A new report from Jupiter Research says that despite the growth in the legitimate download sector, the threat from illegal P2P file sharing remains high. That conclusion is based on a new survey of internet users in Europe. Of those surveyed only 5% downloaded music legally, while 15% shared music via non-legit P2P platforms. Illegal downloading was highest among the 15-24 age group - 35% of whom admitted to using P2P services. Jupiter also reckon that the young people they spoke to have "little concept of music as a paid commodity".
Commenting on the survey, Jupiter analyst Mark Mulligan told reporters: "The digital youth of today are being brought up on a near limitless diet of free and disposable music from file-sharing networks. When these consumers age and increase spending power they should become key music buying consumers. Unless the music industry can transition these consumers whilst they are young away from free consumption to paid music formats, be they digital or CDs, they may never develop music purchasing behaviour and the recording industry could suffer long-term harm."
I'm not sure things are quite as bad as Jupiter make out. If when I was 15 you'd asked all my school friends how many albums they owned, and then how many illegally taped albums they owned, I'm pretty sure you'd have found most possessed a lot more than three times as many bootlegged-recordings as they did albums they'd actually bought, and most of them still matured into legit music consumers. Which brings us back to that same old question - kids might have large illegal MP3 collections, but are they spending more or less of their pocket money on music based products? With the plethora of ringtones and merchandise and magazines and stuff around these days, I suspect they spend more. Perhaps Jupiter could research that.