Downloading illegal music doesn't really harm artists so it should be legal. Under US copyright laws, people who use programs to download music illegally at no cost are breaking the law, but this is why it should be made legal (Math). There are millions and millions of people every day who download music illegally from the Internet. How will the authorities catch everyone doing this? I'm saying there is no way to catch anyone downloading music illegally. There are too many people doing this every day for the government or anyone to do something and give each of them consequences. There are some people who have received large fines and jail time for downloading and distributing their illegally downloaded music, but I think this should stop. There's a story about a guy named Joel Tenenbaum who only downloaded thirty songs and had to pay $675,000 to four different record labels. “This to me sends the message, 'We've considered your side with some legitimacy,'” he said. "$4.5 million would have been, 'We're not buying this (Lavoie) at all.'" He's filing for bankruptcy as a student at age 25 just because he downloaded thirty songs that would have only cost about thirty dollars if he had downloaded them legally . He is now in debt and will take years to get back to where he started before this accusation. Music companies need to accept that illegal downloading is a fact of life in the twenty-first century and will never go away (Michaels). Between the years 2004 and 2009, it is estimated that 30 billion songs were downloaded illegally worldwide (Adkins). There is also a study that shows that the people who download all this music illegally are... in the middle of the paper......I Pirate Content." Opposed Viewpoints in Context. Gale, October 18, 2010. Web. 28 January 2014. .Lavoie, Denise. “Jury Orders Student to Pay $675,000 for Illegally Downloading Music.” The Guardian. Np, 4 August 2008. Web. 20 January 2014. .Rothman, Lily. “Illegal Music Downloads Not Hurting Industry,Study Claims.” TimeEntertainment. Taboola, 21 March 2013. Web. 20 January 2014. .Shields, Rachel. “Illegal downloaders spend more on music,” survey says The Independent, 1 November 2009. Web, 10 February 2014 .Tait, Adam. "Report that illegal downloads do not harm the music industry, March 21, 2013. Web March 12 2014." >.