Gazeta Mercantil, 14/06/2005

Paris, June 14, 2005 - OECD reveals that crime can hamper online volume of business recorded in the music industry. Internet music piracy could become a major obstacle to the success of legal online content markets, according to a report presented yesterday by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). The organization pointed out that “it is difficult” to demonstrate that the 20% drop in turnover recorded in the music industry between 1999 and 2003 is due to piracy, but points out that a third of internet users in OECD member countries downloaded music from network across peer-to-peer platforms.

In October 2004, almost ten million users connected to the free file exchange networks simultaneously, pointed out the OECD. For the organization, the programs used in the free exchange are “an innovative and promising technology”, but acknowledged that “many Internet users make unauthorized copies” of the files.

The OECD pointed out that in 2004 there was “a change” with the appearance of 230 legal music sales sites, which offered more than one million files. Although, for the time being, music sales over the internet do not represent more than 2% of the sector's turnover, the OECD pointed out that in 2008 it could reach between 5% and 10% of turnover. The sale of music through the network “could be beneficial for the music consumer”, but also “have a cultural cost, by depriving the community of an authentic access to the less commercial productions of the artists”.

Seminar in Brazil

In the preliminary letter concluding the international seminar "Strategic Combat against Smuggling and Piracy", the event's organizers declared that the seminar had as its "objective to show society, two serious problems that afflict the country: smuggling and piracy. The event was organized by the National Union of Federal Revenue (Sindireceita).

The first, according to information in the document, as a result of the action of people and groups organized with the objective of, through the entry of illegal goods and products, obtaining monetary profits, brings in its scope, the entire structure of organized crime, and must be treated as such by the State. The second problem, piracy, has been rampant in a growing movement, it is also a crime and must be treated equally.

"Both problems require actions by the State, not merely punctual and localized actions, but integrated, articulated and consistent actions that can guarantee the exercise of citizenship", says the letter. "Smuggling and piracy also have social consequences, since the people who make them operational are in reality, people whose absence of opportunities led them to this path, as an alternative for survival", continues the document.

kicker: In 2004, 230 legal music sales sites appeared, offering more than one million files