NZ Copyright Industry Claims New 'Three Strikes' Law Halved Movie Infringements After One Month: So What?

from the show-us-the-numbers dept

The implicit justification for various new copyright enforcement laws, such as the "three strikes" approach, is that they will encourage people to buy more authorized digital goods and thus support artists and their works. Naturally, those in favor of this logic like to produce figures that purport to show that it is working.

Here's another example, based on the claimed results from just one month's operation of a new three strikes law in New Zealand:

In a submission to a government review of the legislation's efficiency, NZ FACT [New Zealand Federation Against Copyright Theft] claimed New Zealanders illegally viewed movies in the top 200 online 110,000 times in August last year -- the month before the new law took effect -- but only 50,000 times in September.
Of course, those figures are unverified, and might well be wide of the mark – note that they were in a submission to a review by the New Zealand government, and not something released publicly. But even accepting them for the moment, it's significant that the same report on the Australian IT News site wrote:
Despite the drop in the first month, NZ FACT noted there had been no "discernible progress" since then.
So we have a drop followed by a plateau. The question is: what happens in the longer term? In Sweden, when the IPRED legislation against unauthorized file sharing was brought in, the Internet traffic for the country dropped by 30%, suggesting that the law had modified users' behaviors considerably. But eight months after that, traffic was back up to the original level, indicating that whatever users had stopped doing in the wake of the new law, they were doing it again -- something confirmed by more recent research. Similarly, an early report claimed that the French three strikes program had already resulted in increased digital sales -- except that was not the only possible explanation, as a previous Techdirt post explored.

This pervasive uncertainty means that one month's figures about supposed drops in unauthorized file sharing are really pretty meaningless. What we need to see is the long-term pattern. And more importantly, if there is indeed a significant, sustained fall in such sharing, we need to see an equally significant, sustained uplift in sales that correlates with that fall. Without that kind of positive effect, demonstrated with rigorous data, three strikes programs are little more than an exercise in vindictiveness.

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Filed Under: new zealand, sharing, three strikes


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  1. identicon
    F!, 27 Jul 2012 @ 2:56am

    The real question

    Did music sales double?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. identicon
    JC Cater, 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:00am

    Lolol, US supported propoganda, ignoring shift in downloading from p2p to usenet, vpn, seedboxes and lockers.

    No benefit to sales.

    Score one for copyright cartel.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
    identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:01am

    "Without that kind of positive effect, demonstrated with rigorous data, three strikes programs are little more than an exercise in vindictiveness."

    Ahh, so you think the movie and music industry should just bend over and take it in the ass until the die, right?

    You fully support people breaking the law?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:14am

    DETECTABLE traffic stopped.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  5. icon
    PaulT (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:16am

    Re:

    Ah, AC, where would be without your immediate distortions and lies? That's not what Glyn was saying, and you know it. try addressing what's actually being said, for a change.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  6. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:18am

    Re:

    Oooh. Looks like we have a fine specimen here today, folks. An AC who jumps to conclusions.

    Let us see how they act.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  7. identicon
    relghuar, 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:19am

    ...little more than an exercise in vindictiveness...

    Ummm, and that should bother entertainment industry because ... ?
    From their loud mouth-frothing cursing of anything "free" I was under impression that vindictiveness is one of their primary objectives?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  8. icon
    Titania Bonham-Smythe (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:26am

    "...we need to see an equally significant, sustained uplift in sales..."

    Every penny of which funds organisations that lobby for curtailments of our freedoms on the Internet.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  9. icon
    The eejit (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:26am

    Re:

    We'll have to see if there is a comparable increase in sales. I suspect that the answer will be...NO.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  10. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:27am

    Oh right, lets all just assume that every copyrightable thing is an automatic download shall we, just so we can say an "unpopular" idea works

    link to this | view in thread ]

  11. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:27am

    Re:

    And spends ridiculous amounts getting laws passed that cause more 'losses' than piracy!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  12. icon
    Dionaea (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:31am

    Re: ...little more than an exercise in vindictiveness...

    True, but it SHOULD bother the people living in these countries who get stuck with these utterly useless and vindictive programs because the retards in charge are being bought by the entertainment industry.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  13. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:34am

    How long before a law is passed forcing us to buy their goods, because piracy or no, i wont be lining the pockets of greed orientated companies, companies who wont think twice in accusing their consumers, potential or otherwise, as fucking criminals, for the heinous crime of, gasp, operating an electronic device, pushing buttons, and not least shaing 1s and 0s, oh the humanity

    link to this | view in thread ]

  14. identicon
    relghuar, 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:45am

    Re: Re: ...little more than an exercise in vindictiveness...

    Just a little detail about people - fact I basically hold for an axiom ;-) :
    People are idiots. The larger the group of people, the higher the average level of idiocy.

    Don't hold your breath about them being bothered by any such triffles, let alone going out of their way to do anything about it.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  15. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:52am

    Even if it's true, doesn't the 3 strikes law infringe on a human right according to UN?

    It's like saying having the police shoot suspects on sight has dropped crime rate by 50%. But shooting a "suspect" on sight is not exactly fair or just, is it? That's why we have trials to see if someone is innocent or guilty, and we don't have the police act as executioners.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  16. icon
    Blatant Coward (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:56am

    I would like to know if they are still monitoring the government offices as well since this is the same NZ that had a MP talk about how wonderful
    listening to a compilation made by a friend, a illegal compilation, to be sure, after passing their 3 strikes law.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  17. icon
    Ninja (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 4:16am

    Wait, I'm sure there is data showing that the movie and music industries are making trillions of dollars after France introduced the three strikes. I remember Australia alone lost its entire yearly GDP because of piracy. Every year.

    ... *facepalm*

    link to this | view in thread ]

  18. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 4:18am

    Re: Re:

    "We'll have to see if there is a comparable increase in sales. I suspect that the answer will be...NO."

    The problem is there is never going to be a direct, overnight shift. It's a question of time. If you turned off the internet completely tomorrow, there would still be a huge backlog of all the stuff people have downloaded and never watched / listened to. It might take weeks, months, or even years to get past that.

    It's a long term thing. Piracy didn't kill the music industry overnight, it took 10 years. Why would expect the reverse to have instant results?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  19. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 4:19am

    Claims is the key word here.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  20. icon
    Ninja (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 4:25am

    Re: Re: Re:

    Piracy didn't kill the music industry overnight, it took 10 years.

    Oh, I didn't know music was dead. I can help, I still have music in my HDD! Maybe we should sample them together so they can reproduce and stop being an extinct species?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  21. icon
    Berenerd (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 4:26am

    Re: The real question

    That is my question too. Honestly, I think the numbers are either farce or they simply stopped looking. There are new ways of pirating music and I am willing to bet that the traffic moved to a more secure method (harder to track) than it actually reducing.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  22. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 4:26am

    Re: Re: Re:

    "It's a long term thing. Piracy didn't kill the music industry overnight, it took 10 years."

    Even a moron in a hurry can tall that that is plainly false.

    The music industry is healthy. The gatekeepers, not so much.

    Just pull up any report on the money made worldwide by the music industry in the past century and you'll see what I am talking about.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  23. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 4:26am

    Re: Re: Re:

    "Piracy didn't kill the music industry"

    Fixed because the music industry is stronger than ever, douchenozzle.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  24. icon
    Ninja (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 4:28am

    Re:

    Ahh, so you think the movie and music industry should just bend over and take it in the ass until the die, right?

    It's not dieing.

    You fully support people breaking the law?

    Yes, if the law is draconian, not needed and out of touch with reality.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  25. icon
    Berenerd (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 4:31am

    Re: Re: Re: Re:

    Music isn't dead Unstealthy Ninja, the industry as it stands is falling and artists are moving to a more friendlier industry where they actually get to see the faces of their fans and see how their art and words touch them. The current industry frowns on happy fans often smacking them with the business end of a tour bus.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  26. icon
    PaulT (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 4:40am

    Re: Re: Re:

    "Piracy didn't kill the music industry"

    It's still alive, moron. Only the recording industry is struggling, and even they're having positive rebounds in places where they actually allow people to access the music they want rather than trying to restrict people. Digital sales are INCREASING in many place, just not quickly enough to repair the damage they already did to themselves over the last decade.

    Have the movie industry put legal alternatives in place and removed the windowing and other factors that drove people to piracy before they attacked it? No, I thought not, that's why this will fail to generate revenue. And no, I don't particularly want to wait another 10 years before you realise it's failed and you decide then might be a time to actually service customer demand.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  27. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 4:45am

    Re:

    We think they should adapt.

    You can't stop piracy. At least no more than you can stop a tidal wave or a nuclear blast. It is time we go over copyright and the business models that depend on it and try to adapt them to the new realities.

    You can't cling to the past forever. Very soon, computers will be able to interface directly with the brain. And then what will you do? What will you do when people can record music and video by merely watching/listening to it? When they can make "pirate" copies of a movie by simply going to the cinema?

    Think about that and you will soon reach the conclusion that copyright need to change, and quickly.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  28. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 4:52am

    Re: Re:

    "You can't stop piracy."

    Nobody is trying to STOP piracy, that would be foolish. The idea isn't to stop it, the idea is to make it unpalatable to those people who might take the risk instead of buying or obtaining the product through legal means. We won't stop most of the people here from pirating, as it isn't done with any reasonable risk/reward calculation, it's done out of spite. That's a different game.

    Piracy is no different from looters in a riot. As long as the riot is going on, the looters think they can get away with it, they face limited risk, and plenty of reward. Reign in the riot, and suddenly nobody wants to loot anymore.

    There will always be people who shoplift, there will always be people who steal, who sneak into the concert and who walk away with your drink in a bar when you aren't looking. You can't stop it all. But you can sure make it less desirable for the vast majority of people not interested in breaking the law.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  29. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 4:56am

    Re: Re:

    that is exactly what the mouthbreather is saying, until you provide "proof" that he excepts, it is just you going after peope for no reason

    murder and rape laws don't seem to work either little glyn, should we then get rid of murder and rape laws?? since according to you, they don't work and are just "an exercise in vindictiveness."

    right?? it is your logic...retard

    link to this | view in thread ]

  30. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 4:57am

    Re: Re: Re:

    *accepts, typo

    link to this | view in thread ]

  31. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:01am

    Re: Re: Re:

    Piracy is not stealing. Get with the program.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  32. identicon
    abc gum, 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:02am

    Re: Re: Re: ...little more than an exercise in vindictiveness...

    "People are idiots. The larger the group of people, the higher the average level of idiocy."

    I find your comment to be amusing. Do you consider yourself to be an idiot along with everyone else and if everyone is an idiot, then just what does the word mean?

    Based upon the premise that the term "idiot" refers to those who are below a certain level of intelligence and or ability to cope and this particular quality is measurable in relation to a reference point then how could it be that everyone falls into this category, and if this were the case then the term would have no meaning.

    In addition, intelligence levels amongst society are typically documented in percentages of the whole. Your statement about an increase in sample size resulting in a higher percentage of idiots is simply not going to happen. Possibly you were referring to "group think" and its affect upon large groups vs small.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  33. icon
    Planespotter (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:04am

    Re: Re: Re:

    Ahhhh... the old "lets just get rid of all laws because this particular law isn't embraced by a percentage of the population" routine! Wicked!

    Laws only work when the majority of the population support them and feel a benefit in having them, when that support drops to a significant level the laws become unworkable and eventually unenforcable... which is where we are heading with Copyright.

    Please do not conflate Rape/Murder with Copyright, it just makes youy look daft.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  34. icon
    PaulT (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:04am

    Re: Re: Re:

    "The idea isn't to stop it, the idea is to make it unpalatable to those people who might take the risk instead of buying or obtaining the product through legal means"

    Yet you often fail to provide those legal means, or provide them with unacceptable pricing, restrictions and other things that either block people from accessing the product legally or make it an unacceptable purchase.

    I wonder why you refuse to accept that problem and instead launch personal attacks on people?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  35. icon
    PaulT (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:06am

    Re: Re: Re:

    "little glyn"

    You realise I'm not Glyn, right?

    Why are you people so obsessed with hyperbole, anyway? Are you finding that your lies and distortions don't work when you address the actual arguments?

    "right?? it is your logic...retard"

    Sorry, I forget to add a lack of adult maturity to the list of your failings. I'll remember next time.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  36. icon
    Planespotter (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:09am

    Re: Re: Re:

    But But... after one month the NZ FACT team have proved beyond doubt that the 3 strikes law has HALVED copyright infringement in New Zealand!

    So which is it? Does it takes months even years or does it take just over 5 weeks to see if the "shift" is really happening?

    Maybe everyone downloaded more in August because they knew that in September their Government was going to try and prop up parts of the Entertainment Industries with daft laws that cannot be proven to benefit society as a whole?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  37. icon
    Planespotter (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:14am

    Re: Re:

    Ninja mate give up, if this moron had his way parts of the US would still have special seats on buses for people who just happened to have different colour skin!

    Mr Moron, Laws only work when the majority agree with them and see a benefit in them.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  38. icon
    The eejit (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:19am

    Re: Re: Re: Re: ...little more than an exercise in vindictiveness...

    Well, to be fair, you should have seen my 10-year reunion last week. The amount of idiocy was immense. And yes, I do count myself amongst those idiots.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  39. identicon
    abc gum, 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:36am

    Re: Re: Re:

    You might try addressing the issue(s) with facts and logic rather than bs and ad hominem.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  40. identicon
    abc gum, 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:38am

    Re: Re: Re:

    "Piracy is no different from looters in a riot. "

    Wrong.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  41. icon
    Tim Griffiths (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:41am

    Re: Re: Re:

    "The problem is there is never going to be a direct, overnight shift"

    According the industries there should be given that every download is a lost sale (the logic they use to base their damage claims on when suing people) then when there is one less download there should be automatically one more sale.

    Unless the industry wants to admit that "lost sale" means "lost feature sale" and since the future hasn't happened yet that makes it a "lost potential sale" and once we get them to admit that download only represent a sale in potential we can start having a grown up discussion about how much piracy actually hurts the industry... which is actually likely not all that much... at which point we can repel these kind of laws and the industry can take the time to deal with the real problems causing their lost sales i.e. them self's.

    If download in a month drop but sales do not go up then we have huge proof that downloads are not lost sales. What the industry forgets is that most people have a given budget for media, if some pirates more than that budget there comes a point at which their action of pirating does not actually hurt any one because it's not money they would have ever spent.

    Most serious pirates download more content than they could reasonably consume let alone pay and as such using "downloaded" numbers as some kind of measure of harm is idiotic.

    Just take Iphones, you can only pirate apps on jail broken phones which make up what? 20% of the market or there abouts and yet app devs will talk about HUGE piracy of their apps. Which is strange, if we say an app had a 90% piracy rate that rate can only become from 20% of the market and so rather than 90% of market for the app not buying it it can only be at most the same percentage as jail broken iphones.

    Given that there are a whole wealth of reasons for jailbraking your iphone rather than just pirating apps then we have to assume that not every jail broken phone belongs to a pirate. So the percentage of the market who pirate apps is less that 20%, maybe a lot less.

    What is happening here is that since pirates don't have to cearfully pick what they will and won't buy app wise due to budgets like normal consumers do. This means they consume VASTLY more than most none pirating consumers and so vastly inflates the rate of piracy.

    There is an assumption in the industry that a download count exists in isolation and is representative of a users buying habbits. And that is not only idiotic it makes them think the amount of the market they are actually having trouble with is vastly larger than it ever could be. Which leads to the them pushing of laws like this that are not only dangerous but which will never be as effective as they think they should have been.

    Even if a piracy law worked really well put a real long term dent in piracy the actual benefit to the industry (if there is one at all actually) will be so much less than they expect that the industry will presume the law is not doing enough and lobby for stricter laws that likely come at the expense of normal people.

    They are trying to legislate for a world that does not exist while doing massive damage to the one that does.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  42. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:42am

    The freetards from the MAFIAAtards just want to get things for free.

    The current low level of notices effectively rendered the law impotent, the group argued, as public fear of receiving a notice are minimal.


    They want to reduce the fee they have to pay to cover the costs of ISP for sending out the notices to pennies.

    NZ FACT said it had not sent out any infringement notices because of the fee, and called for the fee to be reduced to a few cents per notice.


    Note there that FACT send a grand total of zero notices and claims that piracy halved and now they need more to continue to address the "situation".

    Those people are full of shite.

    They never be happy until the whole world is censored and they can reach inside everybody's home to get them whenever they feel like it.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  43. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:48am

    Re:

    "Ahh, so you think the movie and music industry should just bend over and take it in the ass until the die, right?"

    No, boy, they should learn how to deliver the their product in a more profitable manner.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  44. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:48am

    Re: Re: Re: Re:

    "Ahhhh... the old "lets just get rid of all laws because this particular law isn't embraced by a percentage of the population" routine! Wicked!"

    Like Prohibition?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  45. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:51am

    Re: Re: Re:

    "It's a long term thing. Piracy didn't kill the music industry overnight, it took 10 years. Why would expect the reverse to have instant results?"

    For the same reason voters expect Obama to reverse 20 years + of cumulative bad fiscal decisions by Republicans in only 4 years?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  46. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 5:53am

    Re: Re: Re:

    "The idea isn't to stop it, the idea is to make it unpalatable to those people who might take the risk instead of buying or obtaining the product through legal means."

    In most cases, the so called "piracy" is of material NOT available thru "legal means".

    Make it available, and people will buy it!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  47. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:08am

    considering who released these figures makes me totally disbelieve them. those that are affected by the figures will put out the most self-serving ones. what is needed to make people consider for one second that there may be some truth in them is to have independent results published instead. on top of that, just because there is an apparent drop in 'piracy', it doesn't say anything about increases in other directions or that other means could have been utilised. add to that the leaked, confidential document by the RIAA concerning the most prolific way of sharing files andyou see what shit this report contains!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  48. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:15am

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    "where they actually get to see the faces of their fans and see how their art and words touch them - and to work mostly for free".

    FTFY.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  49. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:19am

    The Emperor's new clothes

    Be quiet!

    They think it's working.

    Don't tell them they're stupid. If they think they have won, maybe they won't try passing anymore dumb laws and the Emperor will be able enjoy his new clothes.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  50. icon
    Spike (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:23am

    Higher sales because of three strikes? LOL, I love it.

    Seriously, there is a category of pirates that don't buy anything period. If they cannot pirate it, they certainly wont go out and buy it either. These guys know how to do without if something isn't available for free, but chances are, it probably is available somewheres no matter what the laws are and they will find it. Nothing changes for these types.

    People that buy and pirate both (unsurprisingly this category makes up a high percentage simply because they cannot afford everything they wish to consume), may continue to buy stuff they really enjoy provided they aren't alienated by the industry. People do have fixed incomes, their rate of movie/music purchases most likely will remain static, and if they want to pirate something, as the above category, will find it no matter what the laws are.

    Three strikes regimes are just pissing taxpayer money away and possibly alienating people that already buy product from the movie/music industry. Do you think annoying your customers is good business sense?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  51. icon
    Chuck Norris' Enemy (deceased) (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:24am

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    If the first "F" stands for Failed then I accept the edit.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  52. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:27am

    NetFlix, Google Play Movies, Hulu Premium, and the high prevalence of streaming media available from TV Networks and Cable channels. That and the low quality and low character engagement levels of feature films. That had nothing to do with the drop.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  53. icon
    Chuck Norris' Enemy (deceased) (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:29am

    Re: Re: Re: Re:

    LOL. Yeah, Republicans are the problem! Democrats never had power in any of the branches of government for over twenty years. Try taking the partisan wool off your eyes and notice they ALL are the problem.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  54. icon
    Spike (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:29am

    Re:

    I must further add with the second category, these people, if they cannot pirate, will not increase their media consumption, they will do without and purchase as usual with what they can afford and enjoy it.

    However if they start getting threats in the mail for casually torrenting that new album, they might not want to support such an industry any further thats giving the threats, since these people already buy their product, yet are getting attacked. Don't bite the hand that feeds you.

    Duh. :-)

    link to this | view in thread ]

  55. icon
    Niall (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:29am

    Re: Re:

    What would be wrong with them having to take their own medicine, so happily doled out to the artists and the public?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  56. icon
    drew (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:30am

    Re: Re: Re:

    If the idea was to maximise sales rather than minimise copying you might meet with more success. Not only that, you'd be able to massively reduce your lobbying budget and hugely improve your public image.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  57. identicon
    JH, 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:36am

    Re: The real question

    I too was left wanting to know the sales numbers. I suspect the increase was negligible at best, and more likely non-existent (as most people reading this blog would expect). If it had been significant every copyright organization would be trumpeting it from the highest peaks right about now. The real question now is will other countries put similar laws into place when they've been proven not to work.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  58. icon
    Spike (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:36am

    Re: Re:

    http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2009/04/study-pirates-buy-tons-more-music-than-average-folks/

    The industry still refuses to believe it. See the CRIA (Music Canada) note in the bottom paragraph.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  59. icon
    drew (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:36am

    Re: The Emperor's new clothes

    Unfortunately it doesn't work like that. If they think they've won this step they move onto the next stage.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  60. identicon
    RD, 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:37am

    Re: Re: Re: Re:

    "For the same reason voters expected Obama to reverse 20 years + of cumulative bad fiscal decisions by Republicans by Inauguration Day."

    FTFY - since the public and Repubs gave President Obama about 15 minutes from when he was voted in before they started holding him responsible for the entirety of the economic troubles this country is in.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  61. icon
    Josh in CharlotteNC (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:45am

    Re: Re: Re:

    Nobody is trying to STOP piracy, that would be foolish. The idea isn't to stop it, the idea is to make it unpalatable to those people who might take the risk instead of buying or obtaining the product through legal means.

    If the idea is only to make piracy unpalatable, then offer quality content in a convenient manner for a reasonable price. You know, like we've been saying for years.

    If you don't offer services the customers want, even if you manage to decrease piracy, you will have a relapse because there are no alternatives.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  62. icon
    Ninja (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:50am

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    +1

    He clearly doesn't know how music is created outside the grasp of the labels.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  63. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:51am

    Re:

    So lets crackdown on the pirates and not improve service, not improve access methods and let the money of the people who are willing to buy but cannot due to windowed access-AKA regional limits-blow away in the wind, or go to the coffers of those that sell VPN bolt holes under the fences.

    Silly, get the low hanging fruit.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  64. identicon
    gnudist, 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:53am

    Re: Re: Re:

    The problem with trying to stop piracy is that it's a lot of work thet's to bring entirely uncertian gains.

    Everyone I know that pirates only does so when their entertainment budget runs dry.

    How many more sales would you even get from these people without piracy? Just how many of these make up the pirate population?

    I keep hearing studies on the amount of piracy but nothing real has been done by industry to see how it actually impacts them. They just assume one iilegal download = one sale they didn't get without even seeing if thet's the case or not.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  65. identicon
    Lord Binky, 27 Jul 2012 @ 6:55am

    Yay, the measured piracy drops and sales don't change significantly so the result was one or a combination of 1) People moved to unmeasured piracy methods 2) Pirating people paused (yay alliteration) to confirm they could circumvent being caught for a strike 3)The current television seasons finished right around the three strike law taking effect.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  66. icon
    Ninja (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 7:00am

    Re: Re: Re:

    Yeah. But it doesn't hurt to repeat the obvious. At some point it might get through the thick skulls.

    Also, it's dying, not dieing. =/

    link to this | view in thread ]

  67. icon
    Tim Griffiths (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 7:14am

    Re:

    What do laws exist to do and how do they ultimately posses authority and legitimacy? The public. A law is only law so long as the public as a whole support it. If the public as a whole no longer support a law then that law will (should) change through both direct action (either through civil disobedience or political engagement) and the results of public elections favouring those who hold the same views as the majority.

    Civil or gay rights are a very clear example of this fact. It's only a few years ago that the age of consent for sex between two men in the UK was lowered from 18 to 16 to match hetrosexual sex.

    The law was changed because our social attitude to homosexuality had changed. So a few days before this law changed and two young men under 18 had sex they would be breaking the law and yet there was enough support for their moral right to do so that a few days later that law was changed. So was it wrong for them to have sex?

    We are at the start of a fundamental change to our society brought about by the internet. There are going to be moral changes that place people in a situation where they are breaking the law while feeling like they are doing nothing wrong.

    Digital locks are already an example of this, you can legally copy a CD you own but it's illegal to break the DRM on the disk to do so. Most people will simply break the law because they feel they should be allowed to do so. What this should mean is that such still pointless laws that exist purely to give the legacy industry a veto on the adoption of a new technology will be revoked.

    Sadly our system is currently a mess and our laws far more often represent the views of a small number of business owners than the public at large.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  68. icon
    Ninja (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 7:16am

    Re: Re: Re:

    We won't stop most of the people here from pirating, as it isn't done with any reasonable risk/reward calculation, it's done out of spite. That's a different game.

    Then we agree that 1 download doesn't equal one lost sale, right? Because those ppl wouldn't buy anyway, right?

    the idea is to make it unpalatable to those people who might take the risk instead of buying or obtaining the product through legal means

    You do know that most ppl that download don't think they are doing anything wrong right? Also, you do realize ppl share offline, right? That they have done it for years now since the cassette, right? It takes a tiny bit of intelligence to notice you will not stop sharing. Ever. Every1 has that pirate friend that downloads the stuff for them and shares offline. For free.

    Also, just one hint for you: my budget for entertainment is fixed and limited. If I can't download I won't buy anyway. And that's universal.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  69. icon
    The eejit (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 8:09am

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    Pretty much. However, according to the GAO's stats on budgets, Republican Presidents have had a tendency to run larger deficits in the past 20 years (and some time before that.)

    link to this | view in thread ]

  70. identicon
    relghuar, 27 Jul 2012 @ 8:28am

    Re: Re: Re: Re: ...little more than an exercise in vindictiveness...

    Of course I count myself amongst the idiots - and quite publicly! If I got a penny each time I proclaimed (sometimes quite loudly) "I'm an idiot!", I could quit my job by now....
    As to the increase in sample size, I really love Pratchett, he has a knack to get the point right and simple ;-)
    "The IQ of a mob is the IQ of its dumbest member divided by the number of mobsters."
    Personally I think this is not limited to mobs, but applies just as well to almost any group of people.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  71. identicon
    JEDIDIAH, 27 Jul 2012 @ 9:16am

    The wolf, the lynx, and the lamb.

    You can alter the original comment to include both parties and it still comes out the same.

    It's hard to get to Washington and not be a pod person. It's a side effect of the selection process.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  72. identicon
    JEDIDIAH, 27 Jul 2012 @ 9:20am

    No magic money machine.

    > Nobody is trying to STOP piracy, that would be foolish. The idea isn't to stop it, the idea is to make it unpalatable

    You just contradicted yourself.

    I have no interest in living in a police state just so that you can satisfy your sense of artistic megalomania. This isn't even about revenue. It's about petty notions of control.

    The numbers in this article confirm it.

    "Stopping piracy" has nothing to do with increasing revenue in the content industries.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  73. identicon
    MrWilson, 27 Jul 2012 @ 9:57am

    Re: Re: Re:

    "OMG, my copyrights are being raped and murdered!"

    link to this | view in thread ]

  74. identicon
    gnudist, 27 Jul 2012 @ 10:32am

    Re:

    "The freetards from the MAFIAAtards"

    Owww, that makes my head hurt. Why not just "the freetards from the MAFIAA"?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  75. icon
    Hephaestus (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 11:08am

    Re: Re: Re: Re:

    "Unless the industry wants to admit that "lost sale" means "lost feature sale" and since the future hasn't happened yet that makes it a "lost potential sale" and once we get them to admit that download only represent a sale in potential we can start having a grown up discussion"

    Nice logic!!!!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  76. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 11:16am

    Re:

    "Without that kind of positive effect, demonstrated with rigorous data, three strikes programs are little more than an exercise in vindictiveness."

    Ahh, so you think the movie and music industry should just bend over and take it in the ass until the die, right?

    You fully support people breaking the law?


    Yes, that's exactly what he advocates.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  77. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 11:41am

    With all the negative publicity it's earned, the copywrong industry needs to die. Couldn't happen to more well deserved folk.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  78. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jul 2012 @ 12:02pm

    Re:

    "Ahh, so you think the movie and music industry should just bend over and take it in the ass until the die, right?"

    Oh wow! No wonder you're so against piracy, you have it confused with anal rape.

    You're going to be so happy from now on!
    They aren't even remotely similar.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  79. icon
    Get off my cyber-lawn! (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 12:36pm

    Why do they always MEASURE THE WRONG THING?

    Declaring that passing a law and reducing "pirate" activities improves the sales of the industry is akin to declaring that passing a law and reducing pre-marital sex improves the fertility rate of married women!

    Apples & Oranges....fruit salad anyone?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  80. icon
    Divide by Zero (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 2:51pm

    Most people I know either held off for a month or so, or just straight away switched to various proxies, VPNs and seedboxes. What really pisses me off about the whole law is the presumption of guilt, and the blatant give us free stuff from the entertainment industries. For a changeI'm feeling pro Telecom, purely because they want the cost to send an infringement notice put up to $104.

    Also, NZFACT can suck a dick for having the most misleading name of all time.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  81. icon
    John Fenderson (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:53pm

    Ends don't justify the means

    Even if three strikes completely eliminated piracy, it's still immoral as long as a "strike" consists of nothing more than an accusation.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  82. icon
    John Fenderson (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 3:55pm

    Re:

    Ahh, so you think the movie and music industry should just bend over and take it in the ass until the die, right?


    At this point, yes. It seems to be the only way to save society from them.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  83. identicon
    F!, 27 Jul 2012 @ 11:52pm

    Re:

    DETECTABLE traffic stopped.


    Bingo. All the 'three strikes law' has done is move half the 'infringers' to more secure methods. Without matching sales figures showing growth in sales, the numbers are meaningless. I'd even bet 'piracy' has increased because there have been alot of folks holding back because they didn't want to get caught, all the 'three strikes law' has done is effectively make it easier because information on how to 'pirate' securely is more widely available.

    Either that, or everyone's finally cottoned on to the fact that hollywood produces nothing but utter dreck.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  84. icon
    PaulT (profile), 27 Jul 2012 @ 11:55pm

    Re: Re:

    "Yes, that's exactly what he advocates."

    Does anybody have a drooling-moron-to-English dictionary handy? I'm trying to work out how he can still be reading the same words as everybody else and come to the exact opposite meaning of them.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  85. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 28 Jul 2012 @ 5:41pm

    Re: Re:

    Because they're twice as bad.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  86. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 29 Jul 2012 @ 12:28pm

    Re: Re: Re:

    We gots ourselves a double baby!

    link to this | view in thread ]


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