You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink the music industry and peer-to-peer

Abstract

It is easy to outline a new strategy. To succeed in its implementation is another matter, especially where there is a large historical baggage. There is no question that the music sector has been facing a major challenge since the 1990s and that it correctly places peer-to-peer as the core issue. It is also obvious that the music industry's strategy has been steadfast in defending today's institutions and the associated illegality of peer-to-peer. That has meant that it has marshaled, very successfully, huge resources to ensure that the illegality remains unchallenged. That has meant making sure that institutions were preserved if not reinforced to establish the illegality of the activities of peer-to-peer networks as well as those of file sharers of copyrighted materials. In its management of peer-to-peer, the music industry has been exceptionally successful in the court, success that can only have reinforced the music industry's instinctual culture of defending the existing nature of copyrights. The same does not hold for the music industry's business performance. © 2009 Springer-Verlag US.