Piracy was known as a sea-encounter or maritime terrorism before. Though sea pirates still exist today and continually harm and threaten the security of every nation, piracy has become widely known as an issue of intellectual property rights—the piracy of copyrighted material (Lessig, n.d.). It takes these forms: literary works piracy, audio piracy, cinematographic piracy, and software piracy. Piracy of literary works is the illegal reproduction of books and other printed materials and the distribution/selling of these for profit. Audio piracy is piracy of sound recordings. Cinematographic piracy comes in two forms: cable piracy and video piracy (Cheemalkonda & Praveen, n.d.). Software piracy is the unauthorized copying or distribution of copyrighted computer programs without the consent of the copyright holders. Regarding its legality, one can only install software once or twice; more than that is already considered piracy. Internet piracy is the use of the internet to download copies of pirated software. There are four main forms of internet piracy: movie piracy, music piracy, game piracy, and e-book piracy. Movie/music piracy is the illegal downloading of movies/music from torrents for personal or commercial use. Games and e-book piracy is downloading games and e-books over the internet, which has become much easier and cheaper (Malhotra, n.d.).
World entertainment piracy is best done through online play and downloading. In 2010, online piracy statistics showed: Worldwide: 42%, comprising the following regions: Central or Eastern Europe: 64%, Latin America: 64%, Asia-Pacific: 60%, Middle East and Africa: 58%, European Union: 35%, Western Europe: 33%, North America: 21%. By countries in descending order: China: 91%, Colombia: 90%, Russia: 80%, Malaysia: 75%, India: 60%, Turkey: 45%, Taiwan: 44%, Brazil: 35%, Saudi Arabia: 35%, Italy: 20%. The most pirated items on the World Wide Web were: 35.8% pornography, 35.2% movies (Avatar, Kickass, Inception, Shutter Island, Iron Man 2, Clash of the Titans, Green Zone, Sherlock Holmes, The Hurt Locker, Salt), 14.5% TV shows (Lost, Heroes, Dexter, The Big Bang Theory, House, How I Met Your Mother, 24, True Blood, Glee, Family Guy), 6.7% PC/console games (Call of Duty Black Ops, Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2, Battlefield Bad Company 2, Mafia 2, Mass Effect 2, Sims 3, Starcraft 2, Prototype, Need for Speed Shift, Street Fighter IV), 6.7% software (Adobe Photoshop CS, Microsoft Office, Nero 9, Windows Vista, Windows XP and 7, Magic Video Converter, AVG Pro, Sony Vegas Pro, Antivirus, Magic ISO Maker), 2.9% music (Watch the Throne, Party Rock Anthem, Adele, Where Them Girls At, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, On The Floor, The Way, The Beginning, Sigh No More, Give Me Everything), and 0.2% e-books (1000 Photoshop Tips and Tricks, Advanced Sex: Explicit Positions for Explosive Lovemaking, What Did We Use Before Toilet Paper?: 200 Questions, Photoshop CS5 All in One for Dummies, What Rich People Know and Desperately Want to Keep a Secret, 101 Shortcuts in Math Anyone Can Do, Touch Me There: A Hands-on Guide to Your Orgasmic Hotspots, How to Blow Her Mind in Bed, 1001 Math Problems, How to Make People Like You in 90 Seconds or Less). There is a $12.5 billion economic loss each year due to music piracy. There are 71,060 jobs lost in the United States every year due to online piracy. In workers' earnings, $2.7 billion is lost each year also due to online piracy. 42% of software running on Earth is illegally downloaded. $59 billion worth of software was illegally downloaded in 2010. More than 75% of computers have at least one illegally downloaded application. 2/3 of torrents available online are illegal. 95% of music downloaded online is illegal ("Online piracy in numbers: The facts and statistics," n.d.).
This paper deals with entertainment media piracy: film piracy and a bit of music piracy, where I take the role of a claims maker. Since piracy in the Philippines is my major focus, I will examine piracy through the production and road/mall buying of pirated compact discs, as the majority in this country is not yet serviced with computers and internet.
Being categorized under third-world countries, the economic standing of our country mirrors the Philippine film industry. Many aspects have contributed to the reduction of investments that were dreamed to be subsidized toward the entertainment industry, while constant costs and taxes have reached higher values in the market. The industry's financial crises have become a serious hindrance to improving the quality of motion pictures through new technology and equipment. While other regions enforce quotas on foreign films, Asia never complied. Since the 1960s, efforts to place quotas on imports have declined and failed constantly and regularly in the Philippine Congress. Current trends center on the entertainment and commercial aspects of movies, whether native or foreign. Watching movies has become one of the greatest and undying pastimes of Filipinos. This serves as their glimpse of paradise, an escape from the pains and stress brought about by different problems we face in reality.
Shockingly, motion pictures are the reported cheapest form of entertainment but are one of the highest-paying industries in amusement tax fees in the entertainment category. The industry generates more than 400 million pesos in taxes for the government. Almost half a million people benefit from the industry: the movie makers, the assistants, those assigned to costumes and makeup, the technicians, the production design team, the cinematographers, the directors, the actors, the actresses, the cleaners, the taping venue owners, the extras, and many more from both the film production and distribution groups, employees, workers in theaters, advertising agents, and other related groups and companies relevant to the perceived success of every picture.
In the 1970s, the market for foreign films boomed. Its output became a hit until it reached the point of patronage over the local production of films. This phenomenon continued and continued to consume our taste for films through the years that followed until today. The dominance of foreign films in the eyes of Filipinos has become a very luxurious preference and somewhat diminishes and lowers the degree of love for local art pieces.
Regarding the structure of the industry, Filipino filmmakers tend to fall into five categories: the major companies; the strong independents; wealthy individuals who finance a movie not necessarily for profit but for some special purpose such as promotion of political views and religious beliefs; people who could not enter any of the major film outfits and produce low-budget films of the rated R or X genre; and finally, filmmakers whose main concern is to develop alternative cinema. The business lines in the industry are composed of producers, distributors, and exhibitors. There is also a threat of substitute products like pirated films or movies edited for television, and a threat of new entrants like new players who can try the local market with more resources from abroad and then collaborate with a local film producer to do joint ventures. These threaten the quality of motion pictures. Originality will be a very controversial issue if this continues.
The entertainment industry is not that free in conceptualizations. There are still rules and regulations bounding their world. A group will have to first evaluate their draft movie and assign it to different categories of censorship. Laws hindering and facilitating include the MTRCB, which is a government arm in charge of classifying films as Restricted, General Viewership, or Parental Guidance; Presidential Decree 1987, or the Act Creating the Videogram Regulatory Board; Republic Act No. 8293, known as the "Intellectual Property Code of the Philippines"; plus several bills in Congress that seek to strengthen the VRB and the National Telecommunications Commission's power in combating piracy. There is also the private sector assisting the government in its anti-piracy efforts, like the Motion Picture Anti-Piracy Film Council, which forged a partnership with the Motion Picture Association.
On the other hand, the major players in industry associations and organizations are the Film Academy of the Philippines, the Mowelfund, and the Film Development Foundation of the Philippines International Film Festival, responsible for funding and providing financial assistance to movie producers who are invited to participate in international film festivals.
An examination of the motion picture production forward linkage shows that the market for film is motion picture distribution and projection. On the other hand, the motion picture distribution and projection forward linkage indicates that one major market to consider is radio and television programming or the development of more films for television broadcasting. Today, internationally acclaimed local films are marketed in many parts of the globe, like the United States, Europe, and Asia. The venues are international film festivals where foreign distributors can review our films and show them in their respective regions. One major region to reach is the Asia-Pacific region since its culture is similar to ours and their people can empathize with our storylines. Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, even Korea and Singapore, are good potential markets for our films. Of course, the US, European, and Latin American countries are good targets for our "exotic" films (Garcia & Masigan, 2001).
The problem that could be evaluated here is the low access of people to both local and foreign entertainment. People want to be updated and be in the stream of what is new. Through these things (movies, music), we learn. In this time, in this generation, giving your opinion is somewhat a must. If you have nothing to share about a topic concerning the meanings, the stories, and issues attached to these movies and music—even about the performance and renditions of each actor and singer, the tune and the cinematography—then it is not unlikely that you will be out of place. People today love to argue, love to affirm, love to take stands, love to learn from other people and the entertainment media. That is why I consider this to be a problem. This may not be serious to many, but it is to me and to some others, too, I guess, I hope.
Problems presented in this paper delve into intellectual property rights, low or no access to entertainment, the profit-inclined entertainment industry, piracy itself, the fall of entertainment industries, low-quality production due to limited budget and support, who acts behind piracy, and the problem of which among these problems is the most problematic and where we should start, from whose perspective.
There exist people who find it really disappointing, discouraging, and disrespectful to pirate their works, but there also exist those who don't mind as long as the workers' names and the parts of the whole work itself are not violated and omitted. People shall not be deprived of pleasurable things, of artful ones. People are being deprived unknowingly due to the control of market prices, so people will "magkakasya nalang sa pagtitingin ng album covers." We have laws to eliminate piracy and protect the artists and makers, but these are not really implemented with a strong hold. Pirated items are still obvious and very visible anywhere we go, even in places where police forces are roaming around. But the interesting thing here is that if we have anti-piracy groups, we unbelievably have pro-piracy groups as well. Speaking of online activity worldwide, we have the biggest, fearless website, The Pirate Bay. 70% of worldwide online users find nothing wrong with online piracy. 67% of digital piracy is hosted in North America and Western Europe. 22% of all global internet bandwidth is used for online piracy ("Online piracy in numbers: The facts and statistics," n.d.). Because of extreme patronage of pirated film and music albums, profits for facility improvements and workers' wages have been jeopardized. We have the perspectives of both sides, and in proposing a solution, it is quite hard to decide whether or not we'll keep on implementing the law—of course, this time, strictly—or make it free for everyone and stick with: art is for everybody.
An analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of the film industry shows the following considerations: good story and believability, well-written scripts, good acting, competent directing, impediments to being world-class, budget and technology, marketing, taxation, limited government support, the high cost of production, the dominance of very few big production companies, MTRCB as a "censorship" body, the star syndrome, and the interpersonal and intergroup conflicts among the film industry players.
On the other hand, the opportunities and threats confronting the industry are: financial capability as compared to foreign films, international exposure and exhibition, a luxury of options and abundance of sources, competitive advantage and a distinct image, piracy, television, cable television, VCD/VHS/DVD, a chance to expand market base, and adherence of the local film market to commercial films.
With the preceding considerations, an action plan to enhance competitiveness is therefore recommended in the following areas: market development and promotional strategies, promotion of Filipino films in international markets through participation in film festivals, discovering, developing, and/or expanding international mainstream or niche markets for Philippine films; encouraging and facilitating participation in international film markets as a step toward the discovery, development, and/or expansion of demand for Philippine films abroad; continuous research and development; competition at the level of the country's core competency; investing in technology; continuous training, development, and education of current and prospective industry personnel; development in collegiate education on courses related to film; laws and industry governance like major tax deductions, curbing piracy, and review of MTRCB's role as a regulatory body; a voice in the government through the formation of the Philippine Film Commission; and a closer look into the local film market (Garcia & Masigan, 2001).
So, who is thought to be behind piracy? Is it possible that those who work for the progress and making of films and music are the ones doing it? It is not far-fetched to accuse those who own these diamonds of seeking extra profit. They might be the cinema staff who can widely see every run of cinema films from the right view. They could be the watchers with camera phones or spy cameras on hand during the filming or cinema film showings. They could be anyone. It is just that we do not have the legal, full identities of who does piracy. And another thing: some men or families who sell pirated music and film discs are hard to suspend because this has been their source of living through the years, and that seemingly contributes to the lax handling of laws in Philippine society.
Entertainment is a form of art. Art has always been a part of our everyday life. It is inevitable. We always see art. Art is everywhere. It is boundless. Art is life. Life is art. The way we think, the things we were taught, the feelings we share, our culture—all are art. Art is finding meaning in every puzzle piece of our days. Art is our hunger for explanations and craving for freedom. Art is a very wonderful and magical element of our lives. We seek it knowingly and unknowingly. Art could be the romanticism of our reality. From it, we learn to love, we learn to survive. And I don't think that this thing shall be forcefully taken off our systems. I don't think that this thing shall be forcefully scraped from our skins just for some monetary purposes. People shall not be deprived of what their eyes want to see, what their hearts want to feel, what their souls want to capture. This would contribute to their everyday doings. This will help them do better and be better persons as each day passes.
Without access to entertainment, one's social growth will slow down or, worse, stagnate. I am not advocating for being madly competitive, but for the individual sense of knowledge importance until it holds throughout the whole society. If we learn to understand different sides, then we will be able to weigh things out and judge which one is right or wrong, and finally, propose a solution for it. And the first step to this, I think, is the accessibility of entertainment to people. Filipinos love to be entertained and to entertain. We love to express ourselves. And expressing oneself is very hard to do, right? Not all have the great gift of being fearless. And movies and music are two of those that continuously help people let out their true feelings. Directors and composers are the instruments who know how to look at social reality and put them into songs and stories. That is why people easily relate their lives to those, quoting the famous line, "Feeling mo lahat ng love songs ay tungkol sa iyo." People find companions or comrades in this aspect. They know that they are not the only ones to have experienced what they have. People also take some positive songs to be their inspiration that they still have the chance to improve their statuses in life. If we get to see these entertainment media, positive effects would outnumber the negative ones, for I have never heard of a story without a lesson—moral, informative, or insightful.
So, what does piracy really do to our society? It gives people the opportunity to watch or hear well-known pieces of artistry at a lower price than buying the original. It makes updates easier for people to access and enables people to talk with confidence about recent entertainment stories. On the other hand, piracy makes people indifferent to the entertainment industry's sales. People think less about the money funded by the producers and think more of their own pleasure. People become unlawful. Piracy lessens the strength of our economy and entertainment industry. It harms our intellectual property rights.
Surely, this issue I thought of needs a remedy. I do not know the rules of the different Philippine entertainment companies, but I guess it is time to make films and music for the Filipinos, for the people, for all the people—yes, that part I will take. We shall not put the primary priority on gaining profit but on the accessibility and availability of these works to all classes all at the same time. I do not know if that will work out in this capitalist world, or if my idea is a very idealistic proposal, but I hope that somewhere in time, people will have equal opportunities to watch and hear talented and awarded human-made artworks.
