Several South Korean P2P providers, in response to music industry requests to block illegal music sharing have completely disabled the ability to download Mp3s through their services.
``We held an urgent meeting last week, and eight of 11 member companies agreed to block MP3 files until we find ways to charge users,'' said Jun Hyun-sung, chairman of the association of P2P service providers.
P2P services like Soribada and Purna have been widely used for file sharing, where thousands of users can give and take their music and movie data. The music companies say such file sharing on the Internet has severely damaged the industry.
According to the Korean Association of Phonogram Producers (KAPP), the offline sales of music albums plummeted from over 400 billion won in 2000 to 120 billion won in 2005, as most young people tend to listen to music on digital players rather than carrying bulky CD or tape players. Soribada, the first and most popular P2P music sharing service in South Korea, said last month it postponed the launch of its new subscription service indefinitely, as it has failed to make a deal with copyright holders on the price of the songs.
