Illegal Film Downloading Up 33% In the UK

moderators_are_w*nke writes "The BBC have picked up a report from 'internet intelligence' company Envisional showing illegal film downloading is up 33% in the UK since 2006. The solution is apparently for content providers to 'compete with piracy and get their content out there themselves as easily and as quickly and as cheaply as possible.'"

Common Sense!

[Anonymous Coward]

It's about frikken time someone admitted that! I've been saying for years that I don't pirate stuff because it's free - I pirate stuff because it's the only way I can get the product that I want, without DRM and without archaic physical media, and that will actually work on my Linux HTPC.

The solution

[supertrinko]

Brilliant solution, If it's easier to get it legally, most would prefer it to illegal methods.

Re:Will never happen.

[ElectricTurtle]

Except that Steam is DRMed shit. If anything what is needed is a GOG or Amazon music or other DRM free thing for movies. If I buy something I don't want some random suit somewhere deciding I can't have it anymore and flipping a proverbial switch that invalidates my purchase.

My Impatience

[improfane]

I torrent but I am not a pirate.

How is this possible?

I recently felt like watching DS9 so I started torrenting a season of it. After watching an episode I proceeded to buy four box sets online.

I went back to watching my torrented versions. How convenient they are!

When they arrived, I deleted all the episodes I watched and started watching the DVDs from the boxset on TV.

Not only do I have Babylon 5 and SG, I have almost completed my DS9 series. They were all collected in the same fashion. Streaming or torrents first and then proper purchases.

Why the fuck would I buy something before knowing what it is like first?

And it's all coming down the same cable

[Rogerborg]

Dear Virgin Media. You (try to) charge me approximately £4-£5 for a 24 hour window of opportunity to stream a bunch of bits to the cable box over there. Or I can use the exact same cable to stream much the same bunch of bits to the network card and hard drive over here, and then I can decode them as many times as I like, indefinitely, at an extra cost of £0.

I'm not saying that I'd actually do either of these things, but you really aren't making it easy for me to pick the former.

Universal Pictures / Lovefilm dispute

[TheophileEscargot]

I wonder if the Universal Pictures / Lovefilm dispute [wikipedia.org] has had an impact. Since November 2009 Universal Pictures have refused to make their movies available to most online DVD-rental services. So you want to see one of their movies you have to pirate it, buy it, or switch to Blockbuster.

Please give us a legal download service.

[What the Frag]

I live in Germany and I admire many BBC productions. The problem is, after many years of the industry 'fighting piracy', they are still missing the obvious.

Yes, I consider myself a "TV show pirate". Why am I pirating? Let's say I want to watch the newest Doctor Who. There are a few ways to watch it:

- legally: Visit UK: Expensive.
- legally: Buy a huge satellite dish and watch/record it. Expensive and complicated, not possible anywhere.
- legally: Wait month for DVD.
- legally: Wait 5 years for any TV station to pick the show up again and show it in Germany with bad synchronization.
- somewhat legally: watch it on BBCs iplayer via Proxy: Complicated to set up, often slow
- probably illegally: download it from Filehoster/Newsgroup: easiest and cheapest, also fast.

So why am I pirating: I'm always picking the fastest, most comfortable and maybe the cheapest way. But I would pay for it, as I would pay for a filehoster or newsgroup provider.

BBC and others: If you want me to stop piracy, please make a platform that
- is available everywhere where I have internet access
- that provides TV shows or movies to an affordable price, with original audio
- that provides TV shows in decent quality (720p), unencrypted
- that provides TV shows immediately after being screened.

I will be your customer.

Envisional...

[Heed00]

It's not like this company has a vested interest in the numbers going up -- oh no of course not:

http://www.envisional.com/ [envisional.com]

Envisional’s business is built around unique, patented search technologies and a superb team of experienced analysts. We use this powerful combination to help corporations protect themselves and their customers from fraud, fakes, piracy and online brand abuse.

Re:My Impatience

[improfane]

I notice that the sources are from the RIAA.

They're known for falsifying published figures inside and outside of trials.

It holds very little weight. They have a vested interest to make it seem worse than it is. Provenance. If you search RIAA and misleading, you get lots of results.

Give me a university backed study, not backed by the RIAA and I might feel sympathy. In other news, the 20xxs are the year of the independent artist using the internet to distribute and market music and movies. Good news!