Nigerian Government Says Country Needs More Jail Time For Pirates And Control Over Content Of Creative Works

from the stupid-useful-pirates dept

The operating theory of incumbent industries is that piracy kills creativity. Try telling that to Nigeria.

From 2010:

The Economist has an article looking much more closely at the Nigerian movie industry, known as Nollywood, which produces an astounding 50 new movies every week. Now, some will immediately point out -- correctly -- that these are much lower budget than our traditional Hollywood picture, but apparently, many of the movies have pretty good plots and acting -- and they seem to be doing pretty well across all of Africa (not just Nigeria). In fact, the report notes that the infringement may be a big part of why Nigerian films are so successful:

"The merchants curse the pirates, but in a way they are a blessing. Pirate gangs were probably Nollywood's first exporters. They knew how to cross tricky borders and distribute goods across a disparate continent where vast tracts of land are inaccessible. Sometimes they filled empty bags with films when returning from an arms delivery. Often they used films to bribe bored guards at remote borders. The pirates created the pan-African market Mr Akudinobi now feeds."

2012:

Prior to the proliferation of Nollywood films, at least one commentator suggested that government takeover of the film industry would be the only means by which Nigeria could develop a film industry.

Notably, although many countries have sought to incentivize particular types of film production through direct government funding, subsidies, or film protection schemas involving film quotas, many of these industries have not been commercially viable in the absence of subsidies or other support schemes. In contrast, Nollywood has created significant volume of local video film content with virtually no government involvement or subsidies. The success of Nollywood may in many respects be attributable to a lack of government involvement and its decentralized nature, which has permitted Nollywood participants to be highly entrepreneurial, adaptive and innovative. Nollywood now may employ as many as 200,000 people directly with estimates of indirect employment as high as 1 million. The market-driven Nollywood approach is less costly than existing models of film production and distribution and may offer a new model for developing countries that wish to develop domestic film industries.

Years of history suggest rampant piracy is directly linked to the rise of the Nigerian film industry, a.k.a. "Nollywood." It's now 2016 and government officials and anti-piracy task force heads are still trying to deliver the same "piracy is killing the Nigerian film industry" arguments.

In Nigeria today, piracy hits all sectors of copyright industry, but the worst hit is the entertainment industry, hence one of the greatest challenges facing the Nigerian entertainment industry is piracy, which has robbed the industry of billions of naira (Nwogu 2014). Kanayo (2013) as cited in Alakam (2014) is agitated by the fact that pirates are feeding fat literarily and figuratively on creative works at the expense of the proposed beneficiaries of the work.

The government has wormed its way deep into intellectual property protections, despite having nearly nothing to do with the rise of Nollywood. This isn't a good thing. In the hands of the Nigerian government, the production of creative works is somehow tied to national security.

To show his support for the fight against piracy in Nigeria at the 28th annual international conference of the Society of Nigeria Theatre Artists (SONTA), held in collaboration with the National Institute for Cultural Orientation (NICO), with the theme ‘Repositioning Nollywood for the Promotion of Nigeria’s Cultural Diplomacy & National Security,’ designed to explore the linkages between Nollywood and cultural diplomacy as a tool for addressing the current security challenges, President Muhammadu Buhari vowed to clampdown on piracy in Nollywood industry by empowering relevant agencies, even as he described it as an albatross to both practitioners and government.

The language barrier makes a mess of the metaphors, but it's likely President Buhari is calling piracy an "albatross," rather than the "clampdown." Either way, he has -- along with the country's "Cultural Orientation" agency -- connected piracy to "security challenges." Worse, the government thinks it should be in the business of policing the creative works themselves.

Buhari regretted that excessive exposure to foreign films have led to moral decadence and the erosion of cultural values, especially among the youths, and expressed optimism that through the industry these lost cultural values would be restored.

So, not only does the government want to prop up the major players in the industry (who produce the smallest percentage of creative works), but it wants to make sure anything created lines up with its perception of itself. With this, Buhari can add censorship to the government's anti-piracy efforts.

As for the efforts themselves, they appear to be limited to the stuff that hasn't worked previously, but harder.

The minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed described piracy as a ”monstrous disincentive” to the movie industry and indeed the entire arts and entertainment industry, suggesting that a longer jail term with no option of fine for convicted offenders and the establishment of a dedicated national task force on piracy could help curb the scourge.

That should make people "respect" copyright more. Put 'em in jail for violating ethereal rights. Or for contributing to terrorism. Or for making the government look bad. It's all pretty much interchangeable as far as the government -- and the backers of the government's plan -- are concerned. Stiffer penalties have done little to curb piracy elsewhere in the world and are frequently a PR nightmare when imposed. Piracy spread Nollywood's influence throughout the world and allowed its films to be viewed by residents of other repressive nations whose governments have maintained local control of creative content.

The minority represented here is hoping to control not only the distribution, but the content, of future creative works. Piracy may be the talking point, but government expansion and increased protectionism are the ultimate goals.

Filed Under: copyright, infringement, nigeria, nollywood

How Piracy Created The Massive Movie Industry Success Of Nollywood

from the and-what's-happening-now dept

We've written in the past about how the three largest movie producing countries in the world are Nigeria, India and China -- despite the fact that all three have extremely high rates of infringement. It seemed to offer the perfect counterpoint to the insistence from the MPAA that high piracy rates automatically lead to the destruction of any form of movie industry. In fact, further research showed that the amount of piracy in Nigeria actually was a big part of the reason why Nollywood has been so successful. The ability to let "pirates" distribute their films in the most efficient way possible meant that the movies were distributed far and wide across Africa and established Nigeria as the place to go for movie making.

Of course, as we've seen through the history of the development of various industries, it's always after those industries are created and growing rapidly that the existing players suddenly want to ramp up intellectual property laws to stomp out new competition. This is true throughout pretty much the entire history of intellectual property law, and it shows that such laws are not -- as we're told -- about creating incentives to invest in these industries, but rather about keeping out the competition and setting up gatekeepers to lock things down for established players. The same thing is happening in Nigeria as well, as there have been new efforts to crack down on infringement, despite it being so central to the importance of the rise of the industry.

While we've covered all this before, Eric Crampton points our attention to a new research paper that digs even deeper into this story: The Rise of Nollywood: Creators, Entrepreneurs, and Pirates by Olufunmilayo Arewa. It covers much of the same ground as our previous reports, first noting the usefulness of infringement in establishing the industry -- which appears to employ more people than Hollywood. In fact, what's amazing is that while many developing nations focus on government subsidies, insisting that that's the only way to build a local film industry, there's almost no government support in Nigeria, yet the industry is significantly bigger than comparable countries:

The rise of the film sector in Nigeria runs counter to existing trends in the film sector in which developing countries, which produce 1.2 films per million inhabitant annually, lag developed countries, which produce 6.3 films per million inhabitants annually. At current Nollywood production levels, Nigeria produces approximately 6.7 films per million inhabitants annually. Bridging the developing country film production gap remains challenging, particularly because the optimal ways to create domestic film industries remain elusive in many instances. Prior to the proliferation of Nollywood films, at least one commentator suggested that government takeover of the film industry would be the only means by which Nigeria could develop a film industry.

Notably, although many countries have sought to incentivize particular types of film production through direct government funding, subsidies, or film protection schemas involving film quotas, many of these industries have not been commercially viable in the absence of subsidies or other support schemes. In contrast, Nollywood has created significant volume of local video film content with virtually no government involvement or subsidies. The success of Nollywood may in many respects be attributable to a lack of government involvement and its decentralized nature, which has permitted Nollywood participants to be highly entrepreneurial, adaptive and innovative. Nollywood now may employ as many as 200,000 people directly with estimates of indirect employment as high as 1 million. The market-driven Nollywood approach is less costly than existing models of film production and distribution and may offer a new model for developing countries that wish to develop domestic film industries.

In fact, part of that "market-driven" approach is to figure out ways to embrace and leverage widespread infringement. That helped set up rapid and inexpensive (to free) distribution and promotion of new films. It has also continued to drive interest in new films, as people want to keep seeing more, helping to keep the industry going.

That said, the report also talks about the new efforts to crack down on infringement, but notes that this might not make much sense. It notes, correctly, that "the battle to control piracy will not be an easy one," and that such an effort to ratchet up pricing may be futile. Instead, it suggests taking a more proactive approach to providing better services and to looking at better ways to monetize the movies -- including things like advertisements and product placement.

Discussions of the piracy problem in Nollywood are based upon goals for control of distribution that may simply not be viable for Nollywood given current institutional structures and manners of doing business. In addition to dealing with piracy and issues of control of distribution, Nollywood participants should undertake focused strategies to address varied business and legal impediments. The development course of Nollywood, which in fact increasingly moving to digital distribution outside of Africa, and events in other arenas, suggest that the battle to control piracy will not be an easy one. Further, to the extent that webs of unauthorized uses enmesh consumers and end users, seeking to impose desired pricing in the face of rampant unauthorized distribution, or even the possibility of such distribution, may be futile, particularly given broad nature of Nollywood distribution networks. This ultimately may mean that price reductions may be one way to deal with problems of piracy, particularly to the extent that Nollywood participants can effectively harness other sources of value. Nollywood participants thus far have focused to a significant extent on the value of Nollywood content, which may obscure other potential sources of value to Nollywood participants. For example, the network of viewers reached by Nollywood films may be valuable to advertisers and others who may be willing to pay to have access to such viewers. The value of these Nollywood networks may actually be far greater than the value of the content itself.

The report also notes that "Discussions about the future of Nollywood should seek to move beyond discussions of copyright and piracy to fundamental reconsideration of a broader range of business and legal issues." I'd argue that applies to nearly all copyright discussions. Not just those in Nollywood.

Filed Under: movies, nigeria, nollywood, piracy

Nigerians Looking To Crack Down On Movie Piracy, Despite Thriving Nollywood Movie Industry

from the missing-the-point dept

One thing that's common as you look through the history of intellectual property law is how stronger IP laws almost inevitably lag increases in creative or inventive output. Of course, this flies in the face of everything that we're told about intellectual property law, about how it's necessary to incentivize such creativity or inventiveness. In fact, if that were the case, we wouldn't see such creativity showing up in places with very lax or non-existent laws. And yet, time and time again we do. For example, we've highlighted how the movie industries in Nigeria, China and India are thriving, despite very lax laws and enforcement. In fact, with Nigeria, we've discussed how widespread "piracy" was a large part of what helped "Nollywood" succeed.

So what's happening now? Once again, after this explosive outgrowth in creativity, then people look to put in place these laws. Loricnet points us to the news that in Lagos, Nigeria, officials have been looking at technological solutions to "deal with" the issue of infringement. Officials are reviewing five separate technologies, and the "winner" will be rolled out for use by city officials. At least some of the solutions on the "short list" appear to be focused on providing new business models and greater sharing, rather than using technology to "block" certain activities, but some of them appear to be the same old DRM.

I'm not sure why politicians are getting involved here, but it really does highlight how, once again, intellectual property law is not about incentivizing creation (that already happened without it), but rather about protectionism for those already there. It's the same thing we've seen in the past. After there's an outburst of creativity, those who were there first don't want new competitors, and they run to the government for greater protectionism against competition, and the preferred tools: greater IP laws and greater IP enforcement. Sad to see the same thing happening yet again.

Filed Under: drm, movies, nigeria, nollywood, piracy