''Media Piracy in Emerging Economies'' is a report released by the

Social Science Research Council The Social Science Research Council (SSRC) is a US-based, independent, international nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing research in the social sciences and related disciplines. Established in Manhattan in 1923, it today maintains a he ...

in 2011. It contends that “high prices for media goods, low incomes, and cheap digital technologies are the main ingredients of global media piracy. If piracy is ubiquitous in most parts of the world, it is because these conditions are ubiquitous.”

Reception

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

Cory Doctorow Cory Efram Doctorow (; born July 17, 1971) is a Canadian-British blogger, journalist, and science fiction author who served as co-editor of the blog '' Boing Boing''. He is an activist in favour of liberalising copyright laws and a proponent of ...

commented that "This report and its researchers are rare examples of academic rigour in a world of special pleading and cooked industry statistics." '' Computerworld'' UK blogger

Glyn Moody Glyn Moody is a London-based technology writer. He is best known for his book '' Rebel Code: Linux and the Open Source Revolution'' (2001). It describes the evolution and significance of the free software and open source movements with interview ...

wrote that "Given the scope and rigour of this report, I think it will go down as a decisive moment when the discourse around piracy changed fundamentally, with the content industries being forced, finally, to explain and justify their methodologies, rather than simply stating their claimed results."

Reuters Reuters ( ) is a news agency owned by Thomson Reuters Corporation. It employs around 2,500 journalists and 600 photojournalists in about 200 locations worldwide. Reuters is one of the largest news agencies in the world. The agency was esta ...

' blogger

Felix Salmon Felix Salmon (born 1972) is a financial journalist, formerly of ''Portfolio Magazine'' and ''Euromoney'' and a former finance blogger for Reuters, where he analyzed economic and occasionally social issues in addition to financial commentary. In Apr ...

also hailed it as "The best report ever on media piracy". Canadian academic

Michael Geist Michael Allen Geist (born July 11, 1968) is a Canadian academic, the Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-Commerce Law at the University of Ottawa and a member of the Centre for Law, Technology and Society. Geist was educated at the Univers ...

, writing in the ''

Toronto Star The ''Toronto Star'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper. The newspaper is the country's largest daily newspaper by circulation. It is owned by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary of Torstar Corporation and pa ...

'', found that "While setting the record straight on piracy myths is valuable, the report's most important contribution comes from chronicling how piracy is primarily a function of

market failure In neoclassical economics, market failure is a situation in which the allocation of goods and services by a free market is not Pareto efficient, often leading to a net loss of economic value. Market failures can be viewed as scenarios where indi ...

Gilberto Gil Gilberto Passos Gil Moreira (; born 26 June 1942), is a Brazilian singer-songwriter and politician, known for both his musical innovation and political activism. From 2003 to 2008, he served as Brazil's Minister of Culture in the administration ...

, former culture minister of Brazil, was quoted saying the study is “required reading for anyone concerned with copyright and enforcement, or with the challenges of cultural globalization". Magellan Media's founder Brian O'Leary invited to comment by

O'Reilly Radar O'Reilly Media (formerly O'Reilly & Associates) is an American learning company established by Tim O'Reilly that publishes books, produces tech conferences, and provides an online learning platform. Its distinctive brand features a woodcut of ...

blogger Jenn Webb, was only in partial agreement with the report, noting that "Concerns about convenience, availability and usability (the absence of onerous rights restrictions) factor into individual decisions about what and whether to pirate media products. This doesn't refute the Social Science Research Council's claim that higher prices in lower-wealth countries can lead to piracy. It does suggest that it may not be enough to just lower prices. I do agree fully with the SSRC's conclusion that enforcement has limited impact." '' Ars Technicas Nate Anderson emphasized that the SSRC "report debunks alleged link between piracy and terrorism" put forward by a 2009 report of the RAND Corporation and funded by the motion picture business.Major report debunks alleged link between piracy and terrorism
/ref>

References

{{reflist

External links

Report page at SSRC

Talk given by its editor, Joe Karaganis
at the

Berkman Center The Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society is a research center at Harvard University that focuses on the study of cyberspace. Founded at Harvard Law School, the center traditionally focused on internet-related legal issues. On May 15, 200 ...

(includes video)
The Simple Economics of Piracy (Or, Would You Pay $136 for Tron Legacy?)
article by Karaganis in

The Huffington Post ''HuffPost'' (formerly ''The Huffington Post'' until 2017 and sometimes abbreviated ''HuffPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and ...

comment
by

Reihan Salam Reihan Morshed Salam (; born 29 December 1979) is a conservative American political commentator, columnist and author who since 2019 has been president of the Manhattan Institute. He was previously executive editor of ''National Review'', a column ...

Interview with Karaganis
by Felix Salmon Copyright infringement 2011 non-fiction books