We present a model of online music sharing that incorporates economic and technological incentives to sample, purchase, and pirate. Contrary to conventional wisdom, we find that lowering the cost of sampling music will propel more consumers to purchase music online as the total cost of...

Recent technological and market forces have profoundly impacted the music industry. Emphasizing threats from peer-to-peer (P2P) technologies, the industry continues to seek sanctions against individuals who offer a significant number of songs for others to copy. Combining data on the performance...