14 DAY TRIAL // It's well known the fact that the underground market has grown a lot, especially when talking about P2P downloads where the BitTorrent industry was often brought in the spotlights due to legal fights with copyright holders. However, it's obvious that some people choose to download pirated movies, music and games even with poor quality, functions and features. That's why the folks at Wired, in collaboration with BigChampagne Online Media Measurement, did a research to find out which are the most popular movies, TV shows and songs traded on peer-to-peer networks.
Here are the tops as they were published by Wired:
Note that the study did not include statistics from private BitTorrent websites that required user registration or from other P2P file sharing networks.
It's interesting to note the fact that even if the authorities struggle to reduce this phenomenon, pirating content and publishing it on the web, they gather more and more fans. Just analyze the popularity increase rate of BitTorrent websites recorded after RIAA and other copyright holders started legal disputes. Take for instance TorrentSpy. Although it was finally shut down and even banned to the US, the website had an amazing number of users which were continuously helping the administrators keep it alive.
On the other hand, downloading pirated content from the web obviously affects the revenues of a certain artist, a matter which may affect the user as well. Let's suppose you're a Britney Spears fan and you really like her music. Obviously, you choose the download her albums on the web because their free.
But what if one day Britney discovers that her music doesn't bring so much money like in her good days and decides to stop singing? Who's the one affected? Probably you, in case you're an addicted fan. Sure, this example may sound difficult to become reality but someday, you may admit that buying original content is better...