The practice of piracy of movies is expanding and affecting the global movie industry more with each passing day. Some estimates state that the yearly revenue loss is $5-6 billion. In the Indian scheme of things, the loss is reckoned to be around $2.7 billion annually. Thanks to portable and high-quality video recording gear like camcorders and smartphones, this stumbling block for the industry is only becoming more worrisome.
Factors affecting piracy
A diverse set of factors impact the increase of piracy. Consumers often do not have access to several movie content owing to economical or geographical barriers, propelling them to consume pirated content. New technologies such as advanced file compression and storage formats like Blu-ray make it easier for pirates to manage large volumes of data. Factors like these aid piracy in all parts of the world, especially in countries that have a lot of people in the lower income pool.
Piracy in the Indian film industry
India’s Hindi film industry along with its regional film industries make the country the largest producer of films in the world. Agonisingly for the stakeholders, this industry is plagued with rampant piracy. In the 2000s, CDs and DVDs largely contributed to piracy. With the internet becoming progressively accessible, pirated content is being spread like wildfire by dint of torrent websites and various social media groups.
Effects of the OTT era
Ahead of their OTT releases in India, Cruella and Black Widow were both available on pirated websites for months. In the Bollywood industry, movies like Shershaah, Roohi and Mimi were immediately available on such websites post their OTT releases. Some pirates have even been daring enough to announce the sale of the Salman Khan starrer Radhe on Facebook. Three persons were arrested under sections of the Copyright Act and the Information Technology Act. Industry associates find piracy concerning OTT releases especially appalling as it can be done easily post the movie release with the picture quality being just as good as the original. The principal consumers of cinema – the youth need to be educated about the baneful effects of piracy through sharing of knowledge. A statutory warning can also be shown at the beginning of movies. Stricter laws need to be made by the Central Government and the governments in the states to prevent the malpractice of leakage and illegal distribution of these contents. Only in this way, cinema can be preserved and hence cherished by the generations to come.
#piracy #movies #india #hollywood #bollywood
Piracy is a practice against law and we are strictly against it.
About the author
Subhro Majumder is a Content Writer who is a sports and technology enthusiast. His other varied interests often sway him into reading about history, politics and international relations.
