FILM AND TV WORTH PAYING FOR?

I was able to recently attend a meeting for the new launch of the Industry Trust’s latest campaign against piracy.
Onthe 18th February, the UK audio-visual industry launches a new campaign that aims to win hearts and minds on copyright and creativity. The new campaign seeks to address the continued challenge posed by copyright infringement which accounts for annual losses of over 500 million.

Liz Bales, Director General of the Industry Trust for IP Awareness, said:

“Ourprevious campaigns have helped to make the public more likely to want to do the right thing. ‘Moments Worth Paying For’ goes one step further by also showing where they can do this. Findanyfilm brings together a  multitude of film and TV providers, from cinemas to online catch-up services and everything in between, to make it easier than ever for the public to enjoy official content.”

What first struck me was that there is a clear focus on, rather than being intrusive as with previous campaigns, what the experience of content delivers. “Moments worth paying for”

I had attended a previous conference which garnered a generally bad reaction from the crowd (the general public). They had quoted the average price of a cinema ticket being £4. This obviously didn’t go down well as the average price in London is higher by a good margin. The figure quoted was seen as an unfair representation, driven down by smaller cinemas’ pricing on a national average. But one audience member’s reasoning for piracy was, that he “could not go see all the movies he wanted to” because he “couldn’t afford it”.

I was able to grab a couple of minutes with Liz Bale to discuss the new initiative. It was good to find out that Liz had actually taken on board of all these points from the previous conference and fully understood the figure quoted was not indicative as a whole. But, also interestingly brought up that we have become almost ingrained with a false sense of ownership through piracy. Seeing films, listening to music which used to be a luxury, are now thought of as a given right. This is true in a way, how the general attitude towards these things have changed. But also through the rapidly developing technology of the internet, it has just become much more easily accessible. Rather than being intrusive in the new campaign, telling the public explicitly “that is wrong”. They are instead offering the onus of, if you enjoy and get something from the experience, then surely this is worth something? It hopes to “inspire greater respect for copyright and the value of creative works.”

This is being delivered through a series of themed adverts, aimed towards the 16-24 yr old market share (the largest piracy age group), run in tv & online advertorial space. The cinema space, which the adverts usually run in, is given freely to use by the British film industry. Alongside this the Industry Trust are also launching a new website findanyfilm.com -a gateway to official film and TV services across a range of formats, both on and offline. This pretty much sums up the availability of a film across different platforms.

It stands, that the majority of piracy today comes from online downloading. I spoke of how I believe, that perhaps improving the digital delivery of content might also help. Lovefilm (the UK’s biggest rental service) offers nothing in terms of this HD quality streaming or download, which in a way puts major distributors a step behind alternatives in terms of accessibility and convenience. Liz Bale did point out that the majority of people do not have internet speeds currently capable of this. Though we see the BBC & other tv networks investing in online distribution as a means of curbing copyright  infringement, perhaps the same should be done for films and within a shorter release window? At this point it seems to be about damage limitation. Yet, we are seeing box office records still being broken with films such as Avatar and even Alice in Wonderland, with the 3D revolution driving audiences back to cinemas. This campaign, for me, rightly focuses on the movie watching experience and does a great job in offering up an emotional valuation of creativity.

But do you believe this campaign will be more engaging to the public?
- Dexter Kong

Here is the campaign’s Trailers: