New technology can beat piracy

Piracy has become such a bane that every entertainment industry is feeling the heat and can see their revenue charts dipping. It is estimated that film pirates in the UK make up to £300 million a year, a figure quoted by federation Against copyright theft (FACT).

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Commenting on this trend of film piracy citing the example of legal download of music the UK film minister Shaun Woodward said,' The real answer to fight piracy lies in development of new technologies.' "You're going to have to look at slightly more ingenious ways of making electronic copies available so that people may actually pay a different price for something that they can download at home, which is just being released in the cinema.

"If they want to watch it at home, then maybe you should make it available to them.

"But they should pay a premium rate for having it earlier on and it should be encrypted in such a way that it can't be copied."

He said He said no one offers film at the same time when they are released in the market and this time gap helps the pirates to copy and distributes the films there by making a quick profit.

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He further said that most of this money helps the funding of organized crimes.

A number of major companies, including Sky, BT and AOL, already offer film downloads in the UK, while giants such as Apple and Amazon offer similar services in the US.

Movies are also available on demand on TV in the UK through services such as cable provider NTL Telewest and broadband broadcaster Homechoice.

More than 90% of pirate DVDs came from people recording films with camcorders in cinemas, a FACT spokesman said.

Camcorded copies of hits including Pirates of the Caribbean 2, X-Men: The Last Stand and V for Vendetta have been traced back to the UK.

Looks like in few years time we will see movies being released at the same time in theaters and on DVDs to fight the piracy crime.

Via: BBCNews