Abstract
File-sharing has become synonym with the “digital economy” where large music conglomerates as
well as certain artist voice strong concern over the impact on their bottom line. This research analyzes
the music industry, which has been heavily impacted by a major technological shift i.e. the invention,
and rollout, of the Internet. We look to the technological shift that has enabled the downloading
phenomenon, as well as analyze the uniqueness of the music industries situation. By comparing the
book publishing industry as well as the software industry, which are arguably also influenced by
intellectual property rights and plagiarism, we try to find similarities as well as dissimilarities with the
music industry. We find that the music industry has used alliances as well as Mergers and Acquisitions
in order to consolidate their positions in an attempt to slow down change. There is no consensus on
the exact extent of ill effects of filesharing. We point to an unwillingness to achieve convergence of
purpose between the IT-community and the much of the music industry. Finally we point to the
historical fact that consumers always get what they want in the end, which should indicate a need to
find a viable e-commerce solution
Recommended Citation
Andersson, Bo; Lahtinen, Markus; and Pierce, Paul, "File-sharing - A threat to intellectual property rights, or is the music industry just taking us for a spin?" (2009). ECIS 2008 Proceedings. 3.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/ecis2008/3