01 Oct 2023 at 05:08
Europeans will have more than 3 percent in 2022 more illegally downloaded and streamed in 2021. Digital piracy has actually decreased in recent years, but last year the trend reversed. High subscription prices and fragmentation of streaming services may be the cause of this.
Between 2017 and 2020, the number of internet users using pirated files decreased. But after the corona period, people are more likely to look for illegal streams and downloads.
The increase across Europe amounts to 3.3 percent. That doesn’t seem like much, but BREIN Foundation chairman Tim Kuik is not happy with it. “We are making efforts so that it goes down,” he says. “So if it goes up, that’s not good news.”
Of all illegally copied files, almost half of them were TV programs. In 28 percent of the cases, this involved publications, with Japanese manga comic books in particular gaining in popularity, followed by audio books and e-books. This was followed by films (11 percent), software (7 percent) and music (6 percent).
Illegal internet TV is popular in the Netherlands
In our country, illegal IPTV subscriptions are the largest form of piracy, says Kuik. These are boxes that are connected to a television. You pay less than 10 euros per month to gain access to hundreds of TV channels and streaming services.
Comparatively, things have been slightly better in the Netherlands in recent years, according to Kuik. “But it is still quite bad, if you consider that there are still about a million users of illegal IPTV offerings.”
Professor of Media Studies Mark Deuze thinks that people are looking for alternatives because more and more streaming services are being added. “It is unaffordable to subscribe to all kinds of services,” he says. According to the professor at the University of Amsterdam, it does not help that the range of services is constantly changing. “People want control over their entertainment.”
But Kuik calls it a matter of choice. “There’s more than meets the eye,” he says. “There is also a lot of choice when it comes to cars, but at some point you have to make a decision. You look at which service best suits your taste and choose the best offer. You can cancel one service every month and take another.”
Foto: Pexels
‘We should be able to see everything whenever we want’
However, humans are not programmed that way, Deuze argues. “Linear television has taught us that we have to be ready at set times for certain programs,” he says.
“Streaming has changed that: we have to be able to see everything when we want. If you want to see something on one service one day and something on another service the next, it is not affordable. But people don’t want to go back.” to the old way of watching TV and looking for a different way.”
That does not give people the right to simply pay for illegal services. According to Kuik, by subscribing to an illegal IPTV service you are contributing to a form of organized crime.
In three or four years, many streaming services will be gone.
Mark Deuze, professor of Media Studies
Illegal IPTV services are therefore under the magnifying glass of authorities. In May this year, four people running such a service were arrested in Den Helder. For ten euros a month, subscribers had access to ten thousand TV channels. After the action, hundreds of thousands of subscribers lost their illegal access and money in one fell swoop.
Moreover, Deuze thinks that the legal offer will become better for consumers in a few years. “The situation is now simply too complex,” he says. “All those different services that exist now will not last. In three or four years, many will have disappeared again. Only a few will remain and they will then purchase the supply of the disappeared services.”
2023-10-01 03:08:18
#illegal #streams #downloads #subscription #unaffordable #Tech
