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How Viacom can sink the pirates

arstechnica.com — There are no quick and easy ways to beat piracy. But here's how Viacom CEO Sumner Redstone and his Hollywood buddies can do it with blood, sweat, and tears.

Bury

MrBabyMan 6 days ago, made popular 5 days ago

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LANjackal, on 05/10/2008, -8/+35"They start on demand and play stutter-free from any PC, Mac, or Linux box, anywhere in the US, any time."
The US? How about the world? This article unfortunately suffers from the tunnel vision typical of the tech industry, in which the US is the only viable market for their product. Nonsense. The world does NOT begin in Redmond and end in Boston.
- Mononuclear, on 05/10/2008, -0/+27of course not. The world includes alaska hawaii and maine too!!
  - dafragsta, on 05/10/2008, -0/+11Don't forget Puerto Rico and Guam
    - TruthKid, on 05/10/2008, -0/+2There always has to be one...
- joeanon, on 05/10/2008, -3/+5The US is the biggest market for media and video by far... AND they are also the biggest internet population.
  
  So, I think it's a valid idea to focus on the American aspect. It hurts us the most and we do it the most.
  - DalamarArgent, on 05/10/2008, -0/+2Sorry, but the world is greater than the U.S, as LANjackal states above. Hell just the English speaking market excluding the U.S. is larger than the U.S. market.
    Talking exclusively about American media, then you are probably correct, however world-wide media, I would put it on India to be the #1 consumer, and wouldn't hesitate to put several other Asian countries in the top 5.
- Lynxpro, on 05/10/2008, -0/+12Hey, it cuts both ways. I can't exactly use the BBC iPlayer here in the States, now can I? The BBC could've made it pay-per-view for non-UK viewers, and/or placed their content on iTunes...but instead, they think they can get away with charging US$100 per DVD box set of a 14 episode season (err, series) of *Doctor Who*. I'd pay that price if it were on Blu-ray, but alas, the BBC and Russell T(ool) Davies didn't comprehend that HD was right around the corner when they revived the show in 2005.
- Night, on 05/10/2008, -0/+5You have to remember most of these companies are US based. They are licensed to sell in the US. If they or a foreign partner company want to offer the episodes else where is another mater. Yes most of these ideas are global but in this case they are referring to and using a specific ___US____!!!! company as an example.
- MercedRocks, on 05/10/2008, -0/+7The first season of Battlestar Galactica is a perfect example - since it was going to take them 6 months for it to arrive in the US after the UK pirates sped up the process for them.
adam1mc, on 05/10/2008, -1/+26I agree with the comment above but the article does make a great point that if the big media companies will get their heads out of their asses and update to a more modern business model -- they will win in the end. I'll be headed to ABC.com today to watch Lost in HD. Because it's available at ABC, I won't even attempt to look for it on TPB.
- oderdigg, on 05/10/2008, -1/+8It true is too bad that people outside the US cannot watch HD videos online at abc.com. I mean, Calgary is closer to Redmond than Boston is !!
  - oderdigg, on 05/10/2008, -0/+4Holy ***** my grammar sucked.
    - sarge96, on 05/10/2008, -1/+4Yes, yes it did. Normally I would've taken you to town there, but as you are policing yourself, I can move along.
  - BearinG, on 05/14/2008, -0/+1can't even watch the non-HD videos either..
- sarge96, on 05/10/2008, -1/+2I would go for the ideas suggested in this article. The problem is that the industry just won't do it. I would so much rather watch The Daily Show on a Comedy Central website, and if I had to deal with ads, that what Adblock Plus is for. If it there was a legitimate way to get what I want, I'd do it, but there isn't, so, i donwload season 3 of The Office from TBP.
- koko775, on 05/10/2008, -0/+2No kidding. Ever since I discovered that SciFi put BSG on their site for streaming sooner than I could download it on my connection (basically right after it aired), I stopped torrenting it. I don't own a TV, so given two decent choices I actually decided to go the legitimate route. It's a great thing when big companies actually pay attention to their customers.
  - AzureRise, on 05/10/2008, -0/+1Funny, how a while back not owning a tv would be considered barbaric but now with computers it's more easily accepted than before. My only question is, since computers are replacing tv, what will replace computers?
Alphateam, on 05/10/2008, -4/+22iTunes is proof that people WILL pay for the content they want in a format they want. It has been that way for years and these people are just starting to get it. I've watched Lost on ABC.com, sure there are commercials, but less than the regular show has. I can watch it when I want to. Thanks...Its not ***** rocket science. It is just basic supply and demand. Obviously the demand is there because of all the piracy, just give us the supply. It is sort of a hassle to get movies/tv shows via p2p or whatever. You never know the quality till you get it, maybe it doesn't play right, wrong language, sound out of sync whatever....I've give up that hassle watch a few commercials if you give it to me how I want it. Redstone is 84, time to retire and let some young guy with new ideas take over. Retire to your palace and go watch Gunsmoke.
- sarge96, on 05/10/2008, -0/+4"go watch Gunsmoke"
  Downloaded from TPB, of course.
- Lynxpro, on 05/10/2008, -0/+6Redstone won't retire...he's too damn headstrong and he's butted heads with his various "successors" including his daughter. Especially over Midway Games.
- patientzero, on 05/10/2008, -0/+2The problem with your logic is simple: You're assuming there's real money to be made on The Internet right now. Viacom didn't ask for The Internet to mature so quickly, and in the meantime they'd like to keep television ratings up; thus living atop the existing ad structure like pigs on a pile of ***** suckling from the sows nipple.
  
  When they're ready, they'll put their content online and serve it up without a peep.
  
  Also, what does Apple have to lose from iTunes? Do you think that's why they were the brave (first legitimate) ones, and that's why they succeeded? Were they in the record business for decades?
  
  "content they want in a format they want"
  
  Don't want it, no DRM for me either. Thanks.
thelastcivilian, on 05/10/2008, -1/+4Apart from price, the problem is that the media companies can't really stay too far ahead of the pirates in terms of convenience - it doesn't take Stephen Hawking to figure out BitTorrent. Hell, with Democracy Player (or whatever forgettable name they're using nowadays) you can even subscribe to your favourite shows.
- dig1x, on 05/10/2008, -0/+2Digital Download is it.
  
  The "channels" are obsolete. Production houses can go straight to viewers with the internet now. Redstone better figure that out quick.
aflaks, on 05/10/2008, -2/+30They arnt pirates! They are Robin Hoods.
- ultraJesus, on 05/10/2008, -10/+1Robin Hood was the greatest villain of all time.
- Beatmiser, on 05/10/2008, -0/+5Really? Because I was aware that in the legend Robin Hood gave to those who needed the money to live. Not go see ye olde' summer blockbuster.
patrsup, on 05/10/2008, -0/+4I have to agree with the article - make it work for you
michaelpinto, on 05/10/2008, -1/+15Sumner Redstone should be more worried about the fact that I get MTV and CBS for free and I still don't watch those channels - he needs to focus more on ad revenue and worry less about pirates.
- Viakenny, on 05/10/2008, -0/+3MTV? for free? as I know, MTV is a cable channel.
  
  (but in Italy and here in Brazil, it's an OTA network)
- deadsenator, on 05/10/2008, -0/+4An overabundance of ads are exactly why I don't watch!
- mcnasby, on 05/10/2008, -0/+1The thing is, it doesn't matter if you watch MTV. You're not the target. Assuming I'm correct, you're not some mindless 16 year old that says "like" in every other sentence. While I agree that the programming on MTV has reached an all-time low, the advertising dollars are still behind the channel because their target continues watching that kind of garbage. If the ad dollars weren't there because ratings began to fall, then I promise you Redstone would have someone look into it.
  
  Oh and while 93.1% of CBS' programming is pure crap, How I Met Your Mother is undoubtedly one of the most well-written sitcoms currently airing on TV.
MercedRocks, on 05/10/2008, -0/+4For those wanting more info, there's a video up on Google Video of Matt Mason discussing "The Pirates Dilemma"
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-648354371 ...
Jenadae, on 05/10/2008, -4/+1"Some shows are produced by other companies—just tell them to put up with this, or they're off your airwaves"

Lol?
dig1x, on 05/10/2008, -1/+16Well, do you remember what Sony said during the days of Napster?

""The [music] industry will take whatever steps it needs to protect itself and protect its revenue streams," Heckler said. "It will not lose that revenue stream, no matter what."

Fair enough, you might think. That is after all the reason behind the RIAA's legal action against Napster, though it's nice to have an industry executive admit that the case is about control of "revenue streams". Sony Pictures Entertainment operates alongside Sony Music Entertainment, an RIAA member.

But Heckler's comments, as reported by the U-Wire Web site, US news service aimed at college students, get better: "Sony is going to take aggressive steps to stop this. We will develop technology that transcends the individual user. We will firewall Napster at source - we will block it at your cable company, we will block it at your phone company, we will block it at your [ISP]. We will firewall it at your PC.

"These strategies," Heckler told conference attendees, "are being aggressively pursued because there is simply too much at stake."

I swore at that time that I'd never give Sony another nickel. They've *always* pulled this anti-customer crap, but that was the final straw.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2000/08/23/we_will_bl ...
- solid12345, on 05/10/2008, -0/+1The thing with Napster though was men like Shawn Fanning were making a profit off OTHER people's work. It is one thing for a couple kids to be downloading songs in their home for pleasure, it is another for men like Fanning or the guys at the pirate bay who profit themselves by doing nothing other than allowing people to trade files on their network. Honestly if I was a musician i'd be ***** if someone was distributing my music online and taking a cut off the ad revenue without giving me one cent.
moolcool, on 05/10/2008, -4/+6A media company stifling piracy? Buried as inaccurate.
aznhomig, on 05/10/2008, -6/+4"Blood, sweat, and tears."?

Kinda like the War in Iraq? That's going over pretty well, isn't it?

Careful not to spray DDT to kill an ant; this "War on Piracy" is waged upon ourselves, our children, and people we all know by these media companies, who happen to be owned by the largest corporations in the world.
M0stBlunt3d, on 05/10/2008, -1/+7Rich white men, running this rap *****
jakbqwic, on 05/10/2008, -0/+6redstone and cohorts can start by pushing their version of reality firmly up their own collective tight ass, fook off sumner! now then... its never been a better time to create ones own media, what with all the user friendly audio visual tech available to each and everyone of us, it takes time and effort to produce but so worthwhile, we don't want his corny ole shoite no more!
spyd3rweb, on 05/10/2008, -0/+9How about just selling a useful innovative product that satisfies peoples current needs, not peoples needs 20 years ago, and charging a fair price for it. Dear Viacom, your business model is the problem, not the pirates.
- DaDrake, on 05/10/2008, -1/+2If the product sucks so much... then why download it? Video-games aren't food and water; you simply don't need it. Sorry, but this type of entitlement ***** me off and is the exact reason why net neutrality is threatened. The status quo will not continue and more than pirates will be effected. The problem isn't the industry... it's people's moral compass.
  - spyd3rweb, on 05/10/2008, -0/+1The content is fine, its the package, the delivery, and what you can do (are allowed to do) with it that is the problem.
    
    EDIT: The content is even getting progressively less original and interesting.
Auraness, on 05/10/2008, -0/+6An idea that actually works? Don't be silly, Viacom will never listen.
zephyr42, on 05/10/2008, -0/+5You can never get away from pirates completely, you have to Compete or Die. Viacom and the RIAA and MPAA have chosen the path to death, a slow painful death that drags as many down with it. Those that have started Hulu especially, have started to catch on and are now COMPETING with the pirates. There's a TED talk or conference out there that touches on this exact subject.
Cherubim, on 05/10/2008, -0/+2I don't believe that piracy can be eliminated at all. If one tries to shut the pirates out with content restrictions they will simply find another means to get what they want.
chrgrose, on 05/10/2008, -0/+5Reminds me of southparkstudios.com. I go there whenever I'm bored and watch a few episodes. The commercial system is actually quite tolerable too--only 15 seconds long so I pretty much have to watch it if I want to see what happens next.
loganhid, on 05/10/2008, -0/+6Do what you want, cos a pirate is free
DaDrake, on 05/10/2008, -3/+1The fact is, the industry is cracking down hard on piracy and it will get worse. Consumers and ISPs have shown little regard in limiting piracy.... therefore, governments WILL get involve and try to protect people's property and innovation. Sorry .... but the fact is piracy threatens net neutrality and the status quo can not go on for much longer. Either ISPs start getting involve or the government will (and their actions will effect much more than piracy).
- mcnasby, on 05/10/2008, -1/+3You may think so, but I promise you the pirate community is far beyond the grasp of ISPs and the government. Unless the ISPs and the government have been working on some major software to decrypt the information being sent over their networks, the next wave of file sharing (currently being developed by organizations like the Pirate Bay) will prevail once again.
  
  Digital piracy won't end until these entities work with the pirates, not against them. Hulu is a perfect example of a step in the right direction.
malanic, on 05/10/2008, -1/+1Well they might get a few pirates to watch their shows with ads, but there will soon enough be the same content on TPB without ads, and you know where most of the pirates will go then. The problem then is that law abiding citizens who used to buy box sets of DVDs, and go to the movies, will just tolerate the ads and save their dollars.
Law abiding citizens (who don't pirate no matter how easy it is) are propping up the industry at the moment. Give them free content (even ad supported) and I believe the production houses profits will suffer.
Of course you'll dig me down now, because this is Digg, and everything producers make must be made for us for FREE.
freezeout, on 05/10/2008, -0/+8if I plan a bank heist with my crew over the phone is it AT&T's responsibility?
why are ISPs forced to police traffic?
joeanon, on 05/10/2008, -4/+6I think what the author fails to take into account is that the history of piracy in general really doesn't compare to digital piracy, since you can copy digital information exactly and with great ease.

Unlike say, stealing electricity or cable, you not actually stealing a tangible commodity.

That's why people won't stop, because they can't see that it's hurting anyway.

I suggest however, we will hurt our culture by creating a new model for music and movies based EVEN MORE off profit and less off innovative new ideas.

I think we can see this now.. with music, mash ups, and Hollywoods endless list of remakes.

They are effectively banking on art that is known to sell rather than art that is cutting edge.

Well, you can't have a cultural revolution if you don't pay artists one way or another.
Over the course of a few decades you take most of the incentive out of art.

NOW, the good news is that American culture sell well and the global market is growing and getting larger. Eventually though we have to face the reality that giving things away that people worked to make stems profit and innovation.

I don't think you can realistically argue that this level of piracy we see today doesn't hurt the up and coming new artists looking for a break, or the innovative script writter looking for a Hollywood level budget.

Instead we see a lot more short films and ONE HIT WONDERS, diversity is good, but this os MOSTLY happenening because production has become cheap, not because demand has gone up.

Face it, most internet bands never make a dime. Most internet films ONLY make money on advertising,

AND, advertising is not something you can realistically bet on. Huge advertising budget are only around when economies boom and advertising works. Google's profit model looks great on paper, but technically it could dry up overnight.

We should rethink non tanbible products and consider people who make money without really working to be losers, even if they get rich, they are still leeches on society. Money managers, real estate investors, commodity speculators. These guys all live to offset the cost of their lifestyle on your lifestle. They have jobs that accomplish nothing for society AND increase expensive for everyone else. Opportunity should not come at other people's expensive like that and that money, and homes and goods ONLY exist because of the working class, whom these opportunistic business people displace so they don't have to get a real job.

Even scientists WORK, there shouldn't be a job where all you do is talk on the phone trading goods and marking them up in the process. That's just stupid when it comes down to it. Good should sell to consumers for as little as possible, not be jacked up in order to support people who don't want to work for a living.

You can stop piracy with enterprise, but YOU have to offer tangible goods and services with your digital product or make it subscriber based.

You must admit subscription products like anti-virus, firewalls and online games are rarely pirated reliably. MS is simply not trying very hard to stop you from getting security updates to your pirated copy of windows. They could easily if they wanted to, but what they want is to motivate you just enough to buy a legit copy not alienate you entirely.

Music and movies should sell with special bonuses like subsciptions to the actors and musicians special sites with special offers you can ONLY get with a membership.

All in all .. piracy is going to ***** us over because it will force EVERYTHING and your mom to subscruption based, which is pretty damn secure, like your credit card web site.
Not ONLY do you require a log for each person who buys the product, you also monitor the log in and DNS lookup to see how many ips from all over the world are logging in under the same credentials.

Anyway , that's just one idea of how the new business models must work.

Another realistic move is simple. DON'T MAKE DVD and MUSIC players work on computers. If people couldn't rip music and video with any standard PC the amount of files will go down drastically, like looking for rares or high end warez.

Make DVDs play ONLY in dvd players and music DVDs that only play in similar set top boxes and stereos only. Back in the day, when mp3 started, this is how they should have handled it, but pushing out new cheap music players. Not because it stops piracy, but to reduce availability and quality of the rips.

Now, however it may be pointless to change medium and you need a longer term solution.
Plus we know in a global market you can't stop someone from making a reader for the new format.

BUT, game consoles for instance do well to prevent the majority of piracy. Needing a mod chip for instance put piracy BACK WHERE IT SHOULD BE, in the hands of the educated few, not the greedy masses.

Piracy WILL wind up going back underground more, and it should as that's how it always was until P2P. Borrowing your friends software should be GOOD enough for the masses and it 's a fair trade off.

If we just steal everything, we must realize, we are mostly stealing from American businesses and from American artists. Nations like China benefit the most from this and have the least music and video and games to pirate so they have little to lose.

Yet, American's are the biggest pirates of their own media... I guess that's efficient at least... until your culture declines do to lack of new ideas.
- TruthKid, on 05/10/2008, -1/+2Yeah...my attention span is about | | that big so I'm just gonna assume you're giving the generic "I am the business messiah" speech.
- tehhowch, on 05/10/2008, -1/+1tl;dr
pizzaguy01, on 05/10/2008, -1/+5Buried because anti piracy suxs.
cyclades, on 05/10/2008, -1/+6***** Viacom. Redstone will be dead soon anyway. The Dinosaur.
jpl7986, on 05/10/2008, -0/+3all you need is a little know-how to be a successful pirate. When you pay for MP3s, you're just rockin' out with the man.
xadious, on 05/10/2008, -0/+7Sure, The Daily Show and the Colbert Report are available on the official website now, but that hasn't stopped it and other shows from being pirated. They're still as popular as every on usenet, ftp, bittorrent etc with just as many people downloading as ever before.

This article is flawed in many ways, the author seems to think he's got the magic answer to stop piracy -- he doesn't.

Watching downloaded content, in high quality, whenever i want to, for free, beats any kind of business model these companies come up with, whether it be an entire page full of adds, a pay service or a crappy website where videos are split into tiny pieces and are in crap quality. Unfortunately for these companies, there are many people who think like this.

They're not going to stop people from downloading what they want to download, they should be happy with the billions they make as it is.
OffPiste, on 05/10/2008, -1/+3Excellent. SOmeone needs to do something about those Somalis. The US Navy sure isn't doing anything.
holyskeleton, on 05/10/2008, -0/+2well they can shove their fantasies up their asses while we get what we want.
Ne007, on 05/10/2008, -0/+4It's too late for big media. They've already ***** up enough to digg a hole big enough to bury all their corporate executive asses.

I detest them to the point where I go out of my way to screw them over.
laserblazer, on 05/10/2008, -1/+2They want you to believe that piracy and not their own ineptitude is at fault.
JedicodeWarrior, on 05/10/2008, -0/+2Much like Sumner Redstone, the Hollyweird media mogels are always a foot short and an hour late when dealing with piracy. They'd have better luck holding back the ocean with a broom. Asking the ISPs to police internet traffic is passing the buck and making others take the fall for your problems.
Yellowdog428, on 05/10/2008, -0/+2Its funny, I agree mostly with this article. I have and will pirate stuff off the internet. Some things are out of my price point, others I am a try before I buy. But one thing is for sure, I love my Lost and others.
If there is a way to use media people will do it.
I don't pirate music so much any more. If you have been under a rock for the past year Amazon now has DRM free music and I use it a lot to get dingle songs, but I am much more of a hard copy guy it seems.
I watch a lot of programing on Miro and catch up on my Daily show on my DVR.
My guess is the real Pirates out there are not stealing media, more like software. Why don't you hear about Adobe fighting DRM restrictions on Photoshop???
harajukukei, on 05/10/2008, -0/+1why would anyone want to stop piracy.... its glorious.
mm911, on 05/10/2008, -0/+1Proof that an appealing title without anything behind it is enough to make the Digg front page. I like Arstechnica but this post is pretty weak.
The Dr. Dre analogy is silly. Dr. Dre never walked up to Sumner Redstone and said "hey, I'm gonna cause you to make a billion less dollars this year!" He did exactly the opposite...big media realized he would pull in tons of cash...and that's why he was embraced. Pirates are not like Dr. Dre in any sense. The graffiti analogy is a stretch as well...graffiti was never embraced by the mainstream the way hiphop was and never will be.
The bottom line is big media can indeed profit from adapting some of the methodologies used by pirates with their Hulus and iTunes, but they will NEVER be as profitable as the days when they sold countless CDs for $15 or $18 a pop, and they will never shut down the pirates. The difference in quality between pirated media and legit media is not big enough to warrant spending more than $0 to most people, and in many cases is better than what they can buy online.
en3r0, on 05/10/2008, -1/+1Buried as inaccurate, they can't stop piracy.
LauraBlu, on 05/10/2008, -0/+0Just like marijuana, they need to legalize it.
khadin, on 05/10/2008, -0/+0To be honest, I really like South Park Studios. The few commercials there happen to be are not even anywhere close in length to those on television. Much easier than having to wait for an episode to run again or track them down another way.
solid12345, on 05/10/2008, -0/+1You can't compete with free. Won't people realize it is not the business model that is antiquated, it is morality and principles, No 16 year-old teenager with a 30 dollar a week allowance or minimum wage job is going to pay for an album EVER if he can download it for free on P2P sites. He'd much rather spend that money on stupid name-brand tennis shoes or something else you can't duplicate infinitely.
scully32, on 05/10/2008, -1/+1"We ask that companies that become aware of piracy using their facilities do something about it."

STFU. This is like asking gun manufacturers be aware of bank robbery using their products and do something about it.
aahpandasrun, on 05/10/2008, -0/+1Finally, someone in the industry that actually gets it! If you can beat the convenience and quality of stuff that's pirated, then price won't matter. Nine Inch Nails as well as South Park are great examples of the beginning of this working. And this is coming from a huge pirate.
aahpandasrun, on 05/10/2008, -0/+1While I would usually say that you can't fight piracy, this isn't really fighting piracy. This is just presenting people with something that is more attractive to them than the stuff they can pirate.
808ethan, on 05/10/2008, -0/+1Business would rather spend $5 billion to save $2 billion in pirating just to have that warm fuzzy feeling that none is getting any happiness for free.
robotsound, on 05/10/2008, -0/+1ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
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How Viacom can sink the pirates

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