10.06.2013: The Government and music industry have a new educational tool to educate young people about the harm of filesharing – and value of copyright – after selecting the first winners of the inaugural Musi© Biz competition.

Musi© Biz, launched by UK Music and the Intellectual Property Office at the end of last year, challenged 14-18 year olds to produce original and powerful art work that would raise awareness of the issues around illegal music downloading

With prizes ranging from a day with Dream Catch Me singer/songwriter Newton Faulkner to tickets to the Wireless Festival in July, Musi© Biz saw hundreds of students from schools and colleges all around the country create videos and storyboards for short films that demonstrate why copyright matters to artists, performers and everyone else employed in the music industry.

Students were asked to include five key words in their submissions – copyright, royalty, design performers and original – and the entries were judged by UK Music and IPO staff.

First prize:  Abi Foster from Newtown, Powys.  The 16 year old used the strapline Don’t Copy, It’s Not Right and her video entry can be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-e21GkI9hWA&feature=youtu.be   

Foster will get to spend time with Faulkner, tickets to Wireless Festival 2013 and £100 worth of music download vouchers.

Second prize: Annie Wheeler and Millie Wheeler from Romford, Essex.  The 14- and 16 year old sisters spelt out the impact filesharing has on musicians (‘You may not realise it, but when you download music illegally you ignore copyright laws and royalties and are therefore stealing from performers’ pockets”) in their six frame storyboard http://www.ipo.gov.uk/musicbiz-wheeler.pdf   

The girls win tickets to Wireless and £100 worth of music download vouchers.

Third prize:  Jake Dewsbury, Owen Tanner, Fraser Chave, Lauren Hutchins, Ellie Edmonds, Nadia Nicholas, Joe Kidd and Somin Griffin-Dave from Exeter, Devon.  These 14- and 15 year olds from Isca College produced a video called Download Disaster that shows a band breaking up after not earning any money from their album, which had been illegally uploaded to the internet https://www2.iscacollege.devon.sch.uk/downloaddisaster/ 

The students win a state of the art MP3 DJ mixer for their school and £100 worth of music download vouchers.

Highly commended:  Emily Irvine from Newport, Pembrokeshire.  The 15 year old earned a prize for her storyboard charting her experience of writing and recording a song.  http://www.ipo.gov.uk/musicbiz-irvine.pdf 

She wins £100 worth of music download vouchers.  

UK Music CEO Jo Dipple said she was delighted at the level of sophistication of many of the Musi© Biz entries and that all of them had grasped the damaged caused to musicians, artists and the industry by illegally uploading and sharing music over the internet.  

Dipple added: “With all the difficulties associated with legislative moves to change behaviour on the internet, I believe education and the engagement of young kids – through games like Music Biz – will become increasingly important at providing them with an understanding of the issues around filesharing and copyright. 

“We set out with Music Biz to find an interesting and entertaining way to get young kids to think about the value of copyright and the complex nature of creativity and hoped they would understand that songs are not something that should be bartered around the internet for free.

“After seeing the high standard of the entries, I really believe that it has been a challenge they have risen to.  Music Biz has demonstrated that youngsters do understand that being creative can be hard; that songwriting and making music is great fun, but it is also work and should be rewarded.  And all the storyboards and films that have been produced for Music Biz have done a great job at articulating exactly that.”

IPO Deputy Director of Innovation Ceri Witchard said: “We were thrilled to work with UK Music on this exciting competition.  The quality of the winning entries is fantastic, and showcases the creativity of the entrants and their understanding of the value of copyright.”

As part of the music industry’s two pronged – carrot and stick – approach to reducing illegal filesharing, UK Music and the IPO plan further education-based initiatives.  They  will also now run the Musi© Biz competition annually with the next round of entries opening this autumn.