New study says that many of the most-pirated films aren't legally available online

[Justin Kahn]

Piracy has been a thorn in the side of the movie industry for many years now, and doesn't appear to be letting up in any sort of meaningful way. While people pirate films for many different reasons, a new report from the Washington Post, based on data from PiracyData.org, suggests that one of those reasons could be the lack of legal availability.

The report says that PiracyData collated information on the most pirated films from TorrentFreak with data from legitimate digital distribution search engine CanIStreamIt, and found that many of the most popular films apparently aren't readily available through legal means.

Referring to the most pirated movies, the site said that in last week's results (seen below) "not a single film was available from streaming from services like Netflix or Amazon Prime," and that only three of the top ten films including The Lone Ranger, After Earth, and This is the End were available for rental online at the time of the study. Furthermore, the site says that only six of the top ten films, those being Pacific Rim, The Internship, The Lone Ranger, Monsters University, After Earth, and This Is the End, were available to purchase online.

PiracyData says that over the past three weeks, 53% of the most-pirated films have been available through legal digital distribution and over the same period, only 20% have been available to stream or rent.

(Skull image via Shutterstock)

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https://www.techspot.com/news/54355-new-study-says-that-many-of-the-most-pirated-films-arent-legally-available-online.html

 

[Guest]

No **** Sherlocks.

 

[VitalyT]

I'll give you another typical example... movie Gravity has been recently released across the world, while for some bizarre reasons for UK and Ireland it is delayed by more than 1 month, just begging people to try and acquire it illegally.

What's the alternative - to travel abroad to see the movie? Wait for one month after the rest of the world has watched it? And these are English-speaking countries, which means no extra effort for distributors, so what's the hell - one might wonder...?

I'd be happy to pay the full price whatever it is to watch the movie, I just don't have any access to it at all - not in cinemas, not online. What do you think I'm gonna do - sit on my hands for another month and suck it up? This is the system broken. You should look at fixing this one instead, geniuses...

And this just keeps happening all the time...

 

[Guest]

All the piracy studies seem to be made by American "studiers" who are unaware of the fact that there are other countries in the world, where pirated films are often not available legally. And totally ignored is the aspect of translation - in some cases a film would be pirated only because it's a better translated version, or has subtitles, etc. Also there are different quality versions. I personally bought several DVDs in the US, and ended up downloading pirated films because they were of much better quality. All that will probably be revealed in a few years in some other revolutionary study. Just after a new study reveals that 2x2=4

 

[9Nails]

This is a good fact finding, but I bet it changes nothing. Which, I don't quite understand the mentality of Hollywood. I would think that mass availability and distribution would lead to greater sales. But perhaps those distribution channels take to time or effort to establish? That problem does appear to be a factor frustrating customers to a point where illegal activity is a solution. Hollywood needs to fix this quick.

 

[Kevin82485]

People Pirate movies and music because the companies that distribute it make it so hard to consume. They don't make it readily available in all areas of the world, they don't offer legal alternative ways to acquire it, or they put restrictive DRM on it so that you can't watch it on the devices you own.

I had a Blu Ray movie that had a digital copy along with. I saved a digital copy on my laptop, but when I tried to save it to my tablet as well, it would not allow me because I used my one and only digital license on my laptop. No where on the insert with the license key on it did it say that it is a one time use license key. I had no way of removing the license from my laptop or transferring the digital version to my tablet. I was stuck with my decision. So what did I do? I Pirated that movie like there was no tomorrow and got my DRM-free digital version. Not only can I save the Pirated version on whatever device I own, it is in full 1080p, where as the Licensed version is crappy 480p. I gave them my money the first time to watch the movie in the theater and a second time to own the Blu Ray version. I feel completely justified in what I did.

 

[Trillionsin]

Ahh.. thanks for the "To Download" list. lol cheers!

 

[Guest]

There are plenty of good reasons people download pirated movies from torrent sites. Where else can you get a movie that you are watching at home and have real audience members get and go to the rest room or get popcorn? Where else can you get a first run movie with a real live audience that provides a real live laugh track? Where else can you watch a first run movie that actually has Chinese subtitles? And what about the great movies where one character asks a question in English and the other character answers in Russian?

Now do you understand why Hollywood is so worried?

 

[Trillionsin]

There are plenty of good reasons people download pirated movies from torrent sites. Where else can you get a movie that you are watching at home and have real audience members get and go to the rest room or get popcorn? Where else can you get a first run movie with a real live audience that provides a real live laugh track? Where else can you watch a first run movie that actually has Chinese subtitles? And what about the great movies where one character asks a question in English and the other character answers in Russian?

Now do you understand why Hollywood is so worried?

lolwut

 

[Guest]

I think people pirate movies because more than 90% of the movies are ****, you can't tell the good ones from the bad ones any more... I have a saying that goes: "These days, anyone with a budget can make a movie".

 

[Heihachi1337]

Queue the Nicholas Cage face and "You don't say!"

 

[Xclusiveitalian]

The movie industry still makes billions of dollars, the problem is they complain when their horrible movies don't make much money and go straight to privacy, hate to break it to you, good movies makes millions and billions and get pirated and those lost sales only accounts to 1% of loss. You can make it digitally available but I doubt it will make the people who pirate it, not pirate it. Most people who pirate have no intention on viewing the material otherwise. So there is no sale loss.

 

[Guest]

People live in an Immediate gratification society. Waiting 2 to 3 month for movie to DVD just don't float with some people. I'm ready to buy after 2 weeks out of the theater after that I've lost interest. I'm giving The MAN of Steel 1 more week to either stream or come to Blu-ray or that one is also relegated to the do not buy, no longer interested list. Pirating is Played out...so 2008.

 

[Guest]

In my country, pirated films are more easier to get than original one. Prices are far cheaper and faster to get that films too.

 

[benken2202001]

Not to sound high and mighty (since I can pirate like the rest of them), but if you step back and look at things, its funny how impatience is fueling piracy. People don't want to wait for the screening, or dvd release, or dubbed/subtitled versions (whether its days, months, or years). If the availablity to buy the item is there, then cost plays a role also. But most gripes I've read are all about not being able to access the content legally.



I'm curious if they made a drug to make people more patient (marijuana?), if crime would be reduced.

 

[Guest]

AND THE REASON THEY ARE NOT AVAILABLE? because they want you to buy the bluray or dvd. followed by the other channels in the cascading value chain. C'mon get real people! They have to make money somewhere else they be no mo' blo-ck-busters. I use to pirate but I don't bother now, Simply not enough, good-enuff, content.
Peaky Blinders FTW.

 

[TorturedChaos]

When there is a movie or show I want to watch I hit up www.canistream.it. If its not on one of the services I already subscribe to, I hit up "Other" sources.
Put it on Netflix, Hulu, or Amazon Primes streaming services, and I will happily watch it there. Otherwise I'm going to find another way to watch it that probably wont involve me leaving the house.

 

[Guest]

I can assure you that After Earth and The Lone Ranger are not even in my download lists. They would need to make that available online cause they're crap movies they know no sane person would buy physical media for.

 

[SNGX1275]

All the piracy studies seem to be made by American "studiers" who are unaware of the fact that there are other countries in the world, where pirated films are often not available legally. And totally ignored is the aspect of translation - in some cases a film would be pirated only because it's a better translated version, or has subtitles, etc. Also there are different quality versions. I personally bought several DVDs in the US, and ended up downloading pirated films because they were of much better quality. All that will probably be revealed in a few years in some other revolutionary study. Just after a new study reveals that 2x2=4

Genuine question, what releases were US releases that were worse quality than non US releases?

Somewhat related note - the DVD version of Hunt for Red October was so terrible that you could easily mistake it for a several year old VHS tape. Remastered for Bluray though, looks great on that.