UK teens pirate less, stream more

A new survey seems heartening for the music industry, as it shows decreased interest in pirated music, but it may only be rosy on its face.

Less than a third of UK 14 to 18 year-olds are downloading music illegally, according to research from The Leading Question, reported by The Guardian. Meanwhile, 68 percent are streaming music regularly. Overall, the ratio of free to purchased tracks dropped from 4:1 in December 2007 to 2:1 in January 2009, when the survey of 1,000 music fans was conducted.

"These figures challenge the idea that filesharing will just continue to grow," said Paul Brindley, CEO of Music Alley, which performed the survey. "While we don’t think for a second that it shows the war against piracy is won, it does at least suggest that there is encouraging news for the music industry."

Really? Steve Purdham, CEO and founder of a streaming and download service called We7, told The Guardian that streaming teaches bands about their fans’ tastes and leads to concert ticket and merchandise sales. I think the same argument could be made for pirated tracks.

Even if streaming is good for bands, it’s not necessarily good for record labels, who thrive in large part on sales of the actual music. There’s a huge battle going on over whether Internet radio is primarily a promotional tool or a revenue source for the industry, as evidenced by changes at Pandora. Without an increase in sales to accompany the streaming, I can’t imagine this study will do much to pacify an ever-desperate industry.