Slides used in the MAC281 Cyberculture at the University of Sunderland (Feb 2009). The session looked at the responses and justifications given by file-sharers. Focusses on examples taken from the popular BitTorrent site OiNK.me.uk (latterly OiNK.cd). NB some slides which featured animations may have formatting issues on here

1. MAC281
robert.jewitt@sunderland.ac.uk
1

2. Early discourse surrounding file-sharing fell

into 2 camps:
1. File-sharing threatens the livelihood of artists
2. Fan-friendly celebratory explanations on how to
‘do’ file-sharing
First point reconfigured as:

1. File-sharing threatens the livelihood of
conglomerates
(Rodman & Vanderdonckt, 2006: 245-6)
2

3. 3

4. 4

5. download music = lost

sales revenue
 a limited economic notion
music is prone to

personal, cultural, social
& political meaning
processes
5

6. Bagdikian (2004) claims that media

monopolies not only know this, they count
on it.
 Fans &‘their’ favourite band/artist/song/etc
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7. 7

8. The reasons given by social scientists
1.
as to why people file share
Explanation how music gets online
2.
The reasons given by pirates as to
3.
why people share files
8

9.  Between 3-10% of artists recoup
industry expenses (Leyshon, 2005: 187)
 EMI sales down by £50m in 2006
 Profit of £110m
 Industry
is not interested in merely
making a profit, but in maximising profits
9

10.  Usersseek ‘to redress perceived moral
and economic wrongs’
(Rojek, 2005: 362)
 Rich vs. poor
 Music industry vs. music fans
 The suits vs. the scene
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11.  The industry not only makes money
from music, but from the hardware used
to pirate it
 (Rodman & Vanderdonkct, 2006: 253-4)
 Social bandits don’t see themselves as
criminals
 ‘Normalization’ thesis
 (Parker 1998, 2002)
11

12. (Rojek, 2005: 365)
‘Owners of Mac computers were presented

with a product that extended the
performance of their computers. The issue
of law-breaking was obscured by Apple-
Mac’s tried and tested “Think Different”
advertising campaign, which privileged Mac
users as distinctive, creative mavericks
operating in consumer culture which, by
implication, was portrayed as bland and
docile’
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13.  A collectionof secretive Release Groups
 Kudos for being the 1st with a pre-
release piece of:
 Software
 CD/DVD
 Video games
 eBooks
 code
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14. 14

15. 15

16. 16

17. 17

18. 18

19.  Exclusive invite-only private torrent
community
 Specialised in high quality sound
recordings
 Registered in the UK, hosted in the
Netherlands and had users from over
150 countries.
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20. 20

21. 21

22. Explosions in the Sky:
Kings Soundsystem: Sound a Times
Arcade Fire: Neon Bible of of Sudden
Air: Pocket Symphony Allof theSilver I Miss Everyone
LCD of Leon: Because
Release date: March ndth 262007
ReleaseDate: February2007 2007
date: April 2 5 2007
March 19th th
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23. 23

24. 24

25. 25

26. 26

27. 27

28. 28

29. 29

30. The ‘Hydra’?
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31. File-sharers resent years of overpriced products
1.
(expensive CDs & ‘filler’)
Pre-release exclusivity
2.
Discover new music/ lost classics without financial risk
3.
Community spirit (private sites, social networks, blogs)
4.
Very easy to do and low risk!
5.
Reaction against mainstream mass-produced pap/pop
6.
Fan ownership of musical products & free will vs. industry
7.
DRM encourages passivity and limits future
8.
development/creativity
The sound quality of legitimate digital music is insufficient
9.
for many audiophiles
Music consumption has changed
10.
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32.  Gillespie (2006) identifies users of
various technologies have tampered
with them to produce innovative and
imaginative results (culture of hacking)
 Remixing? Mash-ups? Bootlegs?
 Intellectual property vs. end-users
 (see www.eff.org)
 ‘Fair Use’ law
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33. 33

34.  DVDs:
 RCE; CSS; Macrovision
 HD-DVD restrictions
 Microsoft Vista
 Last.FM, Pandora, MySpace, etc
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35. 35

36. Mackay & Gillespie, 1992: 698-9
‘People are not merely malleable subjects who submit

to the dictates of a technology; in their consumption,
they are not the passive dupes suggested by crude
theorists of ideology, but active, creative and
expressive – albeit socially situated – subjects.
People may reject technologies, redefine their
functional purpose, customize or even invest
idiosyncratic symbolic meanings in them. Indeed they
may redefine a technology in a way that defies its
original, designed and intended purpose … However,
the appropriation of a technology cannot be entirely
separated from its design and development:
technologies are designed for particular purposes’
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37. B. Bagdikan, 2004, The New Media Monopoly, Boston: Beacon Press.

Tarleton Gillespie, 2006, ‘Designed to “effectively frustrate”: copyright, technology and the agency of

users’ in New Media & Society, Vol. 8, No. 4.
Courtney Love, 2000, ‘Courtney Love does the math’ available at

http://dir.salon.com/story/tech/feature/2000/06/14/love/index.html
Hugh Mackay & G Gillespie, 1992, ‘Extending the Social Shaping of Technology Approach: Ideology

and Appropriation’ in Social Studies of Science, Vol. 22, No. 4.
H. Parker, J. Aldridge & F. Measham, 1998, Illegal Leisure: the Normalization of Adolescent

Recreation Drug Use, London: Routledge.
H. Parker, L. Williams & J. Aldridge, 2002, ‘The normalisation of “sensible” recreational drug use:

further evidence from the North-West England Longitudinal Study’ in Sociology, Vol. 36, No. 4.
Gilbert B. Rodman & Cheyanne Vanderdonckt, 2006, ‘Music For Nothing Or, I Want My MP3: The

regulation and recirculation of affect’ in Cultural Studies, Vol. 20, No. 2-3.
Chris Rojek, 2005, ‘P2P Leisure exchange - net banditry and the policing of intellectual property’ in

Leisure Studies, Vol. 24, No. 4
Robbie Williams, 2003, ‘Music piracy “great”, says Robbie’ available at

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/music/2673983.stm
http://www.eff.org/

37

38. Background links
38