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Tainted "Piracy" Statistics
newtley writes, "The music, movie, and software cartels claim 'piracy' is a Number One problem not only for themselves, but for the world as a whole and so successful are their continuing dis- and misinformation propaganda campaigns that they've been able to dragoon entire governments and police forces into acting as industry enforcers. But, says p2pnet, far from being at the top of the pile, movie and music piracy rank 16th and 20th, respectively, on a global index of illicit markets. (Software piracy ranks 7th.) And even those positions are subject to considerable doubt."
That list gives me even more reason to believe that society and the States that surround us are both inept. Look at the rundown of the top 10 items and the reasons why the item is "contraband."
1. Marijuana -- The State says what you can put into your body (doing no crime to no one else), probably funded by the big medical business
2. Counterfeit Technology Products -- This is why you shop at stores that guarantee their products with a refund. If there was no law against counterfeit goods, I'd let the retailer find out what is best for me. In some cases, something counterfeit might be of the same quality as the "official and legal" version. Look at Fendi handbags and their knock-offs
3. Cocaine -- See #1. No crime committed against anyone else. Now if you kill someone (when on drugs or off), I can agree that a crime is committed, but the intoxicant shouldn't matter. Sometimes that intoxicant is adrenaline.
4. Opion/Heroin -- See #1 (doing crime to no one else).
5. Pirated Web Videos. Supply and demand here. The supply of digitally transmitted products is nearly infinite, therefore the price falls to the floor. Then again, I am I am against copyright.
6. Counterfeit Pharmaceutical -- Here's another place that the retail and distributor can excel at. Don't trust your distributor? Shop at one that's insured and bonded against dispensing dangerous drugs, or knock-off ones.
7. Pirated Software. See #5 (supply and demand).
8. Human Trafficking. Here's a place I can understand goverment being involved in, but it is also one they're doing a terrible job in fighting. The worst concern is my thought that a lot of States might even be involved in this problem. I know the U.S. government trafficks in human lives and bodies. See Guantanemo Bay.
9. Amphetamines/Meth -- See #1 (doing crime to no one else).
10. Animals and Wildlife Smuggling. Here's a problem better solved through groups like PERC. If you care about rare animals, spend YOUR money to make wildlife habitats to keep them out of the open arms of the State that is part of the problem with extinction.
11. Ecstasy -- See #1 (doing crime to no one else).
12. Counterfeit Auto Parts -- See #2 (shop at trustworthy retailers if you're concerned).
13. Trash Smuggling. A friend of mine is a famous pastor in Uganda. I told him we should go into business to take trash from the U.S. on boats to Uganda and let people find value in the trash. He loved the idea. He deals with the absolute poorest people in Africa every day (I'm going there again in December) and he loves the thought that one man's trash is another man's treasure. They'd probably find millions of dollars worth of treasure in our trash.
14. Human Smuggling -- See #8 (State's failure).
15. Art and Antique Smuggling. I insure against theft, so should you. The State is worthless here.
16. Pirated Movies -- See #5 (supply and demand).
17. Smuggled Cigarettes -- Thank the market for cheaper tax free smokes. I noticed they were $7 a pack in Chicago a few weeks ago. Tax free they're about 70 cents. The State created this problem.
18. Gas and Oil Smuggling. See #17 on the State destroying the market of goods through taxation/theft.
19. Pirated Music -- See #5 (supply and demand).
20. Illegal Fishing -- See #10 (privately funded habitats).
22. Pirated Mobile Phone Entertainment -- See #5 (supply and demand).
23. Pirated Video Games -- See #5 (supply and demand).
24. Counterfeit Cigarettes -- See #17 (market provisions) and #2 (shop at trustworthy retailers if you're concerned).
25. Small Arms Trafficking -- See the second amendment.
27. Counterfeit Shoes -- See #2 (shop at trustworthy retailers if you're concerned).
28. Pirated Books -- See #5 (supply and demand).
29. Counterfeit Sports Memorabilia -- See #5 (supply and demand) and #2 (shop
Soon the people against the music and movie piracy will claim that the survey is flawed. it's the same thing that the Christian Scientists and similar do when presented with proof they're wrong.
Did anyone notice that Pirated Web Videos is #5? Web videos include stolen background music, and stolen movies and TV content. I don't see where the line is between Web Videos and other pirated content, and whether certain money counts towards two issues at the same time.
And organizing Illicit Markets by value is a bit tainted: money is not always correlated with prevalence. Just look at small groups of CEOs earning millions of dollars: overall, they're asmall minority.
No matter what the arguments are from either side, the bottom line is that piracy of copyrighted works is still wrong and shameful.
The fact is pirates are enjoying the fruits of someone else's labor without compensating them for the price they are charging. There is no way that the piracy apologists can get around it, so they resort so stuff like this, and downplay any statistics they don't like.
Wrong is wrong, even if this doesn't rank on the top of the list of evils in the world. Stop trying to justify this illegal activity.
The music companies that make billions off of work done by artists? They have a system set up so that they perpetually earn money off of something they never did. An example is the lawsuit against napster sooooo many years ago. The whole thing went to the labels, none went to the artists.
What a lot of people don't seem to realize is that the media industry is small potatoes. Seriously, look up some hard numbers aggregating the worldwide revenues and profits from music, movies, TV and video games and then compare them to the numbers from other industries. I did this a while back and found that any two of the biggest IT handful of IT companies exceeded the *entire* media industry. And IT is itself small potatoes compared to manufacturing, distribution, energy, agriculture etc. Any one of the major players in those real industries, the ones that actually make stuff, absolutely dwarfs the entire worldwide entertainment and media industry. Consider the fact that most of the music industry's US revenue is channeled through Wal-mart, and then consider what a tiny part of Wal-mart's business music is.
Even if media piracy were absolutely massive, the net effect on the US and world economies would be almost negligible. Piracy can't be a major problem because media isn't major.
But even though media is small potatoes financially, what they have is a direct line to the masses. Because communication is what they do, they have influence, and therefore power, that is orders of magnitude greater than their real economic importance.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
That bidnez would lie to try and make a buck...
Newsflash, business has long since departed the capitalism game and joined the "corrupt enterprise" market. Companies just feel "entitled" to make hand over fist of cash because clearly they're hip, happening, and all that jazz. Sales low? Must be piracy, because it can be in no way due to the COMPLETE AND UTTER LACK OF QUALITY OUTPUT. Or simply overpriced shit. I mean I like boxsets like the next guy, but honestly, a boxset of cartoons ain't worth 70$. Especially when I can score them off the net for 0$.
Combine quality with fair market valued prices and you will see a return of sales numbers.
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
Why is this news? I get the feeling when reading this someone just made up these facts. The sites they are posted on seem questionable at best. The first link proudly displayed an ad for file sharing programs. Just doesn't feel right to me.
Totally off topic but the new spell checker in Firefox rules!
K Man
"The music, movie, and software cartels claim 'piracy' is a Number One problem not only for themselves, but for the world as a whole"
Well, they obviously don't consider the other illicit markets a big problem.
But seriously. Look. Marijuana is top, followed by counterfeit technology... next two positions are drugs. Then web vids, more drugs, then comes pirated software. There's 2 more drug markets and 4 smuggling markets before you hit Movies.
"Women are just like ninjas; They lie even when it is more convenient to tell the truth." ~ Unknown
On the havocscope illicit markets list, Drug markets are measured alongside counterfeit products and pirated products.
The problem comes when figures for pirated & counterfeit products are from those industries, quotes of how much is lost... Now, somehow I doubt that the illicit marijuana industry value is based on how much that industry has lost. Considering that it is illegal in most countries.
So here we have two sets of figures - one which is basically "estimated loss on profit, based from industry" and the other is "estimated products sold".
Does anyone else see why this list isn't conclusive?
"Women are just like ninjas; They lie even when it is more convenient to tell the truth." ~ Unknown
I don't believe you truly understand the problems that counterfeit pharmaceuticals are causing - this goes far beyond some crook cheating a patient or someone sticking it to the 'rich pharmaceutical companies', but is a problem that creates disease pandemics and kills thousands.
To give you one example, counterfeit antimalarial drugs are a huge problem at the moment and are threatening the lives of hundreds of thousands in Southeast Asia and Africa. Often times the pharmacies themselves aren't aware that they're selling counterfeits - in fact the proliferation of counterfeits is so bad in some areas that a large pharmacy unknowingly sold 100,000 counterfeit antimalarials and in a separate incident the entire stock of one Burmese hospital was found to be counterfeit. Simply shopping at a distributor that's "insured and bonded against dispensing dangerous drugs, or knock-off ones" doesn't appear to be a realistic solution.
Simply testing whether the drug is a counterfeit is not necessarily a trustworthy precaution either. Due to the proliferation of counterfeit antimalarials, testing procedures were put into place. The counterfeiters got smart however, so they started to include low levels of the real drug in with their fakes. Now not only do we have drugs on the market that test as 'real' but don't provide enough of a dose to effectively treat patients, but these low levels of drug are rapidly creating drug-resistant malaria strains. Unless we're somehow able to stop this black market industry, soon we won't have any drugs left to treat malaria. How is this not murder of innocents for profit?
While you may think that stopping counterfeit pharmaceuticals is 'ridiculous' and that it's a 'non-violent', 'non-crime', I most certainly do not. It is ridiculous to think that the various States of the world are fighting these issues, most of them are non-crimes and in most cases not even violent crimes.
You don't seem to get the point. The MPAA was INTENDED as a lobbying party. Why would lobbyist be in southern CA? They obviously would want to be near the politicians. They may work for the movie studios, but their job is in DC.
You see, the people trafficking monkeys and smokes make enough money to pump into other economies, like cars, homes, dining, etc. So essentially, they're probably pumping a ton of money into other industries, providing jobs and money for others. It's a double edged sword, I guess, when it comes to morality. But then again, had my company stolen a couple copies of windows, cut down on "HNIC" lunches, and not outsourced half the workforce to a company in Ohio who didn't care about customer service, just the number of calls they were actually taking, then I'd still have a job. So honestly, since these people are providing money to other markets and supporting their fellow man by doing so, I'm not so sure I have a problem with all of this. I'd rather be employed by someone that pays well and cuts a few legal corners, then be unemployed by someone who paid too much for the unethical and wrong services.
Never monkey with another monkey's monkey.
Special interest groups make up statistics that support their position... news at 11.
Reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.
Dear governments of the world: We're concerned & we want to help you make the most out of your law enforcement dollar. We think we can help. Out of a list of 29 items, we the sane people of the planet will permit you to ignore the vast majority of these for the next few years -- 22 of them, in fact.
Furthermore, even though we're eliminating over 75% of the crimes on your action-item list, we are a generous bunch, so we'll only eliminate 50% of your budget. Given your newfound surplus (once you adjust, of course), we'd like you to apply the best possible strategy -- along with all of your remaining resources -- to making noteworthy progress against 7 high-priority items that actually impact citizens' lives on a day-to-day basis, in the order that they're listed below.
You'll notice we're taking a middle ground on the drug enforcement thing, putting some on the list & leaving others off. Well, that's what you get when you realize that the sane people of the world include liberals, conservatives, and libertarians. Our views may differ a bit on recreational chemical policy, so in this case we agreed to leave you to enforce the ones currently wreaking measurable societal damage, and let idiots do as they will on the rest. That list may change over the course of time.
# 8 - Human Trafficking
# 14 - Human Smuggling
# 25 - Small Arms Trafficking
# 9 - Amphetamines/Meth (we're really just sick of looking at ugly teeth)
# 6 - Counterfeit Pharmaceutical (I want my V!grr8 to do its job, dammit)
# 11 - Ecstasy
# 4 - Opium/Heroin
When these 7 are no longer a problem, please see us about permission to prosecute any of the others. We imagine that there will still be other, more pressing issues once you've solved the biggies above.
Pi Ran Out
Oh come on now. The writeup has the phrase: "dragoon entire governments and police forces into acting as industry enforcers". Copyright law has been around for a -LOT- longer than the .mp3 format. The MPAA has not dragooned entire governments. The governments are simply enforcing copyright laws. If a convenience store is robbed will we see a headline on slashdot about 7-11 dragooning entire city governments to go after the customers of 7-11? Are we suddenly opposed to all enforcement of laws on slashdot now or just copyright laws?
I remember when napster was the hot topic on slashdot and people ripped on the mpaa for going after napster when it was just a tool to search. "They should go after the individual violaters, napster isnt breaking the law!" was modded +5 again and again. Now a decade later the MPAA is doing just that, they are suing people who are violating copyright law. The old arguments were at least based off the idea that people shouldnt be allowed to break the law without fear of reprisal.
The MPAA has a right to expect that copyright laws be enforced as they are written.
If the media companies are confident of the value of their losses to piracy, why do they not report these losses to the IRS?
Is it not fraudulent to incur such huge losses and *not* report them?
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.