Midwest Research a Music Downloading

Midwest Research

A Music Downloading Business Research Proposal

For music consumers, the shift to the computer-file medium happened years ago. This is particularly true with demographics that have essentially come of age through the evolution of the personal computer, the internet and ecommerce. Over the course of the early 21st century, "online buying was most popular among 25- to 34-year-olds and least attractive to the 65+ seniors." (Vargas, 1) This same demographic is composed of individuals who, over more than half a decade of unrestrained music downloading access, have come to expect a number of opportunities. Specifically, there is an immediacy to this access that transcends traditional music buying methods, with the click-and-download process bypassing the need to go to a store or wait for an online-ordered item to arrive in the mail. Songs instantly appear on the consumer's hard-drive and may subsequently be listened to and burnt to a Compact Disc. With literally infinite peer-to-peer communities emerging constantly to improve the organization, presentation and reliability of such acquisition methods, users still have countless ways to find music for free.

Students at Midwest University reflect this exact pattern, and have thus become part of a pattern which runs afoul of music industry needs and legal perceptions. The proposal here will seek to resolve the impasse by researching the prospects for a partnership with legal music downloading services which will allow students to continue to download for free but under more lawful terms.

Body:

Midwest University, like all major universities and campuses across America, is faced with an interesting and difficult challenge with regard to the issue of illegal music downloading. It is a well-recognized fact that many students use the high-speed internet provided by the campus itself in order to use peer-to-peer trading programs that allow for the free downloading of pirated music, movies and other unauthorized digital items which are characterized as intellectual property. The opportunity for students to engage in this activity represents a distinct conflict of interest for the university, which does not permit the use of its channels for the piracy of music, but which also supports the entitlement of individuals to use the computer technology at their disposal with relative freedom within the limitations of the law. This proposal will call for a research investigation which effectively determines the best way for the university to improve the legal adherence of its students while simultaneously preserving the student body's ability to use downloading services according to their desires.