it creates greater competition and allows the market to move forward.

two interesting links on the matter are found bellow:

http://mis-asia.com/news/articles/hp-malaysia-seizes-more-than-370-counterfeit-products

http://www.hg.org/article.asp?id=5043