Almost exactly a year ago, Japan changed its laws governing intellectual property by introducing a measure which made illegal downloading a crime punishable with jail time and excessively heavy fines.
So far, the effect of the new legislation is slightly perplexing. While there has been a reported decrease in the level of piracy, surprisingly, (or unsurprisingly depending on who you ask) the Japan Daily Press reports that the introduction of the law has had the exact opposite effect from what was hoped on the sale of music. The sales of CD’s and digital music in Japan has actually decreased since the measure was passed.
At first I thought this was simply more evidence that piracy is often used as a tool to discover music, and discouraging piracy can at times be a deterrent to music sales. However, the article also makes clear that since the new legislation, there has been a 50% increase in music rentals. This really makes it much more difficult to ascertain what the major cause of piracy in Japan is.
It could be that because of the stricter legislation the people of Japan are using rentals as an alternative to Piracy as a means of discovering music, and that the decline in CD and digital music sale is not related due to the legislation, but more because of a decline in overall demand for Japanese music. Or it could be one of many other things. One thing thats for sure is Spotify should launch a version of its service in Japan, and fast!
Source:
http://japandailypress.com/1-year-after-japan-started-prosecuting-internet-pirates-cd-sales-drop-some-more-0136953/
