How the Impact of the Internet has Affected the Music Industry Essay

How the Impact of the Internet has Affected the Music Industry - Essay Example The Internet has had a profound impact in many areas of life but one of the earliest and greatest of the cultural (and business) impacts has been on the music industry (DiMaggio et al, 2001) both positive and negative. This is an important issue because the growth of the Internet and faster Internet connections has been accompanied by an increase in downloading and filesharing. Once a file is in digital form and on the Internet, it can easily end up anywhere in the world. This is the negative impact, and one of the worst affected industries of this problem has been the music industry (Peitz & Waelbroeck, 2005). The Internet has been both a blessing as a great distribution channel, especially for budding artists, but at the same time, it has posed serious problems because money is not flowing into the music industry as it used to. The situation has therefore spawned efforts for greater digital rights management (Hilts, 2003). The major companies in the music industry are Universal, Wa rner, EMI, BMG, and Sony, and they are all concerned for their very existence.