JEDDAH, 14 October — A simple definition of piracy is the unauthorized reproduction or use of copyrighted material. In other words, piracy is theft in its purest form. In this age of technological enlightenment, with the world seemingly going forward, many old habits have also changed in order to keep up with the times. New and improved methods have become a part of piracy with severe financial consequences to those that fall prey to it.

The new term applied to piracy is "file swapping" or "ripping" music into the MP3 format. This is how the Internet music service Napster operated before having the plug pulled on it by the American courts. Napster allowed users to take a music file either from a CD or stored on a computer’s hard drive, and trade it with an online partner. To do this, Napster used file-compression technology (MP3) which allows music to be sent across the Internet in far less time then it would take otherwise.

The process of taking music from a CD is called "ripping." Once the music is ripped from the CD, it can be loaded onto a computer hard drive or put on a recordable compact disc. Although Napster recently agreed to pay $26 million to settle a copyright lawsuit with songwriters and music publishers, a hundred new websites appear everyday with illegal music downloads. It is estimated that owners lose billions of dollars every year to copying and piracy.

The music industry is a $40 billion per year industry. The IFPI and RIAA estimate music piracy from counterfeit physical media (primarily CDs) is over $4.2 billion; this does not include potential additional displacement from Internet piracy. CD-R discs now make up 35 percent of all illegal sales totaling 475 million units in 2000. By 2003, the volume of CD-R media used for home copying in expected to reach over 40 percent in Western Europe.

Anti-copying systems are still considered to be in their infancy. Such companies as Macrovision and Midbar Technologies are developing them. The first major record label to use any such technology is Sony music. Sony has issued promotional copies of the new Michael Jackson single "You Rock My World" with anti-PC technology to stop "file-swapping." Jackson’s record label has printed copies of the single to distribute to radio stations with Key2audio technology; that means that it will only play on conventional CD players. The company took the step a little too late — after copies of the single appeared on the Internet weeks before its Oct. 7 release date. The new single from the self-proclaimed "King of Pop," was available on several websites after it had been copied from an unauthorized playing on US radio. In a statement issued by Sony music to the BBC, the music giant said it was testing a number of anti-piracy technologies. However, it said: "There are no plans currently to use similar technology on commercial releases of this record."

Also testing different anti-piracy technologies is the world’s largest record label, Universal Music Group — whose artists includes Eminem, U2, Garbage and Sheryl Crow. It became the first record company to announce plans to copy-protect all its music. By the end of the year, all Universal CDs will have technology in place that will prevent users from copying music onto their computer hard drives. The company will begin using the technology on some releases this month but did not say which software they would be using.

These new methods utilized by these record companies are understandable since they would like to protect their investment like any successful business would. I would, however, like to ask the following questions: If Sony uses this new technology on all or most of their future releases, isn’t it going to kill the demand for their CD burner hardware? Secondly if a song is played over the radio, can’t people still record it then download it on a website as they did with the Michael Jackson single? And I would like to bring up the example of the mighty DVD, which claimed to be copy proof, but was quickly proven otherwise. As I said, anti-copying systems are still in their embryonic stage and until they improve, its business as usual for everybody and that includes the piracy industry.