Has Any Creative Work Failed Because of Piracy?

Andorin writes "Anyone familiar with the piracy debate knows about the claims from organizations like the RIAA that piracy causes billions of dollars in damages and costs thousands of jobs. Other studies have concluded differently, ranging from finding practically no damages to a newer study that cites 'up to 20%' as a more accurate number (PDF). I figure there's got to be an easier way to do this, so here's my question: Does anyone know of any creative works that were provably a financial failure due to piracy? The emphasis on 'provably' is important, as some form of evidence is necessary. Accurately and precisely quantifying damages from p2p is impossibly hard, of course, but answering questions like this may lead us to a clearer picture of just how harmful file sharing really is. I would think that if piracy does cause some amount of substantial harm, we would see that fact reflected in our creative works, but I've never heard of a work that tanked because people shared it online."

Comments

Re:no

[bky1701]

"If you knew that you could get it legally, for free in a couple of years, (wait for it to come out on DVD... Wait till it is out on TV... etc arguments) would you be in such a rush to steal it?"

The only way you can steal a movie is to stick it under your shirt and walk out of Walmart with it. Copyright infringement is not theft in a legal OR moral sense. Don't call it that because you have been told "it's close enough" by people with horribly vested interests.