MPAA Actually Admits That Some Of Its Piracy Stats Are Bogus
from the not-going-far-enough dept
For years, we've pointed to the bogus stats claimed by the MPAA concerning what kind of impact "piracy" is having. The stats incorrectly count "ripple effects" in a rather troubling manner. First, they only look at the ripple effects in one direction (those that hurt the movie studios). They don't bother to count ripple effects that go the other way (such as cheaper movies for everyone, allowing them to spend more money elsewhere, helping the economy). More importantly, though, using ripple effects is merely double, triple or quadruple-counting the actual losses, as Tim Lee brilliantly explained. Of course, that hasn't stopped reporters from citing these bogus stats as fact or politicians from using those stats to justify ridiculously awful legislation. Given all that, it's rather shocking to hear the MPAA finally admit that the stats in a recent report are bogus -- but only one specific number. Apparently, via some unexplained "human error," an MPAA study reported that 44% of "losses" due to piracy came from college campuses -- which explains the recent efforts to get new legislation forcing colleges to filter internet connections. However, the MPAA is now admitting that the real number is actually just 15%. The MPAA insists all the other numbers are perfectly fine, but didn't bother to address all of the criticisms of the methodology. This likely means that the mistake made here was so egregious that even the MPAA couldn't wait for the new legislation to pass before admitting the error. That alone, is fairly surprising. Hopefully, though, this will start convincing the press and politicians to be at least a little skeptical of numbers coming from biased industry associations.Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: bogus stats, mpaa
Companies: mpaa
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
hopefully...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: hopefully...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: hopefully...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Future Legislation
The best possible outcome here would be to have an outside PROFESSIONAL contractor, that isn't being bribed, just to be absolutely sure we can really trust the rest of their numbers. It would be very interesting to see how the numbers would come out with a 3rd party investigation.
This also means that some of their court arguments may get a bit complicated as a nice side effect.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Say it ain't so...
Wow, deja vu! I knew I had already commented on this article... lol techdirt.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Say it ain't so...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Say it ain't so...
Come to think of it, the comment section could use a funky feature like that.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Say it ain't so...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
The future of Digital data ...
Hell, I bet over half of American society doesn't even know or even care that MS Windows Vista has DRM built right into it. The MPAA are lil cry babies that never figured in the (positive) ripple affect because it wouldn't show a substantial enough loss (if any). If they don't talk about the ripple effect for the good and only focus on the bad ripple effect, of course the losses look catastrophic, but given the entire picture, you will find that the MPAA is just there to fill their pockets ...
I wish American society would smarten the hell up ... that's not going to happen though, just look at society ... sigh, No, I'm not happy with the way that American society has ... ok, that's for another story ...
*Steps off soapbox*
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
hmm
What's really absurd is calling 100% of college piracy "losses". There's no way poor college kids are actually going to buy that much music, even if piracy wasn't an option, so the actual loss is much less than stated, even if the numbers aren't cooked, which they probably are.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Based on a lot of comments here, I would say so. I mean, what real damage do you do compared to their overall profit?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Copyright is not theft
Digital music is a non-scarce good
There isn't even a shelving space issue.
(insert standard MPAA is wrong argument here)
Who said here that they want to download their stuff for free? It just sounds to me like these people are sick of the MPAA's crap.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
human error
Never buy another DVD until they get their sh*t straight.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: human error
You know, because Doug Morris makes up figures by the amount of paper cuts he can fit between an employee's toes, and he drinks a lot of coffee and never has to go the bathroom. Ever.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]