Nate Anderson’s article in Ars Technica this week reported on the findings of the Social Science Research Council’s Media Piracy Project, a three year cooperation between 35 researchers whose “mission was to examine media piracy in emerging economies, which account for most of the world's population, and to find out just how and why piracy operates in places like Russia, Mexico, and India.”
“Their conclusion is not that citizens of such piratical societies are somehow morally deficient or opposed to paying for content. Instead, they write that ‘high prices for media goods, low incomes, and cheap digital technologies are the main ingredients of global media piracy.’”
So, people in “emerging economies” buy pirated goods because they’re cheaper? Probably could have guessed that. Although this is hardly ground breaking, the research also finds that often the only legitimate copyrighted options are “only distributed by huge multinational corporations whose dominant goals are not to service a large part of local markets but to protect the pricing structure in the high-income countries that generate most of their profits.’” This becomes a problem when the Russian worker is asked to pay $15 for a legal version of The Dark Knight. In terms of percentage of wages, that same $15 would be “equivalent to a US consumer dropping $75 on the film.” I’m a huge Christopher Nolan fan, but all the bonus features and blu-rayness in the world wouldn’t get me to pay $75 for that movie.
Anderson also reports that the “authors have seen ‘little evidence – and indeed few claims – that enforcement efforts to date have had any effect whatsoever on the overall supply of pirated goods. Our work suggests, rather, that piracy has grown dramatically by most measures in the past decade.”
Anderson’s article doesn’t include any industry perspective but I doubt these findings come as a surprise to the “multinational corporations,” and I also doubt that they’ll stop seeking stricter enforcement. In fact, it appears that Victoria Espinel, the Obama administration’s IP Enforcement Coordinator, is seeking harsher penalties for and greater authority in intellectual property crimes. Of course, this isn't directly related to piracy in developing economies, and Espinel is an appointed government official, so any connection to the interests of private corporations would be silly. (But, oddly enough, it does seem like these guys run in the same circles from time to time.)
These issues remind me of our Lawrence Lessig reading, “The Future of Ideas,” as well as his Wall Street Journal article, “In Defense of Piracy.” As we know, Lessig is all about copyright law reform, but I think his call to “Decriminalize Gen-X” could also be expanded to the people in these developing countries. The industry could at least give them a chance to purchase legal copies at a lower price instead of continuing a losing war to eradicate piracy.
This discussion is also reminiscent of the “Media Distribution in the Digital Era” panel during the Net Worth Conference a few weeks ago, where we saw Kelly Summers from Disney talking about the company’s piracy concerns. Summers confirmed that a major concern is the professional pirates in these developing countries that are making businesses off of Disney’s creative property. As the research suggests, I wonder if lowering the price of a Disney DVD would dramatically curb piracy. I’m sure as Disney lowers their price, so too will the pirates, but it would certainly test the SSRC’s contention that these economies are willing to pay for media content at a lower price.
If anything I think this research should point out the appetite for content. As James Earl Jone’s said in Field of Dreams, “If you build it, he will come.” And if you’re a media corporation, I think it’s a safe bet that people will consume your media…it’s just a matter of who gets paid and for how much.
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