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Survey: streaming services decrease piracy

More anecdotal data suggests legal, affordable content is bringing piracy numbers down.

Piracy_Key

The introduction of streaming services such as Netflix, Stan and Presto has seen piracy levels drop, according to a survey by Choice magazine.

A survey of more than 1000 participants suggests the number of people regularly pirating in Australia has dropped by a quarter while subscription and Pay TV numbers have increased from 46 per cent to 59 per cent.

“This proves once again that making content affordable and easily available is the first and most effective tactic to reduce piracy – not a draconian internet filter and notice scheme,” Choice campaign manager Erin Turner said in a statement on Friday.

“It’s clear the drop in piracy is a result of increased availability of legal streaming services in Australia,” Turner said.

Andrew Maiden CEO of ASTRA told TV Tonight, “This drop in piracy is welcome, and stems not only from the arrival of streaming services but also the efforts of incumbent providers to deliver content faster and cheaper.”

“New data collected by ASTRA shows that subscription television channels expressed 11,631 hours of content to Australian screens in 2014/15.”

“This includes 600 hours of premium dramas from the United States and United Kingdom.”

Source: AAP

10 Responses

  1. I agree, I wonder if this is seasonal with the US summer and less top new shows going to air. People getting Netflix and the others are probably catching up on their shows before the new seasons start later this month.

  2. I’d like to see how they came to this conclusion, as for the past three months it’s has been summer in the U.S, where typically illegal downloading would decline as shows are on hiatus. Let’s wait for September 25 to December 25 quarter where all the new and returning shows are airing regularly.

    1. While some of it may be seasonal, the US summer months are when a lot of genre shows (sci-fi, fantasy, etc) are released in the US. Tech-savvy Internet users are highly interested in those, so I suspect that a seasonly-adjusted survey would still show a reduction in “other means” for this period.

  3. “This proves once again that making content affordable and easily available is the first and most effective tactic to reduce piracy – not a draconian internet filter and notice scheme”.

    At first glance I wouldn’t be so certain about the link myself. Didn’t the introduction of Netflix et al. pretty much coincide with industry & Gov’t again ramping up anti-piracy talk & ‘3-strikes’ legislation, the DBC vs ISP decision, etc? Without knowing the survey dates/details, it seems a bit much to highlight that one correlation without acknowledging there were possibly other variables…

    1. Allowing people who are prepared to pay for content, but can’t, reduces piracy in wealthy countries. That is common sense and backed up by lots of research. It has happened with music globally and wherever TV is promptly streamed at reasonable prices.

      It not the whole solution, warning like in the UK and NZ have helped too.

    2. I don’t think the industry/government proposals would have made much of a difference, I would imagine that most people who know how to pirate know how to get around those measures.

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