Is IRMA Listening?

IRISH NEWS EDITORS gratuitiously ceded column inches to the Irish Irish Recorded Music Associatin (IRMA) when it blitzed mainstream media with an announcement that it intends to threaten 50 individuals and companies with demands for payments related to alleged damages for losses they claim have been caused by these people making files available for download. This specious action, devoid of facts, follows a tactic used to rile music consumers last April. It is more bluster than action.

The other side of the coin, carefully articulated by Digital Rights Ireland, suggets IRMA’s actions need to be fully debated. For example:

• Disproportionate Damages. IRMA has previously received payment for damages similar to what someone would pay for smoking in a pub. They have quoted an average settlement figure of €2,500 from their April wave of demand letters. Yesterday, the industry claimed that uploaders could expect to be fined €1,900 per song shared. This is unreasonable because that figure relates solely to criminal matters, not the civil matter currently pursued by IRMA.
• No causality. File sharing does not significantly erode recording industry revenues. The record industry's complicated economics and market pressures the reasons for the downturn in the Irish marketplace are manifold. Many music enthusiasts now
  bypass the Irish music industry altogether, buying their CDs from abroad through the Internet. CDWOW, only one such retailer, now has 120,000 registered Irish users and describes its sales as thriving. Music consumption on my college campus is as strong as ever but the big difference is the iPods in pockets means less money is being spent at High Street music shops.

For my part, I digest my music through download zones and I buy most of my CDs from online shops. I often feel IRMA is ignoring my consumption pattern, blissfully unaware of a thriving electronic marketplace that they should be enabling for their Irish members. The recent file-sharing lawsuits proves my point.

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