New Study Shows Extremely Low Percentage of Movie Downloading
Filed under: Newsstand, Home Entertainment, Politics
Piracy is nothing new, especially since the explosion of Napster back when it was a pirated mp3 heaven. Now, half the time we hit the theaters or buy/rent a DVD, we have to sit through a whole spiel on movie piracy. Beyond questioning the actual validity of MPAA and movie company claims, there is a consumer backlash of people fed up with being treated like a pirate with no cause. The current rant on The Movie Blog might be a bit exaggerated, but it's true. The steps taken to curb piracy haven't stopped the myriad of illegal downloads available, but have made it difficult for consumers to back up their purchase or view it on other devices.A new study performed by ABI research has ripped another hole in the already-weak rampant claims of unstoppable movie piracy and the struggling film business. According to the study, which polled 1,725 North American online consumers 18+, only 5% watched legal digital movie downloads, and even less watch illegal downloads, making it "the least watched genre of online video on the Internet." The majority of respondents say they watch short-form content like news, sports and viral media. Why are they ignoring digitally-acquired films and illegal downloads? Because "they were satisfied with their current providers and the rental market."
Obviously this is more of the same. But maybe, just maybe, if we get enough of these studies together that prove most of us are not movie swashbucklers, they'll create an invisible shield from the incessant claims.
[via The Movie Blog]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
12-16-2006 @ 2:05PM
mr skin said...
Downloading and burning a movie to watch is pretty difficult to do. I do it all the time, but it takes a few hours to download, then another 30 min to burn so most people won't bother with it.
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2-26-2007 @ 2:38AM
LMF said...
After reading your post, there are certainly a number of valid points in your argument. The most important of which being the misrepresentation of how widespread illegal pirating is. Considering the amount of public service announcements and federal warnings consumers are bombarded with every time they purchase a DVD or go to a movie, one would expect huge percentages of illegal downloader’s, but certainly not a mere 5%. However, upon viewing the ABI research study using the link provided on your post, I noted that researchers only questioned people eighteen years and older. This is somewhat misleading considering that a large majority of illegal downloader are eighteen years old or younger. Thus, the controversy of some parents being sued by production companies, for the actions of their children. While there is no doubt the extent of this problem is over exaggerated, how exactly should the film and music industries respond? If they take no action, the problem will only increase, and while the precautions may not have eliminated the existing pirated material they certainly have stopped the production of any new footage.
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