It probably doesn't matter to the artists, but I wonder how much of that business went to streaming services, and how much to BitTorrent?
In real life, of my 30+ friends, few and very rarely bother to buy anything from the artists the like anymore, they just torrent it. And they almost never see them in concert either -- since most rarely visit my country.
So a band that used to sell 100.000 and 300.000 records here (say U2), now sells around 10.000-20.000 or so (on a lucky day).
That is, I don't know how many folks that torrent stuff do buy stuff. Anecdotally, I actually just don't know that many folks that torrent. Of the few I suspect do torrent, they wouldn't be buying anything anyway. At worst, they would have been fine with crappy taped copies from the radio. Or music videos on VHS. (Heck, as a kid I probably watched more VHS stuff than anything else, and we bought videos.)
So, my hypothesis is that the amount of money and effort that is extracted from and goes into fighting music torrenting eclipses any supposed money that was lost in the crime.
I'm definitely game for any links. Or ideas on how to explore this hypothesis.
I think that part if it is to create a legal environment that is hostile to making torrenting more mainstream than it currently is.
Music producers are also getting paid, Andy Samberg used to buy his SNL shorts music and Lonely Island beats from producers on twitter selling and leasing their songs directly.