The figures released today and reported by the BBC show that overall CD album sales were down 13% on 2010′s figures to 86.2 million discs.  The figures also showed that the sales of digital albums climbed 24% to a total of 26.6 million in the same period.  The BPI said that the decline in album sales was the result of piracy, and they went on to blame the British government for not doing enough to tackle it.

Now you can’t compare one percentage with another as both will have begun from a different base, so let’s do some maths.  A sales drop of 13% would have made 2010′s CD album sales a total of 99.1 million and a rise of 24% in digital album sales would have made for total sales in 2010 of 21.4 million.  This would make total album sales in 2010 120.5 million.

The BPI are claiming however that total album sales in 2011 of 112.8 which is only slightly down on the previous year is all due to piracy.  Technically the BPI are correct but only in so far as overall sales are down.  Banging their drum about piracy being the cause when online digital sales rose by a quarter (which frankly is a huge sales leap in any industry) just goes to show how behind the times the music and movie industries really are.

People having to tighten their budgets, or finding new ways to buy and consume their music is a much more likely explanation for the sales drop.  The BBC said…

“People now buy the individual songs they like rather than buying the whole album because they like a single,” said Philip Buxton, an independent digital media consultant.  “So they might buy the single and then use services like Spotify and Lastfm to listen to the other tracks and are then much more selective about what they purchase.  “The implication for the record industry is that they need to embrace this new model rather than fight it.”

This reported 6% drop in overall sales will be seen by many as a smokescreen created by major multi-nationals who are feeling their pockets squeezed when they’re not fully embracing the new ways that people want to consume their music and video.  It’s similar to the banks claiming to be hard done by after being bailed out by taxpayers worldwide, just ask the Occupy Wall Street protesters how they feel about that!

The BPI’s Chief Executive, Geoff Taylor told the BBC “While other countries take positive steps to protect their creative sector, our government is taking too long to act on piracy, while weakening copyright to the benefit of the US tech giants.”

Ultimately though SOPA has brought the whole issue of piracy and copyright theft back into the public consciousness and it’s unlikely that the general public worldwide will be sympathetic.  I may be wrong and you might disagree with me, but it’s widely considered that the music and video industries are failing to keep up with the demands of consumers.

What are your views on this?  Do you think that the music and movie companies are delivering content in the way that suits you best?

No, I won’t reveal my methods to you or anyone else. The evidence is solid and you have to take my word for it, and remember, I’m in high standing and trusted. My commercial interests do not play a role, I work thoroughly..

While this could look like a joke it is unfortunately reality in several parts of the world. Last to join the party are users from the United Kingdom who will receive warning letters send from their Internet Service Providers who received the information from the British Phonographic Industry who do not disclose the process of gathering the data in first place.

Scientific studies have shown that the data gathering process of most organizations that send out DMCA notices is flawed and provided access to several methods that explained why. One of the methods was to actively frame other users and they managed to get DCMA takedown notices for one of their network printers to prove the point.

There is definitely a problem with the system if the British Phonographic Industry has the unchallenged might and right to notify the Internet Service Providers of copyright infringements and make them send out warning letters to their customers.

Now the interesting question that arises is why they would want to educate their customers. My first assumption would be that they, as a cable provider, want to reduce the average bandwidth usage of their customers in an effort to maximize the profits from their infrastructure. Usually filesharers have a much higher bandwidth demand than the usual Internet user with the exception of video portal junkies maybe.

Reducing the amount of filesharers that are their customers would definitely reduce the bandwidth bill of the ISP. Cable is a shared connection as well which could increase the speed of all customers as well.

The interesting question will be how they will pick the customers that will receive the warnings. Will they actively monitor P2P networks, will they only react when the BPI sends them a list, will they verify those lists ? What about false positives ? Someone who is download music from Jamendo using the Bittorrent protocol. Will he receive a warning as well ? What about secure Usenet connections ? IRC, FTP, file hosts. How the hell will they be able to determine that a file that is being transferred is indeed a copyright violation ? Filenames alone are without doubt not the safest way of determining that. So, how will they do that ?

My second assumption would be that Virgin Media could have some ties with the BPI or a company that is a member of the BPI. I really do not have enough time to research this so if anyone could help me out it would be appreciated.