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Ars Examines Outlandish "Lost To Piracy" Claims and Figures
Posted by
timothy
on Thu Oct 09, 2008 01:03 PM
from the there-were-more-doubloons-here-I-swear-to-you dept.
from the there-were-more-doubloons-here-I-swear-to-you dept.
Nom du Keyboard writes "For years the figures of $200 billion and 750,000 jobs lost to intellectual property piracy have been bandied about, usually as a cudgel to demand ever more overbearing copyright laws with the intent of diminishing of both Fair Use and the Public Domain. Now ARS Technica takes a look into origin and validity these figures and finds far less than the proponents of them might wish."
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Games: ESA Sent Takedown Notices For 45 Million Infringements In Fiscal 2009 81 comments
eldavojohn writes "The Entertainment Software Association has released this year's fiscal report (PDF), putting out their numbers to level the finger at new targets. Following up on last year's published report, this one has a whole bunch of new numbers to ponder. The top five P2P game piracy countries this year are: Italy, Spain, France, Germany, and Poland. The ESA's anti-piracy program notes, 'Chief among this year's actions were five separate law enforcement raids against game pirates in California, resulting in the seizure of several thousand games and dozens of modded consoles, and the arrests of five individuals.' But don't worry, they've expanded to other countries. 'The ESA sent takedown notices to ISPs covering more than 45 million instances of infringement of member company games in more than 100 countries worldwide.' They also strive to show they are actually doing things, like endorsing 43 bills aimed at regulating content or controlling access to video games — with not a single one of them making it into law. They did put some into effect at the state level; mostly making it a crime to sell mature games to minors. You can also find their activities localized to you, as this report has sections arranged by state and country. Conspicuously absent this year are any global numbers of what piracy cost the entertainment industry, so unfortunately Ars Technica will have to find someone else to audit, although Venture Beat has a good breakdown."
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"Lost" to piracy (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
You're losing sales. That's pretty valuable to somebody trying to make a living off of it.
Besides, when has the Slashdot community ever avoided using the phrase "stolen GPL code" even though you can't steal code? People seem to split hairs only when it suits their agendas...
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
People used to pirate stuff they'd pay for. The lastest stuff is so shitty that no sane person would pay for it! Oh, wait...
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
If it's crappy, why is getting pirated? That doesn't make sense.
Re:"Lost" to piracy (Score:5, Insightful)
because while it isn't worth money to those people it is just above a youtube video of someone lighting their farts and staring at the wall, in that order.
They wouldn't spend their money on it even if there was no piracy is all it means.
How is this concept so very very very hard for certain people to understand.
Also- downloading a movie off TPB is less effort than going to the video rental place.
Simple as that.
Even if the video rental place halved their prices it would still be more effort to go there.
Hell I have no problem paying a subscription- I pay for a rapidshare account. It's convenience that matters to me and TPB is very very convenient for people. And since the rights holders seem to be represented by idiots who didn't jump in faster services like TPB and Rapidshare got there first and are now well dug in.
Parent
Re:"Lost" to piracy (Score:5, Insightful)
Nobody's asking them to pay. But if they were asked to pay they'd simply decline to watch. simple as that.
Value: ~Zero
Cost: ~Zero
Result: Watch
Value: ~Zero
Cost: ~$9.99!
Result: Goes and watches someone light their farts on youtube.
Simple enough for an arts student to understand.
How is this concept so very very very hard for certain people to understand?
Parent
Re:"Lost" to piracy (Score:5, Insightful)
show me where on TPB they get asked to pay.
The question was about lost sales. the point was there were no lost sales because if they had to pay to view then they simply wouldn't view.
Parent
Re:"Lost" to piracy (Score:5, Insightful)
"I'm going to take it and derive enjoyment from it, but it's not good so I won't pay for it."
If one cannot return a shitty movie, he or she's going to find another means to review its value.
Parent
Re:"Lost" to piracy (Score:5, Insightful)
If it's crappy, why is getting pirated? That doesn't make sense.
Because civil disobedience is an excellent way to show your disapproval of bad business models.
Parent
Re:"Lost" to piracy (Score:5, Insightful)
If you honestly believe people are pirating games, movies, and music as a form of "civil disobedience" to stick it to the man, I don't know what to say. It's the same tired cultural revolution argument that's been trotted out for over a decade. The simpler truth is that human beings are selfish by nature, and if there's an easy way to get something for free without repercussion, they'll latch onto it and justify it any number of ways. Your argument, for instance, is a mental exercise in portraying other people as the bad guy, even though you're the one ripping off the artist. It's a huge leap, but people make it all the time so they don't feel like they're doing something wrong.
Besides, what "bad business model" are you referring to? The one where you make something and try to sell it? The industries have already adopted internet distribution models through iTunes, Steam, and so forth. What more do you want?
Parent
Re:"Lost" to piracy (Score:5, Insightful)
If it's crappy, why is getting pirated? That doesn't make sense.
Probably for the same reason as I read the crappy free daily news sheets they hand out on the subway: they're free, they pass some time, and if they bore me I can throw them over my shoulder without a second thought. Nothing lost, nothing gained.
Oh, and nobody loses a sale :-)
Parent
Re:"Lost" to piracy - Major Fallacy Here! (Score:5, Insightful)
You make the fallacy of equating every pirated instance to a lost sale. Many songs are copied that would never be bought otherwise, and the same applies to movies and software. People would simply go without at the price demanded for a legal sale, or find a cheaper alternative (listen less, FOSS, etc.). So to say that sales are lost to piracy is no more valid than flogging the figures of $200B and 750,000 jobs.
Parent
It's not that simple of an equation (Score:5, Insightful)
You're losing sales.
Let's go through the logic of that shall we?
Seems to make sense at first.
Problem with that logic is that it typically implies that every instance of copying equals an instance of lost sales which is clearly and demonstrably not true. Someone who cannot afford the authorized copy will never purchase it so that cannot be a lost sale. Someone who is unwilling to pay the price being asked is likewise never going to be a lost sale. Ergo the only population in question is those who are able and willing to pay the price being asked but decide to pirate anyway. This is necessarily a smaller population.
What really is being claimed is that copyright infringement cannibalizes a percentage of sales that otherwise *may* have come to the copyright holder. For digital works, the marginal cost of a copy is essentially zero so while the copyright holder may lose a sale, he/she/it doesn't lose any cash since they have not lost an asset they owned. It might induce a higher fixed cost per unit since fewer units are sold and the cost cannot be amortized over as many units. A problem to be sure but a very different issue.
It also implies that unauthorized copying never results in purchases of authorized merchandise. It is relatively easy to find examples of products where bootleg/unauthorized copies actually helped drive the popularity of the product to the point where authorized copy sales increase.
You'll notice the word theft never was mentioned because it isn't theft. This doesn't make the copyright infringement any more moral or legal but it does make it a different situation.
Parent
Re:"Lost" to piracy (Score:4, Funny)
I may have to renegotiate the terms of my loan...
Parent
Anyone else find it humorous... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Anyone else find it humorous... (Score:5, Interesting)
Perhaps more importantly, both numbers are seemingly decades old, gaining a patina of currency and credibility by virtue of having been laundered through a relay race of respectable sources, even as their origin recedes into the mists. That's especially significant, because these numbers are always invoked as proof that the piracy problem is still dire--that everything we've done to step up international enforcement of intellectual property laws has been in vain. But of course, if you simply recycle the same numbers from 15 and 20 years ago--remember that IACC's 2005 publications still cite that 1995 congressional testimony, from which it seems safe to infer that they have no more recent source--then it will necessarily seem as though no ground has been gained.
In other words, those standing to benefit are perpetuating the reuse of old numbers so to get ever more beneficial measures passed. Nice to see it stated, but I can't see anyone with clout (e.g. members of congress/their aides) actually reading this.
Parent
Actual losses are zero (Score:4, Insightful)
As I've said before, the actual losses are zero. An opportunity cost only exists when an opportunity exists in the first place. Nobody is crying foul that horse and buggy makers are out thousands of jobs and dollars due to the advent of cars.
To content industry: the advent of the internet results in consumer p2p. It cannot be stopped. Deal with it. Do so by competing against it, not legislating against it.
bad analogy (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:bad analogy (Score:5, Insightful)
That's also where the would-be bit salesmen are full of it, too. The music industry has lost sales to independant labels and artists (most of whom WANT their work shared and use P2P to its full advantage), lost sales due to a prolonged and severe boycott of their wares, yet blame any downturn in sales to copyright infringement.
They count each unpaid-for download as a lost sale, when in fact the vast, vast majority of these would NOT be sales even if copyright infringement were impossible. Peg Leg Pete downloads Madonna's "Lying Dickweeds", finds out it's utter dreck, and deletes it. Madonna's label screams "foul" and says a sale has been lost. College junior Blackbeard (who tries to make ends meet tending bar at night) downloads a copy of Photoshop that he could never afford, and Adobe counts it as a lost sale.
In short, everyone bandying these numbers around are bald faced liars.
Parent
Re:bad analogy (Score:5, Insightful)
People don't demand the physical CD, DVD, etc., they demand the content. How that content is delivered is secondary.
Parent
Re:bad analogy (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re:bad analogy (Score:5, Interesting)
And me without mod points. Even RIAA execs have said they lost an entire generation of buyers because they didn't have a pay-to-download strategy soon enough. If they'd had *something* worthwhile, kids (now young adults) wouldn't think the best way to get your music is through BitTorrent.
Parent
Re:bad analogy (Score:4, Informative)
Authorized, paid downloads are rising:
"IFPI, an international music-industry association, found that 1.7 billion music tracks were downloaded worldwide in 2007, up 53 percent from the previous year. That number includes tracks from full-album downloads but excludes full-track downloads over the cellular airwaves directly to MP3-playing cellphones."
Name another business that grew 53% between 2006 and 2007.
Parent
Re:bad analogy (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, basic economics will tell you that the quantity of something which is obtained for free has no bearing on the demand for a product. "Demand" means the shape of the whole curve, and that curve necessarily spikes far upward at the point where price reaches zero. That people download like crazy for free tells you absolutely nothing about what they would be doing if they had no choice but to pay money.
Parent
Re:bad analogy (Score:4, Insightful)
Ah, but we can both be right.
Does piracy hurt demand? Most likely.
But would demand be higher, lower, or the same if piracy were somehow eliminated?
That is hard to say. My guess from what I know (and I realize this is just a guess) is that demand would still be going down even in the absence of piracy. That is to say, while piracy may be responsible for some losses, the industry would still be hurting even if it were not happening.
In any case, I think that the debate is irrelevant. You can no more stop your products from being pirated than you can stop your buildings from being rained on. If your roof leaks then you must fix the roof, not stop the rain. Likewise, businesses which are built on selling copyrighted material must come to terms with piracy and figure out ways to make money despite it. This is not really a good thing for us (I make my money in this area too!) but there's simply no way to make it stop.
Parent
Re:bad analogy (Score:4, Informative)
Actually, the product of recording companies *IS* the CD and distribution since they did not produce the music, the musician did. Musicians are still making money off their performance, merchandise and numerous other venues including the internet through direct sales and/or straight out giving the tracks away that is not affected by piracy at all. You can't exactly pirate a live performance. Oh sure, you can record it, but that just isn't the same as being there. You can't pirate the experience.
Their business model is antiquated and they either have to adapt and reinvent themselves or die. I no longer support any artist using a major label. There are too many great indie artists as well as a few major bands that are embracing the new model. These numbers will only increase and the recording industry is scared....with good reason.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Your whole argument relies on the assumption that there is no way to compete against P2P, but there is. Simply offer your own downloads just as free. Monetize it using a means other than consumer cost, such as advertising or subscription services on top of the content. It's been done for decades, since before the internet even existed with broadcasting.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
If everyone trades music, video, and software without paying for them, we will have heavily reduced funding for the creation of music and video, since the only potential income will be concerts/screenings/merchandising
You say that as if that would be a bad thing.
Scary, really (Score:4, Insightful)
Read TFA a few days ago... It's actually quite scary that lobbyists can throw around completely made up figures which convince lawmakers that we need law X for problem Y. There should be some kind of accountability for quoting random numbers...
Re:Scary, really (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Scary, really (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not a lie if you believe it.
If someone creates a think-tank for the express purpose of coming up with a white paper to support your position, and you don't technically know (or want to know) that the think-tank is intellectually dishonest about their report, then you can go in front of Congress and say, in good faith, that to the best of your knowledge what you say is true. And, as e
Statistical abuse (Score:4, Interesting)
This sort of abuse of statistics happens all the time. Ars Technica's article was an excellent investigation into a very simple question - where do these numbers come from? It's scary how many government agencies just assumed they were true.
However the question is more interesting than the answer because no one has bothered to ask it before. Everyone just assumes that because the numbers come from government sources, they must be legitimate. This question should have been asked years ago.
Instead, as happens time and time again, this shows that if someone throws out a number with enough confidence, people will believe it. And once the number gets an air of legitimacy attached to it because of who's quoting it, no one will question it.
It's speaking something into being that didn't exist before, and enough people believe in it it is, in essence, true. Like the Hogfather in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series [wikipedia.org].
Parent
Not only that (Score:5, Funny)
so? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:so? (Score:5, Interesting)
What makes you think that the NYT has more credibility than Ars? Personally, I see it the other way around: I'm far less prone to double-checking Ars figures than NYT figures. That's because when I did so in the past, Ars figures were a lot more accurate than NYT figures - at least when it came to tech issues.
Unless you mean that it would be nice for the MSM to pick it up. In which case I have news for you - the MSM hasn't been mainstream in about 2 years. Reader- and viewership numbers are down across the board for these entities, while numbers for blogs and radio talk shows are through the roof.
Parent
Re:so? (Score:5, Insightful)
What makes you think that the NYT has more credibility than Ars? Personally, I see it the other way around: I'm far less prone to double-checking Ars figures than NYT figures. That's because when I did so in the past, Ars figures were a lot more accurate than NYT figures - at least when it came to tech issues.
It's not about credibility - It's about mass acceptance. You may trust Ars more than the NYT, but like nomadic said - We all knew those numbers were garbage. I can't point my mom to Ars and convince her of anything, but NYT, CNN, MSN, etc would all work just fine. And, despite your "MSM hasn't been mainstream in about 2 years" assertion, I'll need a citation before I believe that the bulk of Americans are getting their news or placing their trust more in blogs/talk shows rather than "mainstream" news outlets.
Won't somebody think of Joe Six-pack?!?
Parent
Re:so? NYT REALLY? (Score:3)
Aside from mentioning that The National Enquirer broke both the John Edwards affair story and the Jamie Lynn Spears pregnancy stories and was ridiculed for both why the mainstream media tried to spike them (both turned out true), just what constituted trusted media today -- an old name, or results?
Remember that the NYT also thinks that Barrack would make the best president.
statistically speaking (Score:5, Funny)
Copyright infringement != Theft (Score:3, Interesting)
I would estimate the number of jobs lost to intellectual property theft to be very little, and probably mostly due to patents.
Please stop grouping trademarks, patents, and copyrights together.
Free Culture (Score:5, Informative)
Lawrence Lessig's book Free Culture [free-culture.cc] goes into detail about this subject and comes to the conclusion that it's a load of bullshit made up by the media companies.
I will believe it (Score:4, Interesting)
I've always said I'd believe the numbers when an insurance company pays out a policy for the amount, and/or a company writes off the loss to the IRS in tax filings. Generally speaking, I don't accept claims that are in a forum or format that would not be construed as testimony by a federal court. I have never heard anybody with any authority to speak for a US corporation, give a deposition under oath that makes the claims addressed in the article. It is as though they tell their shareholders, artists, performance rights organizations, and their own attorneys, different things from what they tell the FBI, the Customs agents, certain elements in the media, and lobbyists. I'm thinking there might actually be a crime here, but what do I know?
What about... (Score:3, Insightful)
all the jobs created by piracy? There's been how many software jobs created to come up with new anti-piracy software, DRM and the like. How many law suits have been thrown around bloating the salaries of overpaid lawyers and their ilk. Whole corporations such as the RIAA have been created to combat the travesties of pirates on the high webs.
How many jobs have been created due to the piracy itself. Napster has its roots in file sharing, if not for this company the likes of iTunes would not likely exist. Thepiratebay while not a piracy company would not be what it is right now with out some pirated content.
On the flip side of all of this imagine what the media would be like if artists did it for the art and not for the money. Movies such as Indiana Jones and the Crystal skull wouldn't exist. Aliens, wtf? Thats the kind of "art" that comes out of focus groups and market testing.
Re:What about... (Score:5, Interesting)
Whole corporations such as the RIAA have been created to combat the travesties of pirates on the high webs.
The RIAA is older than I am, and I'm a geezer.
An analog disk has a hard time with bass; the grooves would have to be way too deep. Fortunately, you can correct this in hardware using what is called an equalization curve [wikipedia.org]. It works somewhat like Dolby in reverse.
The record is recorded with the bass attenuated, and played back with the opposice curve (see the wikipedia article for detail).
In the beginning there was no standardization, but with high fidelity albums came the need for standardization. The RIAA was formed to standardize the various hardware companies' and recording companies' curves.
They didn't start suing their customers until this century.
Parent
What Kills Me is... (Score:5, Insightful)
Money lost to piracy (Score:5, Insightful)
Why do people have to be so black-and-white on this issue? Pirates think everything should be free and argue like they're entitled to steal. Argue with them, and they point to illegal MediaSentry tactics and DRM as justification.
The truth is both sides are wrong. The MPAA, RIAA, ESA, etc. forge huge numbers of loss, not pointing to money that shifted to another market. Pirates aren't entitled to steal, but people who produce IP shouldn't be entitled to harass their customers either.
If you really want to solve the issue it is quite simple.
Put out a convenient product, instead of a DRM-ladened one, and people will but it. People will even accept DRM if it isn't too obnoxious. People are buying music and video legally over the internet. Digital distribution is the future and the big boys better embrace it rather than fight it.
Next, if you want to see were the real theft is, it isn't 12-year old girls downloading Rhianna albums, but rather rampant pirating in places like China and Russia, where pirates mass-produce your material and resell it illegally.
The US economy would be vastly better off if they received money from the IP they produced globally. The entire world watches our shows, movies, listens to our music, uses our software, plays our games, etc.
A real international force (unlike the UN) should be able to enforce sanctions against nations who do nothing to crack down on massive piracy. Allowing pirated DVDs to be sold on the street is not acceptable.
Next, consumers in China often have less money to spend than their US counterparts (though that may change) and they are used to cheap prices on pirate goods.
The MPAA should HIRE the guys doing the best bootleg releases over there to turn around quick, legal, localized releases and sell them cheap to compete with the pirate market.
The sad thing is that pirate releases are sometimes vastly more convenient, and better than commercial releases. Check out pirate Windows XP CDs loaded with new drivers, pre-loaded apps, simpler installers, etc.
200 billions? Is that in pre-WW2 deutschmark? (Score:4, Interesting)
On the other hand (Score:4, Funny)
How many lawyer jobs did it create? What about engineers working on DRM and other antipiracy methods? And the guys that make the trailers that say copying movies is stealing, etc, etc. Where would they all be without pirates?
They've done this before... (Score:4, Interesting)
It's been proven multiple times that if you look at actual downloads versus purchases, the loss is indistinguishable from 0. I see the value in having multiple studies for the same claim, but it does make it less interesting for the informed.
Also it's important to note that any figures from anti-piracy groups will have two assinine assumptions:
1) Every downloaded song WOULD have equaled one purchased CD. No one ever buys individual songs from the outlets available to them, and no one EVER EVER buys a CD and listens to more than one song. (I suppose there's some truth that most albums have at most one song worth listening to.)
2) Every single person that downloads songs WOULD have bought every song if it wasn't available for free. (Once again, greatly overestimating what their albums are worth.)
Two... Hundred... THOUSAND... Dollars... (Score:4, Funny)
#2: Uh, sir, I'm not sure that figure will quite do it...
Dr. Evil: Well, okay, then. Two... Hundred... MILLION... Dollars!
#2: Yes, but you see, that really not so much money anymore. Congress spent more than that on their new gymnasium...
Dr. Evil: Alright. Try this then: Two... Hundred... BILLION...
(#2 nods)
Dr. Evil: ...Dollars. Alright--let's contact the press...