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Peer to Peer and the Music Industry
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Peer to Peer and the Music Industry
The Criminalization of Sharing



200 pages | SAGE Publications Ltd

"Matthew David has done a rare and valuable thing with this work. He has comprehensively exposed the inherent radicalism of peer-to-peer communication and exposed the absurdities of the various efforts to quash the practice and technologies. This book is certain to outlast the recording industry."  Siva Vaidhyanathan, University of Virginia

Have the music and movie industries lost the battle to criminalize downloading?

This penetrating and informative book provides readers with the perfect systematic critical guide to the file-sharing phenomenon. Combining inter-disciplinary resources from sociology, history, media and communication studies and cultural studies, Matthew David unpacks the economics, psychology, and philosophy of file-sharing.

The book carefully situates the reader in a field of relevant approaches including Network Society Theory, Post-structuralism, and ethnographic research. It uses this to launch into a fascinating enquiry into:

  • The rise of file-sharing
  • The challenge to intellectual property law posed by new technologies of communication
  • The social psychology of cyber crime
  • The response of the mass media and multi-national corporations

The book concludes with a balanced, eye-opening assessment of alternative cultural modes of participation and their relationship to cultural capitalism.

This is a key work in the sociology of popular culture and cultural criminology. It fuses a deep knowledge of the music industry and the new technologies of mass communication with a powerful perspective on how multinational corporations operate to monopolize markets, how international and state agencies defend property, while a global multitude undermine and/or reinvent both.

It will be of interest to students of sociology, criminology, media and communications and cultural studies.

 
Introduction
 
The Global Network Society: Territorialization and Deterritorialization
 
File-Sharing: A Brief History
 
Markets and Monopolies in Informational Goods: Intellectual Property Rights and Protectionism
 
Legal Genealogies
 
Technical Mythologies and Security Risks
 
Media Management
 
Creativity as Performance: The Myth of Creative Capital
 
Alternative Cultural Models of Participation, Communication and Reward?
 
Conclusions

Good opinions and very useful

Mr Philip Nixon
Lancashire Law School, Central Lancashire University
June 29, 2012

An extremely enlightening and thorough analysis of the contemporary music industry within the digital age. Matthew David explores the rise of file sharing and its cultural, social and economic impact within the industry, and offers alternative mechanisms to these issues. Essential reading for music students wishing to work within the turbulent music business.

Mr Damian Wilkes
My department is not listed, Kidderminster College
July 19, 2011

An interestring insight into some of the current arguments and debates concerning file sharing and the music industry. David has a real sense of how to focus and clearly explain some of the problematic areas of file sharing and its cultural, sociological. economic and philosophical impact. A must read for academics, students and industry practitioners.

Mr Matt Grimes
Birmingham School of Media, Birmingham City University
June 30, 2011

A very interesting and timely book, but too specialised to be essential reading for my course

Dr Grainne Kirwan
Psychology , Dun Laoghaire Inst of Art, Design and Technology
May 26, 2011

The book is very well written, topics are essential and the book is best one adressing these questions.

Professor Arne Krokan
Dept of Sociology & Political Science, Norwegian University of Science & Technology
March 9, 2011

This is an excellent study of file-sharing. The book incorporates a detailed analysis of a wide range of issues that will give students a thorough understanding of the complexities, power and politics involved in the regulation of popular music.

Dr Lyvinia Elleschild
School of Sociology and Law, university of plymouth
August 16, 2010
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Sample Materials & Chapters

Introduction

Chapter Two


Matthew David

Matthew David is a Senior Lecturer in Applied Social Science at Durham University, and has undertaken research in the areas of new social movements, online data-services in higher education, online training in rural areas and forms of free online music sharing. He is author of Science in Society (Palgrave 2005) and Peer to Peer and the Music Industry (SAGE 2010), and co-author of Social Research (SAGE, latest edition 2011). More About Author

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