A report published by the BPI (British Phonographic Industry), found that 7.7 million people have illegally downloaded music worth almost one billion euros over the past few years. Almost everyone has downloaded music or movies illegally at least once in their lifetime. The majority of them however, have no idea how much impact their illegal music downloading has on the music industry.

People all over the world are downloading music illegally while not facing any consequences. Illegal music downloads should have stronger consequences, since it threatens to deprive a generation of talented young people of their chance to make a career in music. Artists and singers often earn money by selling their albums and music. So, if you illegally download music, they gain no profit from you. As more and more people constantly download music illegally, instead of paying for them, the music industry will start to gain less and less profit, which will eventually lead to bankruptcy. If fewer music industries exist in the future, it will be harder for young musicians to succeed. The website ‘go-gulf’ says that an average iPod contains pirated music of $800. That is almost equivalent to purchasing 10 albums legally. If we constantly download illegal music, many talented musicians will be forced to stop making music because of financial restraints. For the sake of our quality of the music in the future and for the young and infamous musicians, we should not illegally download music.

Back in 5th grade, I remember working really hard on a art project. I worked hours and hours and was finally done with the piece. The project was due the next day, so I decided to just leave my finished piece inside my classroom. But, it was a mistake. The next day, one of my classmates in Art almost exactly copied my art piece and called it his. I felt so betrayed and heartbroken, because of my ignored hard work. Have you ever had similar situations happen?  In the music industry, situations like this happens all the time. The music industry tries their best to stop people from downloading music illegally, but there are countless illegal uploading and downloading, which makes the music industries hard to stop it. It has been proven that more than 70 percent of the online users find nothing wrong with illegal downloading. This is frightening, because this means that the majority of the people are even starting to ignore the credits that the artists and singers deserve. In my opinion, I think downloading music illegally is very disrespectful towards the musicians and should be stopped.

A lot people are too lazy to purchase music or think it’s a waste of money. According to iTunes, on average, one music piece costs not more than than a dollar. Think about it this way, coca cola usually costs less than a dollar. You could buy a good quality music legally, by choosing not to drink coca cola once. It is people can be fined thousands and thousands of dollars if caught illegally downloading music. Personally, I don’t think risking to pay thousands of dollars just because of few dollars is not very intellectual.

To sum up, people should not illegally download music for the sake of young talented musicians and for the respect and the credits the artists and singers deserve. If you want a high standard of music in the future, instead of downloading music illegally, you should purchase music legally and support all the talented musicians around the world. Who knows? Maybe you’ll be supporting the next Beyonce or the next Ed Sheeran.