The headline is a spoiler because we know from Betteridge’s law that the answer must be “no.” That the answer is “yes” has been a matter of faith among those who earn their living through the copyright system but research has mostly failed to back that supposition up.
There’s an interesting story on Engadget that makes two points:
- Except in a special, obvious case piracy does not appear to negatively affect sales and in some cases may actually help them.
- You can’t depend on the government to tell you the truth about such things or to even let you hear the truth.
The article, EU withheld a study that shows piracy doesn’t hurt sales, reports on a $430,000 study by the Dutch company Ecorys that was commissioned by The European Commission. The study concludes that except for new, blockbuster movies, there is no evidence that piracy has any negative effect on sales and that in the case of games, may even increase them.
That was not what the commission, which has been championing laws to require ISPs to monitor and filter their users’ downloads, wanted to hear so they suppressed the report except for the part about blockbuster movies. The report was commissioned in 2013 and disappeared until EU parliamentarian Julia Reda filed a freedom of information request in 2017. The commission stonewalled as long they could but finally released the study’s findings.
As a published author, I have some skin in the game but it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that the rent seeking by the copyright industry is not in the public interest and should be reexamined. After all, if their cause is righteous, why do they need to hide the facts?