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DigitalXeron
There is a lack of sanity
join:2003-12-17
Hamilton, ON

DigitalXeron to Paul416

Member

to Paul416

Re: Pirates crap

The spurring behind "piracy" (which word's origination implies that music stores have been raided and money stolen out of the register and shelves looted, which isn't the case — but no other label has as sufficient implications behind it without outright calling people criminals) comes down to access.

The issue is that rather than looking to review the market to see what is happening, the content industry is largely just glancing at the big picture and jumping to conclusions simply because people are acquiring a copy of the product for free.

For instance, if you purchased a car and reverse engineered it, then made the parts yourself for another of the exact same then gave the copy car away, would that be pirating a car because you deprived the auto industry money?

But I digress, "piracy" comes down to access, people are finding the current model of content distribution to be too full of red tape and restrictions that in fact downloading/copying content proves to be more effective than to purchase the content. Among the restrictions?...

Geographic licensing - Often times content will be licensed by the jurisdiction simply because of differences in copyright law, look at hulu and how it is only accessible in the US.

Regional restrictions - Most DVDs for instance have a region flag set on the discs, which means you can only play it in one region or another, so you can't purchase a foreign version which may be cheaper.

Tariffs/Law - Often times if you want foreign content you either have to pay highly for it, or in some cases even it is prohibited through customs unless you purchase it through a highly expensive supplier or pay exorbitant tariffs.

Account required distributors - Many online suppliers of content require you to register an account to purchase content, the process of this is a hassle to do in many cases as some suppliers even want you to "tie" a credit card to your account permanently.

Programs to purchase content needed - Case-in-point: iTunes. Some services require that you download and install a program in order to begin purchasing content, this can deter some potential customers who just want content, not an entire program or service tied to it.

Limited Releases - Limited releases are often more harmful than they are good. It creates an artificial scarcity that ultimately leads to customers wanting a copy of content being turned away because all of the copies have already been sold.

Limited Selections and Flooded markets - Many times licensed distribution channels will have all the popular content and often be saturated by it to the point the range of available content will be restricted to what popular culture dictates. This results in content not seen as part of popular culture becoming unavailable for purchase quickly (say pop culture items being available for months in stores while non-pop culture stuff being available for a week or two).

The overall problem is that there is a high amount of red tape between the content industry and customers' money, and then the content industry complains when people "pirate" content instead of paying for it. In reality, people are largely just seeking content and will obtain it with the most available means necessary. The current markets do not facilitate ease of purchase beyond the pop culture items. Why this is the case is an exercise for the reader.

The solution is easy: For the content industry to instead of lobbying for copyright reform, to lobby for tariff reform and import law changes as well as to require the distribution channels to provide "open purchase" methods of online payment for content (e.g. programs optional, accounts optional). Further a part of the solution is to require distribution channels to have more diversity available in the selections and to ensure that diversity is achieved by providing sufficient product. The final part would be the hardest: To remove the geographic licensing/marketing model.