*Non--fiction*

A student must pay $675,000 in music downloading case
This article is about a B.U graduate student, Joel Tenenbaum, who was taken to court for illegally downlading and sharing music online. Tenenbaum was categorized as "a hardcore, habitual, long-term infringer who knew what he was doing was wrong." Because his actions were willful, Tenenbaum was ordered to pay $22,500 for each incident. Although the recording industry focused on only 30 songs, he has downloaded and shraed over 800 songs. His case was only the nation's second music downloading case against an individual. The first case was with Jammie Thomas-Rasset who owes $1.92 million for willfully violating the copyrights on 24 songs. At first Tenenbaum lied about his illegal beahvior, but in the end he "acknowledged that artists and music companies deserve to be paid for their work."

I was a little frightened after reading this article. I was told that since so many people download music online, everyone couldn't possibly get caught. I also thought that it was ok to download music as long as you didn't share it. I'm sure Tenenbaum was shocked that out of the millions of people who download music online, that he was the one that got caught. I don't think people realize that what they're doing is wrong. I agree that artists and music companies should be paid for their work, however it is ridiculous to think about the cost of music. For example, most people have hundreds to thousands of songs in their music library which adds up to hundreds and thousands of dollars. I think it is reasonable not to want to pay that amount for songs. I was shocked after reading that the law allows $150,000 per track if the infringements are willful. Don't most people know what they are doing is wrong? Or do some people actually think downloading and sharing music is ok? I think it's important for people to think about the consequences before they download and share music illegaly. Just because you didn't get caught up to this point doesn't mean you wont get caught later on.

Coming to America: European Streaming Sensation Spotify
This article is about the app spotify which gives users access to 6 million tracks on the go. It has been launched overseas with millions of users. Spotify is compared to iTunes as big competition. Although Apple has approved Spotify, they could easily crush it with a subscription. Spotify is a great portable app which is scheduled to launch in America by early 2010.

If I was Steve Jobs, I would be nervous. I think this app will do well. Most of the people I know don't like paying $1.29 for a song from iTunes. With Spotify being free with an occasional adevery 20 minutes, I think consumers will be attracted to this deal. One thing I thought about as I was reading this article was if an internet connection was needed to access the tracks? I think many iTunes users are looking forward to the launching of this app. I think it's time iTunes be challenged. Although Spotify doesn't have as many songs as iTunes, I think it will grown.