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Archive for February, 2011

What Do We Really Know About Piracy?

February 10th, 2011 No comments

Despite years of debates over the morality, prevalence and impact of mass online copyright infringement, actual hard numbers, backed by statistically rigorous methods, are almost impossible to find.  Most of what passes as “knowledge” about piracy is based far more on pre-conceived notions and anecdotal evidence.  And that really should not surprise, since the fundamental questions about file-sharing generally have less to do with what has happened and more to do with what might have happened.  That is, what purchases did not occur because of the existence of free alternatives, what sales did not take place if the pirate networks had not made sharing so easy. Speculative counter-factuals are really all we are left with, and such questions can never be answered with any sort of definitive confidence.

Nonetheless, researchers continue to put forth new studies of the file-sharing phenomenon and its possible effects, at least in limited test cases. The latest study to emerge comes from Japan and looks at one particular niche, Japanese TV animation programs.  By examining how the uploading of the shows to YouTube and the popular Japanese sharing network Winny affected both sales and rentals, the researchers from The Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI) in Tokyo came to some tentative conclusions,

Estimated equations of 105 anime episodes show that (1) Youtube viewing does not negatively affect DVD rentals, and it appears to help raise DVD sales; and (2) although Winny file sharing negatively affects DVD rentals, it does not affect DVD sales. … YouTube can be interpreted as a promotion tool for DVD sales.

A clear statement in favor of broadening distribution channels and moving away from prosecuting file-sharers?  Maybe, but as with any study of piracy, the questions raised end up overwhelming any attempt at generalization.  Aside from the difficulty in linking statistical correlation with causation, we have no way of knowing how specific the dynamic the researchers see in this instance can be observed elsewhere.  Do anime fans act differently than general TV or movie fans?  Do Japanese fans act the same way as American or European fans?  Are only specific kinds of anime or could it be applied to animation in general?  And more broadly speaking, how does this kind of unauthorized distribution affect other forms of media, from music to movies to comic books?

Ultimately, it seems to me, that no matter how rigorous and scientific any individual study about piracy may be, there will always exist far more questions and caveats than conclusions reached.  Because so much is not, and cannot, be known about what might have happened had there not been any infringement, making generalizations both for or against piracy are more faith-based than anything else.  The morality and ethics of file-sharing will continue to spark intense debates, but claims about its concrete indisputable effects should probably be taken with a rather large grain of salt.

Categories: comics, General P2P, Uncategorized Tags: , , , , , , ,

Words Not Actions

February 4th, 2011 No comments

When analyzing the anti-infringement activities of the content owning industries (RIAA, MPAA, etc.) it is often far more interesting to focus on the results of what they do, rather than the rhetoric they employ.  While Hollywood executives love to harshly criticize unauthorized distribution of their movies, very frequently they do things that in fact contribute to such activity, as I have outlined previously.  The well-publicized recent campaign by US authorities to seize the domain names of suspected infringing sites, pushed vigorously by the content owners, neatly presents a case where words and actions are deeply contradictory.

As nearly every analysis of the recent ICE action has noted, by seizing the US registered domain names of foreign-owned and operated sites, the authorities have propelled the sites to set up on domains not under US control, and to do so within days, if not hours, of the seizures.  Rojadirecta quickly went from a .com to an .es address and atdhe.net very rapidly became atdhe.me, with all the same streams and functionality.  It would appear that aside from a very momentary interruption, the practical effect of the seizures will be negligible, except to make any future actions by rights holders that much more difficult, since the targeted sites will be farther from US jurisdiction.

Additionally, and even more importantly, the recent ICE domain seizures that focused on sports streaming sites has had, and will continue to have, the effect of generating more publicity for this kind of infringing.  Consistent with the concept of the “Streisand Effect,” attempts to suppress troublesome information online result invariably in that information becoming even more widely distributed.  While impossible to quantify with any certainty, the seizures by ICE surely increased awareness of the existence of rojadirecta and atdhe, and even more, of the ease in which viewers can access live streaming of sporting events online.  As we so often see in articles about “cord-cutting,” or dropping cable in favor of purely internet video delivery, many people are stymied by the lack of live sports online, yet now, because of the actions of ICE, millions more viewers have just been instructed that it is actually quite simple to get live footage of every soccer match or football game.

It defies logic to think that the seizures could have had any other outcome.  Yet the major content owners and their representatives in government continue to pursue strategies that inevitably result in more of the infringement they so assiduously decry.  Is it incompetence or something else that drives such misguided actions, because from an outside observer it is hard to reconcile what they say with what they do.

Categories: General P2P, General tech Tags: