INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY, ETHICS AND LEGAL ISSUES

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY, ETHICS AND LEGAL ISSUESINDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT

NAME:KARTICK A/L S. RAVI CHANDRANTP NUMBER:TP025722INTAKE:UCD2F1404IT {FC}TITTLE: MALAYSIAN MUSIC INDUSTRYSUBJECT CODE:CT031-3-2 IPELIHAND OUT DATE:21.07.2014

ESSAYMusic in Malaysia was born out of necessity. In order to live comfortably in an age without phones, computers and fax machines, musical instruments like such as the rebana, or giant drums, were used as essential tools of communication. The syncretic music in Malaysia developed during the post-Portuguese period (16th century) and contains elements from both local music and foreign elements of Arabian, Persian, Indian, and Chinese and Western musical and theatrical sources. In 1950s, the musician P. Ramlee helped in creating a Malaysian music that combined folks songs with Western dance rhythms and western Asian music. It was a huge contribution of him to the Malaysian Music Industry. Does Malaysian music industry, has been positively and/or negatively impacted by the digital media? Does it affect the earnings of the artists? What are the pros and cons of digital media towards Malaysia music industry? There are a lot of questions revolving around the music industry towards the advances of digital media technology. I will explore these questions and attempt to answer the big question of using digital media, both legal and illegal, is a real threat to the overall music industry? The pros and cons of digital media can be explored based differing criteria, with the most controversial being whether the digital media is legally acquired.There are many positive impacts by the digital media towards Malaysia music industry. One of the advantages of digital media on the music industry is helping the local artist. Before, the only way to produce and sell the music is by having a record deal by a major recording label. Now artist can put their songs onto the website for a small fee and share it globally. Many people have started their careers by using the internet to upload and stream their music to other listeners. This has allowed for many new upcoming Malaysia artist and songs to be introduced and listen to than ever before. The infinite shelf space provided by these internet music stores creates a wider selection. Customers no longer have any restrictions on what they could listen to because they now have the advantage of unlimited choice. Many believe the internet has set music free, by making it more available to music lovers all around the world. The artist can also now get greater feedback from fans by letting them preview songs on an upcoming album and it also allow the interaction between the artist and fans. The artists and fans both get something out of streaming the music digital. Another good impact for the Malaysia music industry is now more and more people can listen, download, and play music anywhere they want. It has also made it easier to find artist, view upcoming shows or tour dates, promotions, ticket information, and just about anything you want to know about the artist. Digital music has created one of the most successful and profitable industry for music. Applications such as iTunes, Amazon, and Rhapsody have allowed consumers to download music onto different devices by charging a small fee. These kinds of applications have profited billions of dollars and have pushed the music industry into new markets they could never reach before.There are also advantages by purchasing the original CD of the mp3 songs or else the video songs of the music. This allows the music industry as well as the artist to gain profit from that original hardcopy sale.Although the digital media has helped the Malaysia music industry, it has also caused turbulences in the music industry, changing the way in which people buy, listen and trade music. Music industry has pushed for and placed more pressure in convergence of technological products both software and hardware, developments in online music also raise significant challenges that are likely to be relevant for other digital content sectors as well. The below paper aims to identify the negative impact of digital media has had on the music industry.

The main argument that record labels make about the advancement of digital media technology is that downloading music gives rise to copyright and piracy issues. When one uses the copied versions of these files, they are indirectly encouraging piracy. Music piracy is the illegal duplication or distribution of sound recordings. This is played a huge part in the music industry and has brought them down. One of the major copyright violation cases that have focused the Malaysia or a worlds attention on the term "intellectual property theft" is the case of Napster. Sites like Napster and Lime wire allowed consumers peer- to- peer file sharing which led to illegal downloading of songs. This also led to declining album sales of artist and corrupted files on the internet. There are still websites on the internet today that consumers can download illegal songs but new laws and legislation has been fighting to keep these hijackers off the web. In fact, piracy is the major reason that this region doesnt have access to services like Netflix. 25% of losses by the entertainment industry are internet based as been reported by the Intellectual Property Alliance (IPA) in 2010. Worse, 99% of all song copies on the internet in Malaysia are infringing some sort of copyright. Another negative impact of digital media on the Malaysia music industry is the decline of album sales which has been the musics number one source of revenue over the past couple of decades. With music being downloaded at low prices or by a song, most consumers are not buying the artists CD albums to get the song they want, they are downloading them instead. The development of new portable devices such as the iPod allowed consumers to download music and listen to anywhere they wanted. This also led to the development of iTunes. ITunes is the largest online music store which allows consumers to download any music from any artist for a small fee per song. The music industry just cannot compete with this kind of revolution and distribution of music. Music can be found, downloaded, shared, and reviewed faster and easier on the internet than from buying a CD. This piracy corruption leads to the lost damage to the Malaysia music industry as well as to the local artist.As of late Deezer, Spottily, Rdio, and a few other music streaming services have entered our country. The idea is that they believe Malaysians will pay for music if given a convenient, low cost method of doing so. Sriram Krishnan, Head of New Markets for Asia Pacific, Spottily made a very good point in an interview around the time spottily was first launched in Malaysia. He says that consumers dont really care if music is legal or illegal; they care if its free. As a consumer, its very hard to argue with that logic.Fortunately, this is also the digital media were talking about. So its not all bad. People are willing to actually pay for convenience. More importantly, they are also ready to give money to things they like. Altruism is not yet lost to the world. For instance, while spottily works fine for free but about a quarter of their 24 million users actually subscribe and pay money to use the service.So its not entirely about getting free stuff. Although how many of those people are Malaysian is still uncertain. It should put a dent in piracy though. This is because it is much easier to get music thru streaming.The age of digital media and the greater ease of reproduction had increased the cry for modifications in intellectual property practices. Views on intellectual property range from the concept that ideas should be completely free -unprotected and unrestricted, to the belief that intellectual property should be highly protected.As a consequence, the problem of pirated music and existence of parallel free but illegal market brought copyright issues to the focus of interest of the music industry. As a form of intellectual property, copyright is usually managed to the protection of cultural creations that are nonexclusive in their nature. Malaysia needs to focus on addressing music piracy by taking measures to root out the problem. Its high time stringent intellectual property laws are enacted and implemented to deter people from indulging in piracy, in order to help the Malaysian music industry. Unauthorized copy is been punished under the federal current laws like the Copyright Act 1987 must be enforced without fear or favor. Under the Act, an organization, the person which are responsible for those piracy are liable to a fine between RM2, 000 and RM20, 000 and can be jailed up to five years for each pirated copy.IPA members have always placed great hope on the promise of development of a strong legitimate copyright market in Malaysia. Malaysia had the distinction of being the first country in the world to partially implement the WIPO Internet Treaties, the WIPO Copyright Treaty (WCT) and Performances and Phonograms Treaty (WPPT), as far back as 1998. A study carried out by the World Intellectual Property Organization, in conjunction with the Intellectual Property Corporation of Malaysia (MyIPO) in 2007, showed that for the years 2000-2005, creative industries contributed almost 6% to the Malaysian economy, grew at an annual rate averaging more than 11% per year (faster than the rest of the economy) and had faster growth in employment than other sectors (10.7% to 3.3% growth in employment). Notwithstanding these impressive numbers, which demonstrate that copyright is a powerful engine for economic growth in Malaysia, piracy in various forms stunts the further growth of Malaysias copyright market.

While for a time it appeared the situation might improve due to negotiations between the U.S. and Malaysia toward a Free Trade Agreement, those negotiations have stalled.As in conclusion, the case study above is given to provide a summary account of the recent disruption in the music industry and to take a closer look at those positive and negative impacts towards music industry cause by legal and illegal of digital media. Specifically, this study is trying to show that illegal and legal downloading not only Affected the total number of units sold, but had a similar effect on the on the financial performance of companies in the Malaysia music industry. In order to prevent the piracy corruption, copyright collective management is important in Malaysia music industry.

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