Digital Piracy

http://thetrichordist.com/2013/12/03/the-politics-of-piracy-guest-post-by-chris-whitten/

by Chris Whitten

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So over a decade into the free culture debate, where are the Top 40 Creative Commons stars? Where is the blockbuster TV series given away free on YouTube? Clearly there is no grass roots revolution in free entertainment that is gaining unstoppable momentum.

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While I’m on the subject of tin ears, Angela Daly brought up that other old chestnut; free content fuels alternative sources of income. “A musician can make money playing live”. This claim has been rebutted time and time again, but the anti-copyright lobby either isn’t listening or fails to understand the very simple counter argument. As a musician in the 1980’s and 90’s, my income was derived from recording and playing live.

If you remove my income from recording, I am left with income from playing live. It isn’t shiny, new income; it’s income I was already earning thirty years ago. As simply as I can say it one more time, there is no financial benefit from having my avenues of income reduced.

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I will agree that consumers are experts on consuming. However, they aren’t experts on production. Quality content doesn’t grow on trees; it is invariably expensive to produce. Before the consumer gets hooked on a well made TV series, the show’s makers have to secure reliable and long term funding to get their series made. It’s not a little unfair then for consumers to complain about lack of cheap and easy access once they have become fans of a certain show. Cheap television is reality TV made with amateurs and a skeleton crew. Popularly pirated shows like Breaking Bad and Game Of Thrones employ a large, experienced and professional crew are filmed on elaborate sets, and feature professional actors.

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Flekser wants to dispel a few myths about content piracy.

Her number one myth is that everyone pirates. Implying that if you pay for content you are in a minority, essentially a sucker.

In fact, the Sycamore/Newspoll research shows 75% of Australians over the age of 18 (polled anonymously) do not illegally download content online. A similar figure has been stated by UK communications regulator Ofcom, with 18% of internet users over 12 years old admitting to having pirated content, according to their research. The Breaking Bad finale enjoyed a paying audience of 10.3 million in America alone, with half a million pirating the episode worldwide. So yes, it is clearly a small minority who are pirating. But perhaps they are a very vocal minority, especially online in the forums, tech blogs and chat rooms.

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