Tired of waiting for that US Box office hit to hit your local theatre? Why not..

In light of the previous post (see below) where I remarked on many of the readers of musicpiracyresearchblog being unable to access the articles cited previously, it's time to take a dive into movie piracy. Why? You can access a full article on movie piracy here.

Discussed elsewhere, the paper by Danaher and Waldfogel explains how they successfully employed a statistical analysis of primary data on Box office returns to demonstrate that the staggered release strategy employed by the movie industry (where Hollywood movies are typically released in USA first) encourages illegal downloading.

The paper explains three principal reasons why this approach is adopted, where elsewhere George Lucas has went on record to explain that simultaneously releasing films in cinemas and to buy on DVD/Blu-Ray would satisfy different audiences.

The focus of this blog is of course music piracy, where it is the industry which is thought to be affected the most - a likely bi-product of the much smaller file sizes of individual songs as compared to movies. Much can be learned from related research on movie piracy, however.

In this particular instance, it is also learned that movies in the action and sci-fi genre are over-represented in pirate form, where an assumption flowing on from here would be that such genres are enjoyed more by males. This would fit with research on piracy overall, which suggests young males to be the principal advocates of piracy.

Do you think it's time to abandon this staggered approach to releasing films?

Also, while we are on the subject of movie piracy, find below a TED Talk presentation (mentioned in the last post) about 'copyright math' which expresses the difficulties in measuring economic losses through piracy.

Twitter feed now live @musicpiracyblog with daily updates.

References

Article cited above is a working paper at time of blog post. Both authors have personal web pages, where it is encouraged you contact them ahead of any formal citations of their research.

Advice on accessing articles

Starting to receive emails now with many readers unable to access some of the journal articles cited on this blog. Please note, I am unable to forward specific articles to you. Articles can be bought individually.
I have decided in light of this flurry of emails to go into more detail on some future blog entries. Look out for 'In depth' in the titles for future entries where I will explain more comprehensively the methodologies and materials used in select studies.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/ is a great website which does a far better job at summarising scientific articles, where sadly, there isn't much on there in the way of music piracy research aside from this excellent article which demonstrates how the removal of DRM restrictions may reduce piracy. This sort of research would fall under the previously mentioned broad area that is 'deterrents' which will be considered in future blog posts.

Also, please see http://www.ted.com/ which presents excellent presentations by researchers and public figures (freely available to the public) including a recent addition where the concept of copyright math is proposed. It highlights the difficulties in measuring losses due to piracy. TED can also be found on Twitter @TEDTalks

I also direct you to the UK governments January 2012 POSTnote publication (short briefing notes by the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology) by Chadrika Nath, which calls for open access to scientific information. It is a big discussion point just now, with an article in The Psychologist May 2012 magazine also calling for access to such information for journalists, to check and confirm findings before publishing.

If this is something you want to discuss, please email me or leave a comment. Twitter feed also now online @musicpiracyblog

For now, please see the 'Resources' page above with some general advice on searching for articles online, where you should be able to find out more by simply searching for articles on Google using good keywords.

Hope this information is useful and worthwhile.

 Twitter feed online @musicpiracyblog with daily updates.

Spotlight on predictive factors: Gender

A large volume of the scientific literature on piracy concerns predictive factors and deterrents. In other words, who it is getting their hands on copyrighted content for free and how we can stop them from doing it.

As has been mentioned in a previous post, the general rule in research is that if a trend keeps emerging from different datasets, then it is considered to be true. If different researchers explore the same phenomenon using different measurements, exploring different samples and they keep finding the same thing, well.. it's probably true. Such is the case with gender as a predictive factor in music piracy research.

And yup, you guessed it. It's males who are the culprit. 

To briefly discuss the findings from a few studies, Nel, Raubenheimer and Bounagui (2009) identified gender as a moderating variable in the intention to purchase music downloads. Also, Kini, Ramakrishna and Vijayamaran (2004) identified males as more likely to engage in software piracy. More interestingly, in terms of trying to understand why this gender difference exists, Malin and Flowers (2009) note males as having more favourable attitudes towards piracy than females. How does this help us better understand the gender difference? Well, Taylor, Ishida and Wallace (2009) established that attitudes towards the act of piracy to be a predictive factor of actual engagement. 

Surely anti-piracy strategies would do well to try and alter attitudes towards music piracy then? Such was the successful approach in the UK with smoking long before the smoking ban came into effect.

Why might males be more favourable towards piracy though? Two alternative, yet equally controversial suggestions are given below.

1 Males are more tech-savvy

Ample support exists for such a claim where it is thought to be the increased confidence males have with technology (from their increased experience) that empowers them to engage in the risky activity that is piracy. Alternatively, females relative lack of knowledge and confidence contributes towards their reluctance to do so.

2 Males are more immoral

The subject of the previous blog entry, support also exists for this claim where females consistently outperform males on various measures of moral reasoning. This may stem from their greater empathising skills where females are more considerate of the consequences their actions will have on others, thus making piracy engagement unattractive.

Age as a predictive factor is on the cards for a future blog post, but for now, ask a few friends why they do or do not engage in piracy. You are guaranteed to hear all sorts of different responses. 

Go on, ask around. Do you notice any consistent gender differences?

Twitter feed online @musicpiracyblog with daily updates.

References

Malin, J. and Flowers, J.B. (2009). Adolescent self-control and music and movie piracy. Computers in Human Behaviour, 25, 718-722.

Kini, R.B., Ramakrishna, H.V. and Vijayaraman, B.S. (2004). Shaping of moral intensity regarding software piracy: A comparison between Thailand and US students. Journal of Business Ethics, 49(1), 91-104.

Nel, J., Raubenheimer, J. and Bounagui, M. (2009). Gender differences in purchase intention of music downloads. Management Dynamics, 18(3), 25-36.

Taylor, S., Ishida, C. and Wallace, D. (2009) Intention to engage in digital piracy: a conceptual model and empirical test. Journal of Service Research, 11(3), 246-262.

Arr pirates' moral compasses way off?

Piracy has been described as "morally as well as economically unstable” (Lord Mandelson, cited in BBC, 2009).

This is from the man who set the recent changes in UK law into motion. But is there any truth to it?

Maybe so.

First of all, Marshall (2004) argues illegal downloading/file-sharing is not theft, but rather copyright infringement and that statutorily and practically they are very different. It's generally accepted that stealing is wrong, but copyright infringement? That sounds complicated.. Even theft is messy, where stealing office stationary for example, is normalised enough to be tolerated. Morality is unfixed.

As far as music piracy research goes, the results certainly sway in favour of the argument that those who download music illegal are immoral. But as Stephen Fry commented in his speech at the 2009 I-Tunes festival (discussed in previous blog entry below) this does not mean they have crossed a line into criminality, with no way back.

To briefly consider the findings from just a few scientific papers, the moral intensity of students has been shown to vary cross-culturally, thought to account to account for differing piracy rates (Kini, Ramakrishna and Vijayaraman, 2004) with Al-Rafee and Rouibah (2009) observing religion as a predictor of reducing piracy.

This is all very good, but the question begs: 'How does one measure morality?'

Many studies use questionnaire-items which pose moral dilemmas, where morality is often measured in accordance with a famous model of moral reasoning by Lawrence Kohlberg. Hunt down the articles if you are interested in the methodologies used.

As a general rule though, when the same trend of results appears over several studies using different approaches, then it becomes accepted as probably being a genuine finding. As more and more studies reach the same conclusions, that's where things are headed on this one.

What do you think?

And why all this interest in morality? Well, it could form the basis of future anti-piracy strategies, getting under the skin to change attitudes long-term. Such is the argument by Chiou, Huang and Lee (2005) who remark that a moral focus could be the best approach to tackling the issue, not confusing legal messages or invasive technological advancements, with artists appealing to fans on a person to person level via blogging, for example.

Morality can also account for consistent demographic differences, where gender and age will be explored in depth over the next few blog posts.

As Marshall (2004) states: "The Napster wars will not be won by law or economics - even if Napster is shut down, new possibilities for online piracy will emerge. Technical solutions are therefore not the answer. The Napster wars can only be won by morality. The industry has to persuade the public that infringing copyright on the internet is wrong".

New! Twitter feed online @musicpiracyblog with daily updates.

References

Al-Rafee, S. and Rouibah, K. (2009). The fight against digital piracy: An

experiment. Telematics and Informatics, 27, 283-292.

BBC (2009). Net pirates to be 'disconnected' [online]. Available from: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8328820.stm [Accessed 11 November, 2009].

Chiou, J., Huang, G. and Lee, H. (2005). The antecedents of music piracy attitudes and intentions. Journal of Business Ethics, 57(2), 161-174.

Kini, R.B., Ramakrishna, H.V. and Vijayaraman, B.S. (2004). Shaping of moral intensity regarding software piracy: A comparison between Thailand and US students. Journal of Business Ethics, 49(1), 91-104.

Marshall, L. (2004). Metallica and Morality: The Rhetorical Battleground of the Napster Wars. Entertainment and Sports Law Journal, 1, 1-3.

'You wouldn't steal a handbag'

When he's not Twittering away, stuck in lifts, the UK's beloved Stephen Fry is a thoroughly good public speaker. He speaks with flair, confidence, eloquence and of course, wit.

One such example is at the 2009 I-Tunes festival, where his illuminating account of the history of copyright as as comprehensive as you will find anywhere.

He goes on to discuss his thoughts on file-sharing in an amusing way where it's really interesting to hear the voice of someone who works in the creative industries. 

It raises some interesting questions, but I direct you there rather as I think it's a good accessible background to set up some of the content to follow on this blog in the coming months.

Available to download for free from his official website: http://www.stephenfry.com/2009/07/27/series-2-episode-4-itunes-live-festival

Enjoy.

If you don't want to see who is winning in the match between digital and hard copies of music, please look away now..

Available to the public, the IFPI Digital Report 2012 can be found here.

Some findings to stimulate interest can be found below.

Digital music revenues to record companies has grown by 8% globally since last year, where some markets including in the USA deriving over 50% of their profits from digital mediums.

"28 per cent of internet users globally access unauthorised services on a monthly basis, according to IFPI. Around half of these are using peer-to-peer (P2P) networks.  The other half are using other non-P2P unauthorised channels which are a fast-growing problem" (p.2 of 'Facts and Figures').

The report goes into depth on the relative success of recent anti-piracy initiatives internationally, including site blocking. The next big thing reads to be increased involvement from Internet Service Providers.

It's a fantastic read, where it really paints a bright future for the music industry, charting the rise of subscription services.

The PDF also lists the most comprehensive database of legitimate music services, globally. There are around 500, in 78 different countries. Here in the UK, there are around 70 in addition to the big boys such as Spotify, Deezer and I-Tunes..

Why not check out Rara or Boomkat?

Inauguration

This blog aims to bring together the findings from research into music piracy as well as introducing general discussion points around the topic.

Furthermore, commentaries on ongoing technological and legislative changes will be presented along with relevant links to encourage further reading.

It is hoped that this resource will help bring attention to the wealth of research which has been conducted over the last decade to the right audience: you.