The effects of modern technology have brought forth a mixture of bile and honey. It is bile if technology is affecting you negatively and honey if it is impacting your life positively.
of video content are experiencing both right now as technology has improved the output of videos created while at the same time making it easy to pirate their work.
Piracy is affecting content creators of audio, text, video, software, and others. It is a cankerworm that has eaten deep into the fabrics of some industries, especially, the entertainment and knowledge-led industries and this has left participants completely frustrated.
Piracy is clearly a criminal act according to Nigerian copyright law but how enforceable is this law considering our complex judiciary processes?
This issue has always spurred relevant stakeholders to gather over the years to discuss the way forward in tackling the problem. There seems not to be any iota of improvement over the years. Everyone along the down the line in the entertainment industry is affected by piracy – artists, writers, authors, movie producers, music producers, cinematographers and software developers, etc.
I have often asked myself the essence of the Nigerian copyright law. Is it not to offer complete protection, preservation and reservation to the works of creators? It is sad that there is little or no compliance with this law, a situation which has prompted affected parties to call for stiffer punishment for violators.
Several forms of contents are pirated but the focus of this piece is video content because it commands lots of viewership, attracting massive attention. Believe it or not, a number of movies get seen by some ‘lucky’ few before being shown at the cinemas, or even sold to millions for low prices, causing huge revenue losses to the creators.
A Nigerian national daily reported in 2014, quoting professor of political economy and management expert, Pat Utomi, that Nigeria could be losing over $2bn to piracy every year.
What is the role of technology in all of this? There are two dimensions to this. One is that technology has in many ways contributed in worsening the situation due to unlimited access to digital resources. Two is that the same technology can also be used to curb piracy and reduce it to the barest minimum if proper models are implemented efficiently.
Most torrent websites today now get tonnes of traffic from pirates who are always in search of movies and video contents without any desire to pay for them. Torrent platforms mainly allow users to download copyrighted materials such as — Finish Reading on the Punch
