Industry group hits out at counterfeit CD, DVD sales
Updated
The music and DVD industries are issuing festive season warnings about counterfeits and piracy, arguing they put the incomes and jobs of thousands of people at risk.
Presenter: Rob Sharp
Speaker: Marianna Annas, the General Manager of Music Industry Piracy Investigations
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ANNAS: It's incredibly rife at the moment. MIPI, the Music Industry Piracy Investigation organisation which I work for works on the music side and obviously on the film side, that's very, very prevalent as well and we work closely with AFACT which is the Australia Federation Against Copyright Theft and various other industry groups. So that's in fact how rife it is. Many industry groups have to band-together and work together across all round formats that it covers.
SHARP: I guess, Marianna, the obvious question is where are the bulk of the pirated copies coming from and are we talking about sophisticated operations or is it a case of someone making hundreds of copies from their home laptop computer?
ANNAS; It varies greatly, Rob. Some operations are incredibly sophisticated and some of them are a little on the low-end side. The raid that we did yesterday in Sydney's West, took place in the Western suburbs at some markets. It was the second raid of a related incident that had occurred at Boot Hill Markets in April, during the year. But there are also some very high-scale operations as well. A couple of weeks ago we did a raid where a million CDs were seized, so it takes all forms and sizes, as you can imagine.
SHARP: So how can the authorities effectively monitor the problem and stamp it out? Will they ever stamp it out?
ANNAS: Well, we believe that consumers can greatly assist in the problem in the way that they vigilantly make sure that they are trying to buy legitimate products. There are certain signs to look out for in buying legitimate products. So consumers are a big key and education is also a big key. We work very hard on the education side and on the lobbying side, and it's a question of all those things.
SHARP: Just briefly on that quality issue, how can you tell the difference between a good, original copy of a CD, whether it be music or a DVD or counterfeit?
ANNAS: There are a few things to look out for, a few key indicators for counterfeit product or possibly legitimate product are just having a look at the CD and the artwork and the graphics and are song writers' names or artists' names or titles of songs spelt incorrectly. Are the graphics a bit grainy or unclear? Are there an excessive number of tracks? For example, is it a compilation that has 75 tracks on it that looks a little bit unusual, or probably a very key indicator is, is the price so attractive that it's too good to be true? Is it really cheap?
SHARP: Yeah, on that. I mean with digital technology, the quality of the counterfeits can be almost as good as the original. So what's the incentive then for someone to pay $30 or $40 for an original CD or a DVD, when you can buy a good knock off for five or ten dollars?
ANNAS: Well, the incentive is probably two fold. First of all, you will never get the equivalent quality. You might get an advanced sound quality, but you won't get the equivalent quality in packaging and the way it comes to you as a consumer.
More importantly, the production of music is a legitimate business for many people, and that's not just recording artists and songwriters and the people that actually work on the production side, but it has a domino affect. It is also the people who work in the warehouses, that pack the music and get them to the stores, and it's the people who work in the stores. It's retailers, whether that's chain retailers or small businesses, just try to make a living out of selling legitimate music.
SHARP: Marianna, on the issue of cost, I mean would it be easier for the music and DVD industries to combat the problem if the price of legitimate CDs and DVDs was more reasonable?
ANNAS: I think if you consider that to be fair when a new release hits the market, it probably is around the $30 mark. That's actually not to disproportionate from say the computer games or the electronic games price bracket, but also on the other hand, say a Top 100 or a Top 20 release will find its way down to the $20 or the $15 or even the $10 price tag within about six to 12 months of its release.
