Piracy Fuels Brazil's Tecno Scene

A DJ performs as people dance to technobrega music in Belem, Brazil, Sept. 15, 2007. Belem is home to one Brazil's most thriving pop scenes: Tecnobrega, a musical movement that's expanding exponentially thanks to musicians and producers who see music pirating as a marketing tool rather than the theft of intellectual property. (AP Photo/Renato Chalu) (Renato Chalu - AP)

BELEM, Brazil -- This steamy city at the mouth of the Amazon river is a haven for pirates _ the digital kind who copy CDs and DVDs by the thousands for illegal sidewalk sales.

Belem is also home to one of Brazil's most thriving pop scenes: tecnobrega, a musical movement that's expanding exponentially thanks to musicians and producers who see copying as a marketing tool rather than intellectual property theft.

All around the city of 1.5 million, tecnobrega's cloyingly sweet melodies and synthesizer-driven shuffle beats blast from cars, river boats and curbside speakers set up by street vendors hawking the latest hits.

While piracy is the bane of many musicians trying to control the sale of their songs, tecnobrega artists see counterfeiters as key to their success. Artists, who make their money off of live shows, deliver their CDs directly to the street vendors, who determine the price that market can bear. This "mixtape" phenomenon is popular in other parts of the world, including Argentina and the United States, where it is an integral part of hip-hop.

"Piracy is the way to get established and get your name out. There's no way to stop it, so we're using it to our advantage," explains Gabi Amarantos, who frequently appears on Brazilian TV on the strength of bootleg sales of her CDs (from which artists don't get a cut).

Aspiring tecnobrega artists also e-mail MP3s of their latest efforts to producers and DJs who burn CDs that go straight to the copiers and street stall vendors nationwide, selling for as little as 50 cents. Legal CDs sell for around $15 at record shops.

"It's this really gritty tacky, sleazy jungle music. It's just genius," said John Perry Barlow, a former lyricist for the Grateful Dead and co-founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which advocates protecting free speech in the digital age.

Barlow sees tecnobrega as following in the footsteps of his hallowed "Dead heads," whose trade in bootleg Dead tapes boosted the band's popularity for decades.

"It's making it possible for every kid in Brazil to know their songs by the time they turn five," Barlow said. "It's actually good for a lot of money _ you give it away and it will come back. That's literally true with information, not with property."

Ronaldo Lemos, a law professor at Brazil's respected Getulio Vargas Foundation, an elite Rio de Janeiro think tank and research center, says tecnobrega and other movements like it represent a new business model for the digital era, where music is transformed from a good to a service.

"This year the multinational record labels will only release about 40 records by Brazilian artists, while tecnobrega artists will release around 400," said Lemos. "The record industry argues if intellectual property isn't protected there will be no innovation. But tecnobrega has shown that's not true."

Brazil's National Anti-Piracy Association dismisses tecnobrega as an insignificant movement that makes light of piracy, which it says costs the Brazilian economy two million jobs a year and $15 billion in lost tax revenues.