David Guetta says piracy has enabled him to sell out shows

DJ and record producer David Guetta has said that piracy has helped him to sell out concerts and that it should be embraced.

The Frenchman said that unauthorised file-sharing has helped increase awareness of his music and bring people to his concerts.

He made the admission during an interview with BBC Worldover the weekend.

Guetta suggested that piracy has helped him to sell out a stadium of “20,000 people in Brazil”.

“Is it because of how many records we sold in the shops?” he said, referencing the 20,000 figure.

“Of course not. I wish that every person who is listening to my music would send me a little cheque. That would make me a very rich person. But at the same time this is impossible.

“You can’t fight progress so it’s better to embrace it [piracy],” he added.

Guetta is not the only artist to have endorsed the effects of piracy.

In an interview with WIPR’s sister publication TBO last year, Hollywood director Lexi Alexander said she has found piracy to be beneficial in the past.

“In a nation like the US, to make them aware of certain movies with no stars is very difficult; piracy has its way of assisting marketing,” Alexander said.

“By looking at the page and seeing that a film you have never heard of has 1,600 seeds (the number of people who have downloaded the file and are providing it to others), you wonder what it is.

“I do go on pirate sites and I often find names of projects I have never heard of, but because they are so high up in the piracy chain I become aware of them. The file-sharers have given us benefits and helped us out quite a bit,” she added.