Video Piracy 2.0: Get Ready for Viewer Lawsuits

The Journal's Kevin Delaney details the latest frontier in online video piracy: Sites like www.YouTVpc.com that assemble links to your favorite movies and TV shows--which are hosted on third-party servers in, say, Malaysia. 

YouTVpc's proprietors don't upload the video content--they just find it and link to it.  Unlike YouTube, they also organize it in a user-friendly fashion: lists of shows by year and episode, etc.  The proprietors spend their evenings searching for videos and answering concerned emails from users saying "is this legal?" (Answer: Maybe, for now.)  They cover their costs with advertising and live off Jolt cola and kettle chips.

Implications:

• Merely "linking" to pirated video may not be illegal yet, but, presumably, after fierce lobbying and lawsuits by the MPAA, et al, it might be. (Although this would be a heroic and disturbing precedent--making lists of links illegal). 
• If such efforts fail, the MPAA, et al, will presumably follow the path blazed by the RIAA, et al, and start suing thousands of American consumers who watch pirated video.  The consumers' defense, presumably, will be, "But I didn't download it."  To which the MPAA, et al, will reply, "See you in court."  And the threat of hundreds-of-thousands-of-dollars-of-legal-fees later, most consumers will, sensibly, cave.

What is not likely to happen, but should, is that the MPAA and traditional video production companies should note that 1) successfully suing users hasn't saved the music companies, and 2) the world has changed forever and there is no way stuff the cat back in the bag.  In light of this, BigMediaVideo should pursue a parallel course:

1. Post all their old shows online on their own sites immediately and allow other sites to link to them.
2. Make clear that videos hosted on their sites are LEGAL to watch, whereas video at all other unapproved locations are ILLEGAL (and viewers may be sued, etc.)
3. Build the best-available online directories of online video (an area in which YouTube, for some reason, is failing), so as to establish a presence in video search.
4. Get better at embedding sponsorships, product placements, and, if necessary, short ads in the videos to generate as much revenue as possible.
5. Create subscriber plans in which paying users can get new videos instantly (thus offsetting any lost revenue from folks who prefer to watch TV on their PCs).
6. Share a modest referral fee with sites whose users link to and view the videos (thus encouraging affiliates to promote them.)
7. In short, EMBRACE change, instead of fighting it every step of the way.

Comments

[TallTroll]

>> In short, EMBRACE change, instead of fighting it every step of the way

Amen. The old order is failing. Those that don't evolve with the new marketplace will eventually suffer for it. There's considerable inertia to overcome, it's not as if all the Old Media companies are going to be bust by the end of the year if they don't radically change everything right this very second, but overall thigs will only move in one direction. Those companies that move with the market will prosper, those that don't.... won't

[Victor]

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[Victor]

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[Still Inside]

We keep forgetting that video is fundamentally a different animal than audio. Music can be downloaded and easily moved to the same devices you've always used (ipod, your car, your PC headphones, etc.). You listen to the same song or album over and over meaning you only need to go through the motions of getting the product once in exchange for long term repeated use.

Video is something you watch on a TV set. Once or twice. The folks in the video industry have been market testing PC video-on-demand since the Internet began and still can't find a decent audience that will pay even a small percentage of what they pay at Blockbuster since it's just not a very compelling experience.

The reason people won't come up with the $1 to watch a movie online is the product not the price.

Perhaps next, Google will take a run at the paperback book publishers and bang their head against the read-a-book-on-your-PC wall. Sounds like a good technical idea that is a pain in the neck (literally) in real life.

SI

[walt]

Facilitating illegal activity isn't illegal?

You might want to recheck your law books.

"EMBRACE change"

Like flying airliners into buildings?

Like buying bootleg copies of Vista?

Pretending theft is no longer theft because it is cheaper to steal it than pay for it is a bizarre set of ethics, principles, and morals you adhere to.

Based on your moral relativism, flying airliners into buildings might be perfectly justified after all.

[Henry Blodget]

Has it been established that viewing an episode of South Park hosted on a server in Malaysia is illegal? Downloading, sure. But viewing?

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[Helena Brie]

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