Researchers: movie studios sold more after Megaupload was shut down

Study examines sales in 12 countries from two studios before and after closure.

Read the whole story

 

[jonnybond]

so when are they shutting down you tube that place is a pirates paradise but wait its owned by google and their high priced lawyers making it almost untouchable.

 

[Titanium Dragon]

I just want to point out that these companies don't actually want to "know" facts or reason - they simply want to do what they have always been doing. With no change. If they could get govt to make digital media sales illegal and stick with discs, they would do it in a heartbeat.

Most people resist change. Even most people who claim to be for change are against change. Its just the way that a lot of humans work.

Look at the various people who advocate no DRM ever. 90% of them are pirates, if not 99% of them. Its sad but true. They oppose DRM and effective attacks on pirates because they are effective attacks on them. They oppose data which suggests that what they do harms other people because they don't want to have to change their ways - they don't want to admit that they're wrong, that what they're doing does cause harm. Its the same as the tobacco industry opposing the idea that smoking causes cancer.

Its just reality.

Unfortunately, however, what you've done here is said 1 + 1 = goldfish. You see, you think you made a very clever point.

But you didn't at all, because it is wrong.

Of course the companies don't want to have to do any extra work. But companies end up having to do extra work constantly to stay ahead of the game. Companies do research on new business models, new technology, new ideas all the time not because a lot of them WANT to change, but because they HAVE to change and because they WANT to maximize profits.

They want to know how much piracy hurts them, and how much killing websites like Megaupload can help them. They want to know if the law brings down the hammer what their ROI is, because they themselves sue people and can force the shutdown of sites with injunctions and similar, as well as urge those who are in charge of enforcing the law to enforce the laws more actively - proof of harm means that they are much more likely to get help.

Which is why they continue to refuse to do what the customer wants: sell to me online, simple, no ripoff, no hassle. Everyone on the planet knows this is what the customers want and are willing to pay for.

Yes, everyone wants everything instantly, whenever they want it, wherever they want it, for free. That is the nature of customers. Do I want a free giant pile of money, and everything I could ever want instantly on demand? That would be pretty nice, wouldn't it?

This doesn't mean that customers get it. Distribution across platforms costs money. They have to protect their IP from casual piracy. Bandwidth costs money. They also want to advertise to you, to make you want to purchase more stuff; look at Steam for a great example of this.

Its not in their best interests to give customers exactly what customers want, so why on earth would you be so stupid as to believe that they would do it? Because you want it to be true. You want it so bad.

The truth is that free is not the optimal price. Instant is not the perfect speed. Absolute freedom of sharing is not the optimal system. Because ultimately it is the producer who must produce; you merely consume. "The customer is always right" is a simple lie; they aren't, and anyone who knows anything about business knows it.

Also your point about industry associations being not monolithic is not true. The entire foundation of industry associations is per definition, the interests and issues they have in common. Otherwise they are competitors. So industry associations go hard on the issues the industry has in common and believes in. In this case, furthering their common belief that customer wishes are to be ignored and the law used as a cudgel.

You clearly have absolutely no knowledge of industry associations whatsoever. You are incompetent, but your incompetence prevents you from realizing it.

Industry associations exist to forward the common interests of the industry. Apple, Microsoft, and Google belong to MANY organizations together, but you would have to be high to believe that they are not competitors with one another. Do you think Disney is not competing with Viacom? Do you think that News Corporation and Time Warner don't compete with each other? And yet, they are in the MPAA together.

No, you have no undestanding of industry assocations whatsoever. The MPAA is, in essence, a common lobbying group for the industry, because there are a lot of common interests between them, even though they are competitors - it makes sense for them to band together to form the MPAA even though they are constantly fighting each other for dominance.

You must understand that this issue isn't even new. I was part of a strategy consulting team that did a study for one of the majors in this industry many years ago, very early on in the game. We did the research on how technology and communications platforms would likely evolve, looked at the rise of social communities and told them exactly how this was going to play out technologically, socially and in terms of business - and laid out what was a fairly sensible path for adapting and thriving in this new era ahead. They looked at it, told us we were wrong, did not hire us again - and went on doing exactly what they were doing. That sir, what happens when you give corporate executives an answer that they don't like and falls outside the beliefs in their little bubble. "The customer is going to be have a lot more power, and you need to change" - hell no. That's heresy. Response: "Jane, get my congressman on the line. We need to fix this".

And yet, here you are telling me that they are not competitors with each other, when they clearly are.

Obviously you weren't very good at your job.

Its very easy to claim you had prescience after the fact.

So tell me, how many billions of dollars do you have in your pocket?

The fact that you're here arguing with me on Ars under a pseudonym - one using the word "Zion" in its name no less - spouting utter nonsense really tells me all that I need to know about your reliability.

Yes, they BELIEVE it makes them money. That's the key point there. And to reinforce that belief, they also have to BELIEVE that shutting down megaupload helped, and pay for any studies that will reinforce that belief.

If they paid for a study and it didn't show any change, or showed a decrease in sales, their entire case before the US government would be completely undermined.

Maybe if there was absolutely no one on staff who was any more intelligent than you are.

But I can tell you that there are people who work for those organizations who are smarter than you are.

If there had been no effect, then they would have said that it proves that piracy is so rampant that cutting off one head is useless; you need to cut off all the heads at once. You need to be very draconian.

That's very, very, very easy to see. And its a perfectly valid argument. Indeed, it is the argument that people here made - it won't make any difference because there are too many other heads.

If they had decreased, then they would have looked into how to recapture that effect themselves and make money from it themselves.

Really the fact that it decreased is good news, because it suggests that killing sites like MU actually can have a positive effect, and that significantly more draconian enforcement is not necessary. Destroying the Kim Dotcoms of the world doesn't just help make the world more just, but it also helps their bottom line. And that my friends, is always good news - when public good and private good align.

Things are a lot uglier when they don't.

 

[FearLES]

The easiest and perhaps most widely accepted definition of evil is "selfishness at undue cost to others". I would argue that almost all humans on the planet earth will see that as evil - there are, of course, exceptions, and people add MORE to their definition of evil, but that thing - selfishness at undue cost to others - IS something that is nearly universally viewed as evil.

Yet if I download a file it causes no harm or cost to the copyright owner. No property is lost and no money is taken away. The result is the same for the content owner if I download it or I simply don't buy it.

It is not immoral to use the library, borrow from a friend, buy used, not buy at all or download and these all have the same effect of non-harm on the content owner.

 

[Titanium Dragon]

Yet if I download a file it causes no harm or cost to the copyright owner. No property is lost and no money is taken away. The result is the same for the content owner if I download it or I simply don't buy it.

This is the big lie. The harm is that you are taking their work without compensating them for it, the same as if you refused to pay a plumber for fixing your sink. You are forcing everyone else to pay more for it, or depriving them of just reward for the work they did for you.

The result is not the same because you benefited from their work without compensating them for it. The lack of compensation is harm.

If I steal your stuff, you can always work extra hours to buy more stuff to replace it.

What's the difference?

The answer is rationalization. They're outside your monkeysphere, but you aren't.

 

[hpsgrad]

Yet if I download a file it causes no harm or cost to the copyright owner. No property is lost and no money is taken away. The result is the same for the content owner if I download it or I simply don't buy it.

This is the big lie. The harm is that you are taking their work without compensating them for it, the same as if you refused to pay a plumber for fixing your sink. You are forcing everyone else to pay more for it, or depriving them of just reward for the work they did for you.

Going to the library harms authors; they're immoral, evil institutions that should be banned.

The result is not the same because you benefited from their work without compensating them for it. The lack of compensation is harm.

Not obtaining a benefit is not the same as being harmed. You fail to win the lottery every day, but if you claimed that as a harm, you'd get laughed at, and deservedly so. A salesman who works on commission fails to obtain a benefit from each customer who does not buy from them. Do you honestly think that that salesman is harmed by those people? Do you think that people who fail to purchase something from a commission-paid salesperson are thieves? Hell, even entering a store costs the store-owner money (lights, HVAC, customer service personnel, stock of goods, to say nothing of the space the non-buyer takes up which might be taken up by a paying customer). Anyone who enters a store and fails to purchase something is a thief!!!11!!

Your argument is absurd and incoherent as stated.

 

[ruddy]

Going to the library harms authors; they're immoral, evil institutions that should be banned.

Classic weaseltude. Going to the library, watching a public performance, or borrowing a copy from a friend are all fair uses because, unlike piracy, the use does not create more copies and doesn't diminish the value of owning a copy. Maybe weasels are just too dim to see the difference between experiencing a work and possessing a copy of it.

 

[AnthonyInVA]

With all due respect to Cyrus Farivar and especially Ars: why the hell is this article even on Ars? I understand the interest in differing perspectives, but this is garbage. After having wasted my time reading the paper, I found myself disappointed that this was even remotely thought to be of quality worthy to make an appearance on Ars.

Right from the beginning, it's clear that the paper is doomed:

The authors thank two anonymous major motion picture studios for individually providing data to support this research.

....Two? You've written a paper on the affect of shutting down a service that hosted "25 petabytes of content" but you only got data from two major motion picture studios? Of that 25 petabytes of content, what percentage (since percentages are what this paper is so fond of) of that 25 petabytes were content from those "two major motion picture studios?"

Give me a break.

Interesting how pretty much the only dissenting opinion here is being downvoted to oblivion to the point that nearly all his posts are hidden.

Regardless of your stance on copyright infringement, I'm not sure how it can enhance a discussion to silence the other side of the argument.

Even more disconcerting is that some of those downvoted comments are still visible even though they should have been filtered out by votes (see Titanium Dragon's first post in this thread). Keep in mind it's not always just the comment that's being downvoted, but the individual's ceaseless broken record posts that are nearly identical to others of theirs made in previous threads. Some of the people being downvoted practice making baseless assertions, hurling insults directed at entire groups of people, engaging in the projectile vomit of immorality claims, misusing terms such as "theft" when speaking of "copyright infringement," or any combination of the previous examples.

You can pay any researcher enough money to produce a study that supports the result you have in mind.

As a researcher I find this massively offensive.

While I agree that the saying "any researcher" can be bought is a bit unfair... as a researcher, you have to admit there is quite a bit of "biased research" where funding more than skews (read: dictates) the results in order to ensure a content and possibly repeat client (think pharmaceutical companies, for instance).

 

[FearLES]

Going to the library harms authors; they're immoral, evil institutions that should be banned.

Classic weaseltude. Going to the library, watching a public performance, or borrowing a copy from a friend are all fair uses because, unlike piracy, the use does not create more copies and doesn't diminish the value of owning a copy. Maybe weasels are just too dim to see the difference between experiencing a work and possessing a copy of it.

What does fair use have to do with the morality of it? They are simply exceptions to the monopoly but they do cause a similar "harm" as simply downloading because the benefit can be enjoyed without further benefit to the copyright owner. How does someone else downloading a copy diminish the value of someone else owning a copy? Does that lessen their enjoyment somehow?

So experiencing a work vs. possessing a copy of it?
So if I stream it is ok because I never possess it fully? how about if I delete it when I'm finished? or what if I download it and never end of experiencing it?

 

[FearLES]

Yet if I download a file it causes no harm or cost to the copyright owner. No property is lost and no money is taken away. The result is the same for the content owner if I download it or I simply don't buy it.

This is the big lie. The harm is that you are taking their work without compensating them for it, the same as if you refused to pay a plumber for fixing your sink.

So using the library, buying used etc. is immoral then??? What is immoral about receiving a benefit? If my neighbour improves his house and the value of my house goes up as a result is that immoral?

Refusing to pay someone who expended a scarce resource (time) and not compensating them it is obviously harming them as your benefit came at the expense of someone else but downloading a file doesn't do that. Downloading doesn't use any of the copyright owners scare resources (no electricity, storage, bandwidth, or money, etc).

You are forcing everyone else to pay more for it, or depriving them of just reward for the work they did for you.

So if I download a copy the price goes up and eveyone who previously purchased get an updated invoice????
Work is effort over time but downloading a copy requires no effort or expense from the copyright owner.

The result is not the same because you benefited from their work without compensating them for it. The lack of compensation is harm.

Yet the copyright owner has the same assets whether the copy is downloaded or not? So refusing to purchase makes you a bad immoral citizen? Your credit cards aren't maxed out so you are committing a sin against the nation????

Buying used or borrowing from a friend or library (Benefit with no compensation to the copyright owner) should be considered immoral and illegal???

If I steal your stuff, you can always work extra hours to buy more stuff to replace it.

What's the difference?

The answer is rationalization. They're outside your monkeysphere, but you aren't.

Extra hours are abundant and non-scarce? Do you have a solar powered cloning machine or wind powered robot servants to work the extra hours?
Stealing my stuff means no cost to me and has the same harm/benefit/result for me as you not stealing my stuff?????

 

[ruddy]

Going to the library harms authors; they're immoral, evil institutions that should be banned.

Classic weaseltude. Going to the library, watching a public performance, or borrowing a copy from a friend are all fair uses because, unlike piracy, the use does not create more copies and doesn't diminish the value of owning a copy. Maybe weasels are just too dim to see the difference between experiencing a work and possessing a copy of it.

What does fair use have to do with the morality of it?

That's like saying morality and fairness have nothing to do with each other. It makes me wonder if you could possibly be stoopider.

They are simply exceptions to the monopoly but they do cause a similar "harm" as simply downloading because the benefit can be enjoyed without further benefit to the copyright owner.

Nope. The rightsholder gets to exploit their works' value, and how they get to exploit it is in controlling the works' distribution. Stealing and proliferating copies isn't the same thing as borrowing one copy from the library for a short period of time.

How does someone else downloading a copy diminish the value of someone else owning a copy?

Because as weenies like to complain, the value of copies reside in their artificial scarcity.

 

[Titanium Dragon]

So using the library, buying used etc. is immoral then??? What is immoral about receiving a benefit? If my neighbour improves his house and the value of my house goes up as a result is that immoral?

Its not a question of immorality, but illegality.

In the case of the library or used goods, you are taking a discrete physical object and using it, or using a licensed system. Its not the same thing at all as stealing a copy of something. Used goods and libraries DO hurt publishers, but they are not illegal.

The house example is not comparable because they are improving their own property, which has the peripheral effect of your property being percieved as more valuable; they did not, however, alter your property in any way, and you did not take any part of their property.

In the case of making a copy, you are denying them any compensation for the work that they did for you in producing the program for YOUR use.

Refusing to pay someone who expended a scarce resource (time) and not compensating them it is obviously harming them as your benefit came at the expense of someone else but downloading a file doesn't do that. Downloading doesn't use any of the copyright owners scare resources (no electricity, storage, bandwidth, or money, etc).

Of course it does. THey expended a scarce resource (time) in making the program in the first place.

 

[FearLES]

Going to the library harms authors; they're immoral, evil institutions that should be banned.

Classic weaseltude. Going to the library, watching a public performance, or borrowing a copy from a friend are all fair uses because, unlike piracy, the use does not create more copies and doesn't diminish the value of owning a copy. Maybe weasels are just too dim to see the difference between experiencing a work and possessing a copy of it.

What does fair use have to do with the morality of it?

That's like saying morality and fairness have nothing to do with each other. It makes me wonder if you could possibly be stoopider.

I was talking about fair use not fairness. Morality deals with harm and has no interest in benefits by themselves but dealing with the balance of harm and benefit. If there is no harm then it can't be immoral.
There are many forms of benefit we accept (though greedy rightsholders would love to see them disappear) such as libraries, personal borrowing and used sales. Downloading is simply personal borrowing without physical limits.

They are simply exceptions to the monopoly but they do cause a similar "harm" as simply downloading because the benefit can be enjoyed without further benefit to the copyright owner.

Nope. The rightsholder gets to exploit their works' value, and how they get to exploit it is in controlling the works' distribution. Stealing and proliferating copies isn't the same thing as borrowing one copy from the library for a short period of time.

It is borrowing, just without physical limits.
There is nothing inherently immoral about ignoring physical limits if there are none.
On the other hand stealing is all about the physical limits because you are taking away something and leaving them with less than before.
Stealing vs non stealing has a clear boundary - the results are completely opposite.
Copying vs. not copying results in the same outcome for the rightsholder.

Therefore it is false to equate the two.

How does someone else downloading a copy diminish the value of someone else owning a copy?

Because as weenies like to complain, the value of copies reside in their artificial scarcity.

Yes artificial]/i].

Seems like there is a moral question there. Why should we artificially limit the digital world just so that Disney can make a bit more money? Does that seem like the wrong thing to do?

 

[FearLES]

So using the library, buying used etc. is immoral then??? What is immoral about receiving a benefit? If my neighbour improves his house and the value of my house goes up as a result is that immoral?

Its not a question of immorality, but illegality.

In the case of the library or used goods, you are taking a discrete physical object and using it, or using a licensed system. Its not the same thing at all as stealing a copy of something. Used goods and libraries DO hurt publishers, but they are not illegal.

But should they be illegal then???
Why should we outlaw the benefits of digital abundance?
Copying 1 book for a short time and deleting it seems to have the same effect as buying a used copy or borrowing it.

The house example is not comparable because they are improving their own property, which has the peripheral effect of your property being percieved as more valuable; they did not, however, alter your property in any way, and you did not take any part of their property.

Yes but you were trying to make the point that getting a benefit without compensating someone for it is wrong (whether perception or not, the benefit is real if you can sell your house for more as a result) . This example clearly shows that receiving an uncompensated benefit is not immoral. What is immoral is causing harm which is why stealing is considered wrong - you are depriving someone of their property which makes it just as wrong to destroy it as to steal it.

In the case of making a copy, you are denying them any compensation for the work that they did for you in producing the program for YOUR use.

BS! They produced the work and whether I even know it exists or not, let alone if I copy it, borrow it or buy it, it exists and the effort is the same regardless of if it will sell millions or not at all. I deny them compensation if I decide I don't want anything to do with their work which is the same effect as making a copy.

Downloading doesn't use any of the copyright owners scare resources (no electricity, storage, bandwidth, or money, etc).

Of course it does. THey expended a scarce resource (time) in making the program in the first place.

No copying the file doesn't change the fact that it already exists. Copying the file has a negligible cost and even that falls on the one doing the copying.

 

[ruddy]

Going to the library harms authors; they're immoral, evil institutions that should be banned.

Classic weaseltude. Going to the library, watching a public performance, or borrowing a copy from a friend are all fair uses because, unlike piracy, the use does not create more copies and doesn't diminish the value of owning a copy. Maybe weasels are just too dim to see the difference between experiencing a work and possessing a copy of it.

What does fair use have to do with the morality of it?

That's like saying morality and fairness have nothing to do with each other. It makes me wonder if you could possibly be stoopider.

I was talking about fair use not fairness.

Are you now pretending fairness has nothing to do with determining fair use?

Morality deals with harm and has no interest in benefits by themselves but dealing with the balance of harm and benefit.

Morality is determining right from wrong. Determining fairness, including fair use, is always a moral question.

If there is no harm then it can't be immoral.

Whatever you pretend to yourself, the law recognizes the harm in piracy, both to the rightsholder and to society.

Downloading is simply personal borrowing without physical limits.

Downright Weasel logik

It is borrowing, just without physical limits.

Yup, pure weasel logik. Sounds just like something Jammie Thomas or Joel Tenenbaum each said before their respective juries spanked them.

There is nothing inherently immoral about ignoring physical limits if there are none.

You merely admit you have no morals when it comes to copyright.

How does someone else downloading a copy diminish the value of someone else owning a copy?

Because as weenies like to complain, the value of copies reside in their artificial scarcity.

Yes artificial]/i].

Yup, artificial, just like every other law on the books.

 

[Titanium Dragon]

But should they be illegal then???

No.

Why should we outlaw the benefits of digital abundance?

For the same reason that slavery is illegal - people deserve the ability to earn money from their work.

Digital abundance is a false kind of abundance because the actual resource - creator time - is finite, and failing to justly compensate creators results in systemic inefficiency, with fewer resources being applied to said work relative to their true value.

Copying 1 book for a short time and deleting it seems to have the same effect as buying a used copy or borrowing it.

Wrong.

Let's say I am a public library. If I have one copy of a book, and 100 people want to read it, and each person checks it out for a week, then it will take 200 weeks for everyone to have access to a copy of the book. Many people will be impatient and want to read it -now-, meaning that they will purchase the book, or if I want to increase availability, I could instead have 10 copies of the book, so it would take only 10 weeks for everyone to read a copy. In both cases, the total purchases of the book increase.

If you make a copy of the book, the total purchases of the book do not.

Ergo, the limited availability of actual physical copies drives sales, so while the library may have a negative impact on book sales, you still get some sales (as opposed to zero).

Yes but you were trying to make the point that getting a benefit without compensating someone for it is wrong (whether perception or not, the benefit is real if you can sell your house for more as a result) . This example clearly shows that receiving an uncompensated benefit is not immoral. What is immoral is causing harm which is why stealing is considered wrong - you are depriving someone of their property which makes it just as wrong to destroy it as to steal it.

Your problem is that you are not understanding a fundamental dichotomy.

If I improve my property, your property value may increase. This is basically the opposite of an externalized cost - rather than other people bearing the costs of my acitons, other people gain benefits from my actions. This is not a bad thing.

However, it is worth noting that this sort of action can (and does!) lead to massive inefficiency if the actual activity itself is not sufficiently profitable - for instance, say everyone spending $1,000 improving their house's appearance would increase the property value of everyone's house on the street by $10k. If, however, that $1,000 would only improve your own house's personal value by $500 unless all your neighbors do it too, then even though everyone would rationally benefit from everyone improving their house, no one would logically want to be the first to do so because you actually lose $500 unless everyone else does it.

This is actually a real world problem - beekeepers, for instance, grant huge benefits to farmers, and yet recieve quite modest compensation. The net result is that there is actually something of a shortage of beekeepers relative to the demand for them.

BS! They produced the work and whether I even know it exists or not, let alone if I copy it, borrow it or buy it, it exists and the effort is the same regardless of if it will sell millions or not at all. I deny them compensation if I decide I don't want anything to do with their work which is the same effect as making a copy.

And what if everyone pirates it instead of purchasing it? Then they would go out of business and cease to produce the product in question, thus denying everyone the benefit of their work.

This is closely related to the tragedy of the commons, where a common resource becomes overused because it is free, and therefore everyone has incentive to cheat, but the net result is the destruction of said resource.

You are a parasite if you do not pay for it. You are denying them just compensation for the work you gained from them. They did work to produce the good, and then you stole it without paying for it. It is the same as if you stole a TV - the loss to them is not a TV, but the resources that went into producing the TV, including the R&D involved. Your same argument applies to stealing a TV - they already invested the resources into producing the TV, so what difference does it make if you steal it? They produced it whether you even know that that TV exists or not.

Your argument is not logically consistent, as you can see.