The number of jobs in the film and music industry in the United States has increased despite the claimed negative effects of illegal downloads. In December 2012 the amount of jobs reached an all-time high with more than 400,000 people working in the industry.
The numbers come from the Bureau of Labor Statistics which published a graph showing the amount of employees working in the Motion Picture and Sound Recording industry from 1990 till 2013. The recent rise in jobs is interesting as representatives of the entertainment industry claimthat movie and music piracy causes a lot of people in the industry to lose their job.
Both the MPAA and RIAA use these claims to gain support for SOPA and PIPA, laws that should make it easier to convict and punish internet pirates. With large fines and blocking pirate websites the industry hopes to end internet piracy but their proposals get a lot of criticism from privacy watchers, internet companies and websites. They accuse the MPAA and RIAA of trying to censor the web. The new laws could mean that sites who do not publish pirated content themselves could still get blocked if a forum post or comment contains pirated content.
