"NEW DELHI: With India crossing hundred million mobile subscribers and approximately 25-30 per cent of the phone models in the market capable of music transfer, music piracy has assumed a new avatar- mobile piracy.The total loss to music industry due to piracy is around 600-700 crores per year. The size of the music market on mobile phones is estimated to be Rs 400 crore that includes products like ringtones, full song mobile downloads, music videos," says Savio DSouza, Secretary-General, Indian Music Industry (IMI).He adds, "At present, there are more than 150 million mobile users in the country and the figure is increasing by 10 per cent annually. If 10 per cent users download one song per year for Rs 10, the size of the market is more than Rs 15 crore," he adds.Experts point out that the mobile chip piracy is a technique by which digitised music can be easily copied from any storage device like computer hard disc or USB drive, a mobile phone into the built in memory of another mobile phone or on memory cards or chips.

Vijay Lazarus, president, IMI, says that the total loss to music industry due to mobile chip piracy is around 35-40 crore.

"Currently only Tamil Nadu and Kerala have an anti-piracy wing. It is time the government, both the centre and the state introduce necessary reforms and set up a audio-video anti-piracy wing. We want govt to levy heavy fines and increase the minimum prison sentence of six months to one year to the music pirates and bring the crime under Goonda Act," he adds.

According to IMI, it has helped authorities conduct 10,000 raids in the last five years and seized a huge quantity of cassettes, CDs and shut down more than 630 music downloading sites. IMI is also carrying out special induction programmes for police officials to help them in giving a clear understanding of the flourishing racket of mobile chip piracy and its functionality.

"Many people are still unaware of this crime. So our primary work is to make common people aware and convince law enforcing agencies the modus-operandi of this racket to minimize the volume of losses industry is suffering from," says D'Souza.

"We conducted a raid in Anand Vihar with the help of IMI and found that the shopkeeper was uploading 80-100 Bollywood songs in a mobile for just Rs 250, says Rishipal Rana, Inspector, District Investigation Unit, Delhi. We acted on the complaint of the official from music industry and we are always ready to help them, he adds.

Mohammed Asif, Senior Manager, Tips Industries, believes the music download expense should be made so cheap that the customer need not feel going to the dealers and whole process will become liberal and economic.

"Total eradication of mobile chip piracy is not possible but IMI is doing their bit in reducing it and all the music companies except T-series and Yash Raj, are their members," he adds.

The illegal transfer of music on mobile phones can be done via Bluetooth, data cable, memory card, wi-fi etc. The modes of transfer could be- PC to mobile phone, PC to memory card to mobile phone, mobile phone to mobile phone, mobile phone to memory card to mobile phone, sale of memory card pre-embedded with pirated music.

"Mobile chip piracy comes under provisions of the Copyright Act under Sections 51, 52A, 63, 65 and 68A. The persons who can indulge in mobile piracy include mobile phone dealers, mobile phone repair shops, computer accessories dealers, shops selling video games, games parlours etc.," says a Supreme Court lawyer.

"Piracy is affecting the film, gaming and music segments of the entertainment industry. Mobile chip piracy is something which is never looked at. There is a need for stringent mechanism to control, monitor and regulate the whole process of music distribution so that the actual owner of the music gets royalty," says Nilesh Mishra, lyricist of Gangster , Woh Lamhe fame.

An Assocham report says, the Indian music industry earned more than USD 35 million, or 20 per cent of its revenues, from mobile music last year. Mobile music downloads in the Indian markets are valued at USD 75 million which will further rise by at least 25 per cent in a year time. It further says that about a year ago, roughly 6,00,000 to 8,00,000 ringtones were downloaded daily but is growing by over 50 per cent annually"

*Samsung and Armani team up on luxury mobile phone*
"Schwalbach, Germany (dpa) - South Korea's Samsung Electronics Co. will launch a mobile phone in November that is designed by Italian fashion designer Giorgio Armani, the company announced in the German town of Schwalbach.It said the tri-band SGH-P520, 11 millimetres thick and weighing 85 grams, would be sold in selected mobile phone stores and large Armani boutiques.The SGH-P520 uses EDGE data-transmission technology, not UMTS. Like the Prada phone developed by South Korea's LG Electronics or Apple's iPhone, the Samsung-Armani model has a touchscreen; it measures 2.6 inches.There is a built-in 3 megapixel camera, a microSD card slot, and an integrated media player that supports AAC, MP3 and WMA audio. Samsung has not yet named a price for the new phone"