Michael Jackson’s Death Causes Surge On BitTorrent
The ‘King of Pop’ may have died but his music lives on, and on file-sharing networks, maybe stronger than ever. Less than 24 hours after Jackson passed away hundreds of thousands of file-sharers have downloaded one or more of his albums on BitTorrent.
Michael Jackson suffered a cardiac arrest on Thursday afternoon, which was likely caused by a Demerol overdose and ultimately led to his death.
There is no doubt that Jackson had a tremendous impact on several generations of musicians, and millions of people who grew up with his music. It is therefore no surprise to see that only hours after he was pronounced dead, his music is being sought by hundreds of thousands of people.
At the time of writing the three most active torrents in the music section on the largest torrent indexer, Mininova, are all compilations or discographies from the “King of Pop”. On top is a torrent listing 30 Michael Jackson albums, The Jackson 5 and The Jacksons, totaling 1.94 GB of music.
In common with social media sites, ‘Michael Jackson’ is one of the most sought after phrases on torrent sites too. The search cloud on Mininova is filled with Jackson-related searches from fans who want to complete their collection.
Michael Jackson fills Mininova’s search cloud
This renewed interest in Michael Jackson is not limited to just torrent sites though. On Amazon, Jackson’s work takes up the top 14 spots on the bestselling albums list. Currently the top 10 albums chart on iTunes is dominated by 7 Jackson albums. On eBay there is a similar boom with memorabilia being traded for ten times the prices of just two days ago.
It had been rumored by Michael Jackson biographer Ian Halperin that the ‘King of Pop’ had recorded as many as 100 unreleased tracks but was keeping them locked away. He claimed that upon Jackson’s death, the tracks would be made available to his three children as a personal legacy and to secure an inheritance.
With Jackson’s death the 100 songs could now become available, and considering his troubling financial situation it may not take very long before they become available to the public, in stores and on BitTorrent.
