Internet Pirates Steal the Treasure of the Talented

Let’s not try to fool ourselves, illegal downloading is just plain theft

AUSTRALIANS love good movies and TV shows, but are we loving them to death?

I am ashamed to say that if the figures from the final episode of the television series Breaking Bad are correct, then per capita Australians are the highest illegal downloaders of pirated material in the world.

And let’s not try to lay the blame on the lack of availability of legal content; the episode was available for download on iTunes for the price of a cup of coffee a few hours after it was televised in the US.

To save Australia’s creative talent we urgently need national legislative reform to stop online piracy, which is eating away at our creative industries.

As the outgoing chairman of the National Association of Cinema Operators, during the past three years I have had the privilege of getting to know the hard-working Australians who produce, distribute and exhibit the movies we all enjoy. My involvement with the cinema industry has also brought me face to face with the damaging effects of content theft, illegal downloading and copyright infringement.

I recently opened the Australian International Movie Convention and found myself in full agreement with an old University of Queensland law school colleague and now Attorney-General, George Brandis. He commented in his keynote address that an ”effective legal framework of protection and enforcement of copyright is fundamental to sustaining today’s creative content industry and, importantly, the cultural development of our nation”.

As Australia becomes increasingly dependent on the ”knowledge economy”, we have to protect and support the 900,000 people who work within our copyright industry from the scourge that is eating away at their jobs — intellectual property theft.

Let me strip away the well-honed myths about the piracy websites Australians visit to download such illegal content.

To begin with, illegal downloading is just online theft; it is that simple.

Second, research from the University of Ballarat found the most profitable advertising on piracy websites comes from the sex industry, gambling and malware ads. This very lucrative advertising provides the financial incentive for overseas criminals to operate these websites and become abhorrently wealthy.

These operators are not concerned about freedom of speech or protecting the ”freedom of the internet”, nor are they in the business to promote innovation. It’s all about money. The 2009 criminal trial of The Pirate Bay found that the site’s overheads were an estimated $110,000, yet the owners made more than $1.4 million from advertising revenues alone. An illegal profit margin of 1272 per cent — which would make it more profitable than drug-dealing.

Australia’s creative industry supports a “free and open internet”, that is, an internet that is politically and economically free, operating as part of a competitive free market but where people have rights. The creative industry is also utterly committed to and supportive of free speech. In fact, it is dependent on it.

However, there is a marked difference between a free and open internet on the one hand and artists and industry employees being forced to work for free because of online theft. Creative Australians are entitled to protect and profit from their skills; after all it is their intellectual property.

An internet where individuals can freeload by taking the creation or product of others without permission or payment will result in dire economic and social consequences. Australia will lose tomorrow’s creative brains, together with our talented actors and singers.

If online piracy is allowed to control distribution of content, creative Australian businesses will be destroyed and jobs will be lost.

Respecting the rule of law online will not break the internet, stifle innovation, limit free speech or deter the free flow of information. Yet disrespecting and ignoring the rule of law will take away the incentive for investment and innovation that are key pillars of economic growth and progress.

We cannot stand by and watch value being eroded from this important industry. The creative industry’s ability to use the internet to get a reasonable return on its substantial ongoing investment impacts the opportunities to continue releasing quality entertainment content. Like any other business, if a product doesn’t produce a return on its investment — in this case as a result of rampant piracy — fewer investors will be prepared to risk funding movies such as the next Red Dog or the next Sapphires; nor will the next Sam Worthington or Mia Wasikowska be discovered.

As access to online pirated content became easier, sadly an expectation of getting something for nothing came with it; it’s an unfortunate by-product of the internet era that has started to devalue entertainment products.

Defining commercial entertainment as merely ”information” is both a first step in devaluing such products, as well as a convenient excuse to rationalise online theft.
Unfortunately, when it comes to protecting our $93 billion copyright industry, its $7bn in exports and the 900,000 people the industry employs, Australia is falling behind.

Full text available at: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/internet-pirates-steal-the-treasure-of-the-talented/story-e6frg6zo-1226756027922#mm-premium?sv=bffa3878bfd5fe9d928fcd24900af4a2
PETER BEATTIE
9 November 2013
The Australian
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Peter Beattie is the outgoing Chairman of the Board of the National Association of Cinema Operators-Australasia (NACO). He was Premier of the state of Queensland from 1998 to 2007.