Now that the SOPA and PIPA fights have died down, and Hollywood prepares their next salvo against internet freedom with ACTA and PCIP, it’s worth pausing to consider how the war on piracy could actually be won.
It can’t, is the short answer, and one these companies do not want to hear as they put their fingers in their ears and start yelling. As technology continues to evolve, the battle between pirates and copyright holders is going to escalate, and pirates are always, always going to be one step ahead.
But what’s clear is that legislation is not the answer. Piracy is already illegal in the US, and most places around the world, yet it persists underground, but more often in plain sight. Short of passing a law that allows the actual blacklisting of websites like China and Iran, there is no legislative solution. That’s what SOPA and PIPA were attempting to do, but it so obviously trampled on the First Amendment, it was laughed out of existence as the entire internet protested it. The only other thing you could get the internet to agree on was if they tried to institute a ban on cat pictures.
It’s not a physical product that’s being taken. There’s nothing going missing, which is generally the hallmark of any good theft. The movie and music industries’ claim that each download is a lost sale is absurd. I might take every movie in that fictional store if I was able to, but would I have spent $3 million to legally buy every single DVD? No, I’d probably have picked my two favorite movies and gone home. So yes, there are losses, but they are miniscule compared to what the companies actually claim they’re losing.
They still believe people are going to want to buy DVDs or Blu-rays in five years, and that a movie ticket is well worth $15. Netflix is the closest thing they have to an advocate, but the studios are trying to drive them out of business as they see them as a threat, not a solution. It’s mind boggling.
The primary problem movie studios have to realize is that everything they charge for is massively overpriced. The fact that movie ticket prices keep going up is astonishing. How can they possibly think charging $10-15 per ticket for a new feature is going to increase the amount of people coming to theaters rather than renting the movie later or downloading it online for free? Rather than lower prices, they double down, saying that gimmicks like 3D and IMAX are worth adding another $5 to your ticket.
They have failed to realize that people want things to be easy. Physically going to the movies is hard enough without paying way too much for the privilege. Going to a store and buying a DVD instead of renting or downloading is generally an impractical thing to do unless you A) really love a particular movie or B) are an avid film buff or collector.
The industry is crawling toward these sorts of realizations, and they’re suffering for it. Yes, it’s true that nothing will ever kill piracy. But it’s equally true that nothing will ever kill the movie, music or video game industries either. Projects with bloated budgets and massively overpaid talent might start to fade away, but that can only be a good thing creatively for all the industries. To threaten us with the idea that pop culture is going to disappear entirely because of piracy is just moronic.
I believe in paying money for products that earn it. I do not believe in a pricing and distribution model that still thinks it’s 1998. And I really don’t believe in censoring the internet so that studio and label executives can add a few more millions onto their already enormous money pile.
Treat your customers with respect , and they’ll do the same to you. And that is how you fight piracy.
*Slow clap.*Oh, good, my slow clap processor made it into this thing. So we have that.
Caw! Caw!It's the bird! Run!
Also, my clap was not sarcastic.
Yeah Piracy and the ilk are not the problem. It's the measures they're trying to use to combat piracy that are.
Ironbite-and therein lies the rub.
Alternatively, piracy could be "beaten" if the production and distribution companies could find some way to make legal ownership more desirable than piracy.
When someone else can offer a superior version of your product for free, you know there's something wrong with your business model.Alternatively, piracy could be "beaten" if the production and distribution companies could find some way to make legal ownership more desirable than piracy.
And yet they keep insisting on DRM schemes that do the exact opposite, and then wonder why everyone is pirating their products...
The only way you could beat piracy would be for the production companies to invest the resources necessary to stay technologically out in front of the pirates while at the same time maintaining a long-term standard of compatibility for the legal user. Not sure that's even possible, and if it was the expense would be enormous, likely more than the loss of revenue to piracy.
Alternatively, piracy could be "beaten" if the production and distribution companies could find some way to make legal ownership more desirable than piracy. Not sure how you could do that, but if you could it would take care of the problem. It wouldn't eliminate piracy, but it would knock it down to inconsequential levels.