Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul Audiovisual Piracy BitTorrent Protocol Unofficial Distribution Feature Films

1
Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul
School of Social Communication
Graduate Program In Social Communication
Audiovisual piracy: the BitTorrent protocol as an unofficial way of online
distribution of feature films
Liana Gross Furini
Porto Alegre, January 2015

2
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
To CAPES, for the scholarship that enabled the production of this research.
To Famecos/PUCRS, especially to my coordinator, Cristiane Mafacioli
Carvalho, for the opportunity to teach and learn.
To FACCAT, especially to my coordinator, Augusto Parada, and Ticiano
Paludo, for believing and betting on me.
To my students that, even not knowing it, were my inspiration in many times
during the writing of this work.
To the Director of Communications of BitTorrent Inc., Christian Averill, who
received me with all the kindness and gave me an insightful interview.
To the Group of Ubiquitous Technology, Ubitec, for providing a wonderful
environment of study, research and many discoveries. We are a great team.
To my therapists, Nathalia (my psychologist) and Ale Ravanello (my teacher
of harmonica), for helping me to keep my head together.
To my friends, who have been by my side all the time, especially to Bruna,
who always calmed down the mood.
To my advisor, Roberto Tietzmann, which throughout time became my
master, guru, mentor and counselor. For accepting me as his padawan.
To Matheus, for the tireless encouragement and for always being by my side,
even miles and miles away.
And to my family, for give meaning to it all.

3
It’s better to be a pirate than to join the navy.
Steve Jobs

4
ABSTRACT
This dissertation targets the analysis of the non-official practices of distribution
of feature length films. Although piracy follows the cinematographic industry
since its beginning, the popularization of digital technologies has contributed
to the increase of the discussions on the subject. In this work, we used the
Grounded Theory and will analyze the interaction of users with the piracy to
understand their responsibility related to the non-official distribution of
cinematographic material. We applied the analysis in two feature length films,
focusing on BitTorrent protocol: Let The Right One In (2008) and Captain
America: The Winter Soldier (2014). We learned from these analyses that the
unofficial distribution is more agile than the formal distribution, attracting
spectators and creating new demands for the industry. We emphasize that the
computer and the internet are key-piece in the increase of official circulation.
The computer for the ability to produce many copies in a short time, and the
Internet for the possibility of distributing the content worldwide at no cost and
with great agility.
KEYWORDS: Piracy; Digital technologies; Content sharing; Internet.

5
FIGURES
Figure 1: Countries that most pirate movies .................................................. 11

Figure 2: The Jolly Roger flag........................................................................ 18

Figure 3: Covers of contemporary children’s books that tell the story of the
pirate Jolly Roger.................................................................................... 20

Figure 4: Identification guide of Pirated Material – APCM ............................. 30

Figure 5: Frames of Star Film’s movies ......................................................... 49

Figure 6: Titles released on home video in Brazil from 2008 to 2013............ 52

Figure 7: Total audience in theaters from 2009 to 2013 ................................ 57

Figure 8: Post related to the release of the movie The Way He Looks on
iTunes Store Brazil ................................................................................. 66

Figure 9: Official Pirate version of the movie The Way He Looks ................. 67

Figure 10: Popcorn Time’s Goodbye letter .................................................... 73

Figure 11: Screenshots of examples of Promo Bay ...................................... 80

Figure 12: Mobile version of µTorrent’s app .................................................. 83

Figure 14: Oldest file of The Pirate Bay related to the movie Let The Right
One In..................................................................................................... 89

Figure 15: Oldest file of isoHunt related to the movie Let The Right One In . 90

Figure 16: File of BJ2.me related to the movie Let The Right One In............ 91

Figure 17: File of 4Shared related to the movie Let The Right One In .......... 92

Figure 18: Full movie Let The Right One In on YouTube .............................. 93

Figure 19: Oldest file of Open Subtitles related to the Brazilian Portuguese
subtitles of the movie Let The Right One In ........................................... 94

Figure 20: Oldest file of Legendas.tv related to the Brazilian Portuguese
subtitles of the movie Let The Right One In ........................................... 95

Figure 21: Poster of the movie Captain America: The Winter Soldier ........... 99

Figure 22: Comparison between the qualities of Captain America’s movie files
.............................................................................................................. 103

Figure 23: Watch It Now! app ...................................................................... 118

6
TABLES
Table 1: Dates of the oldest files of the movie Let the Right One In on
researched sites ..................................................................................... 96

Table 2: Top of the table of data of the movie Captain America: The Winter
Soldier................................................................................................... 104

7
GRAPHICS
Graphic 1: Total number of files available in relation to time on The Pirate Bay
.............................................................................................................. 105

Graphic 2: Quality of the files in relation to the total number on The Pirate Bay
.............................................................................................................. 107

Graphic 3: Total number of files available in relation to time on BJ2.me..... 109

Graphic 4: Quality of the files in relation to the total number on BJ2.me..... 110

Graphic 5: Number of seeders of leading file in relation to time on The Pirate
Bay........................................................................................................ 111

Graphic 6: Quality of files in relation to the number of seeders on The Pirate
Bay........................................................................................................ 112

Graphic 7: Number of seeders of leading file in relation to time on BJ2.me 113

Graphic 8: Quality of files in relation to the number of seeders on BJ2.me. 114

8
SUMMARY
Introduction.................................................................................................... 9
1. Piracy: history and concepts.................................................................. 16
1.1. The pirate of wooden-leg, glass eye and bad face ....................................16
1.2. Definitions and concepts about piracy.......................................................23
1.2.1. Copyright and Industrial Property ............................................................33
1.3. Current overview on piracy..........................................................................39
2. Piracy on cinema – and beyond ............................................................. 47
2.1. Exhibition windows and the cinematographic market ..............................50
2.2. Arguments: pros and cons ..........................................................................54
2.3. The impact of digital technologies..............................................................59
2.4. Technologies involved in audiovisual piracy in home video market.......69
2.4.1. The BitTorrent Protocol............................................................................75
2.4.2. The Pirate Bay .........................................................................................78
3. Analysis of piracy in feature films ......................................................... 84
3.1. Piracy as a way of access to least popular movies...................................85
3.2. Piracy following the official release of a film .............................................97
Final Considerations ................................................................................. 116
References ................................................................................................. 122
Annex.......................................................................................................... 132
Appendix..................................................................................................... 135

9
INTRODUCTION
Piracy is a practice that haunts the entertainment industry since its
inception. Feared by industry and widely practiced by users, it is the object of
much criticism and also many arguments in favor. Although it is not a new
practice, the discussion about piracy became more intense with the
popularization of digital technologies, especially from the early 1990s, as
pointed out by Zandbergen (2010). These technologies have made the
production of copies not so dependent of complex processes and thus have
allowed that average user could make unauthorized copies of materials.
The justification for conducting this study is given by the fact that,
increasingly, piracy is part of society and the act of pirating is more common.
Perhaps for this reason there are very opinionative and little questioning
speeches about the impact of piracy on industry and cinematographic market.
In search of theoretical basis, we also realize that there are few authors that
define piracy. In most texts, the term is quoted as trivial, like it did not need to
be defined because it is common knowledge. It turns out that, in practice, the
term piracy is widely applied to different contexts, and often wrongly. Thus, we
understand that the term is lacking of definitions, and we intend to formalize
one in this work.
Accordingly, the objective of this research is to understand how the
internet has changed the relationship of users with the circulation of
audiovisual material. We also explore how the BitTorrent protocol influence on
the power of the users regarding the unofficial circulation and to what extent
the digital technology and the construction of a participatory culture alter the
relationship of these individuals with the distribution of audiovisual products.
The research problem, then, is to understand how the internet changes the
relationship of the users with the circulation of film productions.
For Castells and Cardoso (2013, S/P), studying piracy in the
cinematographic context is important because, without it, there is no official
circulation. Studying digital technologies from the communication point of view
is relevant because they brought great changes in this field. Together with the
Internet, these technologies have empowered the user (who was until then a

10
simple receptor content, if analyzed from the point of view of traditional
media), since on the internet that user actively participates in the production
and circulation of content. The internet media deserves to be studied because
it is part of the everyday life of the society. As discusses Silverstone (2002)
Understanding the media as a process - and recognize that the
process is fundamental and eternally social - is to insist in the media
as historically specific. The media is changing, has changed,
radically. The twentieth century saw the telephone, the cinema, the
radio, the television become mass consumer objects, but also
essential tools for everyday life. We now face the ghost of another
intensification the mediatic culture for global growth of the Internet
and the promise (some would say threat) of an interactive world
where everything and everyone can be accessed instantaneously
1
(p. 17, freely translated).
This power given to the user has two sides: first, it adds to the internet
the characteristic of a repository of audiovisual works (the circulation of
audiovisual works is precisely this research's study object) and, in a second
time, the internet also facilitates the unauthorized duplication of content under
copyright protection, what we will call here piracy - explaining panoramas and
concepts.
From empirical observation, we found that the desire for consuming
audiovisual content is the key for piracy to happen. The cinema and television
entered into the lives of consumers and never left, and this shows the desire
that people have to consume audiovisual material, either officially or in
parallel, outside the traditional system of materials circulation. People want to
see the film that they like, not necessarily what is offered to them.
To Larkin (2004), it is thanks to digital technologies that Hollywood
movies are “available at a speed and volume as never before” (p. 295), and it
also happens due to the increase in piracy, that ends up being responsible for
the circulation of a large part of these materials. The author refers to
American film industry movies, but their affirmation is also true related to the
1
Originally, “Entender a mídia como processo – e reconhecer que o processo é fundamental
e eternamente social – é insistir na mídia como historicamente específica. A mídia está
mudando, já mudou, radicalmente. O século XX viu o telefone, o cinema, o rádio, a televisão
se tornarem objetos de consumo de massa, mas também instrumentos essenciais para a
vida cotidiana. Enfrentamos agora o fantasma de mais uma intensificação da cultura
midiática pelo crescimento global da Internet e pela promessa (alguns diriam ameaça) de um
mundo interativo em que tudo e todos podem ser acessados, instantaneamente”.

11
Brazilian context. According to TorrentFreak site, Brazil is the fourth country in
the world that most pirates movies, behind Russia, United States and Italy
(Figure 1).
Figure 1: Countries that most pirate movies
Source: TorrentFreak
2
The survey was conducted by MarkMonitor, company of Thomson
Reuters, and considers only downloads made through softwares of peer-to-
peer technology 3
eDonkey and BitTorrent. Altogether, 16 movies were
analyzed in this research, including, Frozen, The Hobbit: the Desolation of
Smaug e The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, all of 2013. The research
concluded that the films were illegally shared 150,186,156 times. This number
shows that the practice of piracy is widespread among individuals, pointing
numerically that there is currently a large number of people involved in piracy
of audiovisual content.
According to Paul Craig, “like or hate it, piracy has found a place in our
society and has been widely adopted by both young and old” (2005, p. 232).
The author comments that it is often seen as something that adds social
capital say to friends that have seen the movie that will be released in
theaters next week, or played a game that is not yet available to buy. In this
sense, we understand that piracy, despite being parallel to the official means
2
Available in <http://torrentfreak.com/and-the-movie-file-sharing-capital-of-the-world-is-
140622/>, captured at July 3
rd
2014.
3
Peer-to-peer (or P2P) is an architecture that allows exchange of files between users, without
the need for a server mediating contact between them. We will talk more about this in
Chapter 2.

12
and, therefore, illegal, is still seen as a plus point for the social capital of some
groups.
The choice to study piracy through digital technologies instead of other
spaces (like selling material through street vendors, for example) is explained
in terms that, even though it has always been part of the concerns of the film
industry, the discussion about the issue took another dimension after the
popularization of the internet4
. In this sense, the internet is an environment
where content is controlled by the users themselves and also due to the
increase of bandwidth5
, which enabled the internet user access multiple file
types. In the cinema context, it means that part of the control of the circulation
of the movie leaves the hands of the producers and distributors, jeopardizing
the traditional models of distribution of audiovisual material.
The popularity of P2P architecture is proof that the users have in their
hands the control regarding to the circulation of works. This decentralized
environment allows users to exchange files with each other, eliminating the
need of a server hosting these files. The research is focused on the BitTorrent
protocol, which allows users to transfer large files consuming little bandwidth,
through the network decentralization. From an empirical observation, we
noticed that the films are distributed in various spaces and digital media. We
chose to work with BitTorrent by noticing greater resilience, while the files
being shared are not on a single server, but spread on the personal
4
Currently, 47% of Brazilians have internet access at home, according to the Brazilian Media
Research 2014 conducted by the Secretariat of Social Communication of the Presidency of
Republic of Brazil. Available in <http://blog.planalto.gov.br/pesquisa-brasileira-de-midia-
2014/>, captured at November 23
rd
2014.
5
According to research about the use of Information and Communication Technologies in
Brazil - ICT households and companies 2013, the increase in connection speeds is a
notorious movement in Brazil. The number of households with internet access that exceed
the 8Mbps speed increased from 8% in 2011 to 21% in 2013, while the number of households
with internet speed below 2Mbps decreased. "This movement must be seen and understood
in the light of the continued development of applications and more complex content,
especially video streaming and audiostreaming content. These new content increase the flow
of data in the world wide web and require connection speeds increasingly higher - a
phenomenon that is not restricted to Brazil, but occurs in many parts of the world, even
though at different rates in each region or country". Originally, “esse movimento deve ser
observado e compreendido à luz do contínuo desenvolvimento de aplicações e conteúdos
mais complexos, sobretudo conteúdos de videostreaming e audiostreaming. Esses novos
conteúdos aumentam o fluxo de dados na rede mundial de computadores e exigem
velocidades de conexão cada vez mais altas – fenômeno este que não se restringe ao Brasil,
mas ocorre em diversas partes do mundo, ainda que em ritmos distintos em cada região ou
país”. Available in
<http://www.cgi.br/media/docs/publicacoes/2/TIC_DOM_EMP_2013_livro_eletronico.pdf>,
captured at: November 23
rd
2014.

13
computers of the users themselves. As a result, even if the connection with a
given user is lost, as often happens, the files can still be shared by other
users.
The protocol creation facilitated downloading large files. Download
movies via direct download has a higher propensity to have problems due to
the weight of the audiovisual file (commonly higher than 1GB and, depending
on the compression, may be even higher), and spends a lot of bandwidth to
download because the file is transferred from a single server.
To download a file via direct download, the download needs to be done
without interruption. This means that in case of a problem with the internet or
the computer, the download is interrupted6
and needs to be restarted, losing
what had been downloaded until then. In case of downloading a torrent, the
file is gradually transferred from various locations at the same time and, after
the download completed, the software responsible for doing so takes charge
for picking up the pieces in one file. Since the file is downloaded in parts,
nothing is lost if the download is interrupted. This dissertation will work with
these two types of downloads, focusing on the BitTorrent protocol.
This work has three chapters: the first is a conceptualization chapter,
which deals with the term piracy, originated from maritime piracy, and the
imaginary relating to the pirate, a protagonist figure in this context. We also
will point out the relations of the term with what we understand as piracy
related to copyright. The chapter aims to contextualize the reader about what
exactly is piracy and to which definitions the concept currently leads us.
The second chapter brings us closer to the central theme of this
research: piracy in cinema. In this chapter, we point the opposing positions
that agencies, institutions and users have concerning to the practice of piracy.
Also in the second chapter, we talk about how digital technologies and the
Internet have influenced the distribution of audiovisual material. Since piracy
is not a present day phenomenon and has always existed in the movies,
Chapter 2 helps us to understand what caused this issue to be the subject of
much polemic after the popularization of digital technologies.
6
There are softwares called resuming downloads, that recover lost downloads due to network
problems or on the file and restart the download from the point where it stopped.

14
The third chapter of this dissertation is intended for the analysis of the
research objects: feature films. To understand the relationship of users with
pirated versions of feature films, we analyzed the parallel circulation of two
films: Let The Right One In, by Tomas Alfredson (2008) and Captain America:
The Winter Soldier, by Anthony Russo and Joe Russo (2014). These films
have different characteristics and, in this sense, the analysis has shown that
the public was also related with them differently.
Since the beginning of the research, we felt a difficulty in identifying a
pirated material. With digitalization, duplicate materials staying with the same
quality of the original, being thus impossible to identify an original or pirate
material just observing the image. In this sense, we created an ad hoc
methodology to verify the circulation of pirated material, which we'll talk more
extensively in Chapter 3.1.
We based the creation of this methodology in. According to the
Grounded Theory Institute 7
, the Grounded Theory is an inductive
methodology. In other words, it is not ready, and will be defined as more data
is being analyzed. Borgatti (S/D) also points that “the phrase ‘grounded
theory’ refers to theory that is developed inductively from a corpus of data”
(S/D, online). Carrero, Soriano and Trinidad (2014) claim that the Grounded
Theory is within the social research, in a category of interpretative analysis.
For them, the Grounded Theory alert to the emergence of social standards
process based on investigated data.
Glaser and Strauss (2009), explain that
Generating a theory from data means that most hypotheses and
concepts not only come from the data, but are systematically worked
out in relation to the data in the course of the research (p. 06).
We also used bibliographic research and content analysis. For
bibliographical research, books and newspapers relating to the proposed
theme were used as background, and we added to the research sites and
blogs, very important sources when dealing with a contemporary theme as
proposed here. Bardin (1977) explains that the recourse to the computer
offers new possibilities and affects the content analysis because allows
7
Available in <http://www.groundedtheory.com/>, captured at: December 7
th
2014.

15
researchers to access a vast universe of information and also because
automates some processes. The theoretical reflections on the new media are
increasingly important, as they are part of user’s daily life. To Johnson (2010,
p. 18),
The first generation of the WWW and Internet applications, marked
mainly by human interaction with computers and access to text,
audio and/or video, gave way to new software packages and tools of
the called generation Web 2.0. These applications of the second
generation of the Internet brought embedded a set of principles and
practices where the highlight is the possibility of participation,
collective production and sharing of knowledge and entertainment
8
(freely translated).
This work also analyzes the internet and the piracy from the point of
view of Practice Theory. To Postill (2010, p. 1), “practices are the embodied
sets of activities that humans perform with varying degrees of regularity,
competence and flair”. In this sense, we understand that piracy is not an
isolated event or an established paradigm, but something usual and,
therefore, should be analyzed as practice. We will, then, use the Practice
Theory as background to build our analysis from the Grounded Theory, based
on the data obtained.
Now that we explained how the journey will happen, let's raise the
anchors, hoist the Jolly Roger and leave in search of treasure. Welcome to
the ship.
8
Originally, “A primeira geração da WWW e dos aplicativos de Internet, marcada
principalmente pela interação humana com os computadores e o acesso a arquivos de texto,
áudio e/ou vídeo, cedeu lugar a novos pacotes de software e ferramentas da chamada
geração Web 2.0. Esses aplicativos da segunda geração da Internet trouxeram embutidos
um conjunto de princípios e práticas onde o ponto alto é a possibilidade de participação,
produção coletiva e compartilhamento de conhecimento e entretenimento”.

16
1. PIRACY: HISTORY AND CONCEPTS
Currently, piracy is a concept applied regarding the unauthorized
reproduction of materials such as movies, music, software, among others.
Originally, the term piracy is related to maritime piracy, known in the world
focused on the historical question, by the pirate character, commonly
represented very similarly in books, comics, movies, etc.
In this first chapter, we will introduce the reader to the world of maritime
piracy, bringing issues to the character of the pirate, its symbols and the
imaginary that surrounds it. Then, we will seek to conceptualize and analyze
the kind of piracy we want to explore in this work: related to non-compliance
of copyright, bringing concepts and pros and cons speeches. At this time, we
will also conceptualize and differentiate intellectual property and copyright,
explaining what they are and how they apply.
1.1. The pirate of wooden-leg, glass eye and bad face
The term piracy is originally linked to maritime piracy, which has as
main visual element the historic character of the pirate, as we will deal with in
this chapter. This figure was (and still is) represented in books, movies, comic
books and other cultural products, commonly based on a very similar
imaginary: the pirate of wooden-leg, glass eye and bad face9
.
Imaginary, according to Silva (2006), is like a reservoir, because
“aggregates images, feelings, memories, experiences, visions of the real”10
(p. 11, freely translated). According to the same author, the imaginary is built
individually, through feelings, memories and experiences, and in a group,
through everything that has been seen, felt and remembered in relation to the
pirates, in the various media that represented them. These experiences
9
According to the Dictionary Cravo Albin of the Brazilian Popular Music, “O Pirata da Perna
de Pau” is a carnival song recorded by Nuno Roland in 1946, made famous in the carnival
next year. Available in <http://www.dicionariompb.com.br/nuno-roland/dados-artisticos>,
captured at: December 17
th
2014.
10
Originally, “agrega imagens, sentimentos, lembranças, experiências, visões do real”.

17
establish a repertory, which suggests interpretations and updates the
imaginary that here we seek to rescue. On the other hand, for Maffesoli
(2001), the imaginary is always collective. For the author, the imaginary “is the
state of mind that characterizes a nation. This is not something simply
rational, sociological or psychological, because it also carries something
imponderable, a certain mystery of creation or transfiguration”11
(p. 75, freely
translated). When the imaginary is related to some cultural work - which is the
case analyzed in this work - the author say that the work has an aura that
goes beyond its materiality. This aura is not seen by the people who enter in
contact with the work, but we know it exists and we can feel it. For Maffesoli,
the imaginary is this aura - which he calls "atmosphere" - that we do not see,
but can perceive, and to which we turn when we seek to update the
representations.
Rediker (2001, p. 139) claims that historically, piracy is a crime on a
large scale and also, in most cases, a way of life voluntarily chosen, after
individuals have been challenged or rejected by society. Russell (2010, p. 69)
mentions that the coast of Somalia in previous centuries had a lot of illegal
fishing, which harmed local fishermen whose livelihoods depended on this
activity. At this point, the pirates of the region were understood as a
bodyguard of people, gaining credit and often even status for militia heroes
with the local population for scaring off outsiders. Other men became pirates
when their merchant ships were taken, working outside the law and trade
agreements.
Piracy was sentenced criminally in a court for the first time in 1718, in
Charleston, South Carolina, United States. A judgment made by judge
Nicholas Trott declared as guilty Stede Bonnet and 33 members of his crew,
which initiated the disagreements between government agents and pirates.
According to Rediker (2001), both sides offered rewards for the capture of
their opponents, promoting the idea that pirates were a parallel state to the
official and challenged it. Actions like this, with a bias of rebellion and
autonomy, point to some reasons why pirates are popularly admired and seen
11
Originally, “é o estado de espírito que caracteriza um povo. Não se trata de algo
simplesmente racional, sociológico ou psicológico, pois carrega também algo de
imponderável, um certo mistério da criação ou da transfiguração”

18
as heroes, although their acts were unlawful and, as shown in most cases,
violent.
According to Rediker (2001), many pirates had served the Navy, where
living conditions were hard. There, they often ran out of food, the discipline
was severe, the mortality was high and the wages were low. The combination
of these factors has made some of them decide to leave the Navy and enter
for a life outside the system.
For Russel (2010, p. 76, freely translated), "piracy, by definition, is for
private gain"12
. This idea of private interest could also align with national
interests, serving as illegal operations agent. We highlight the Brazil
commercial relationship with England, that used to make trades on a small
scale since the beginning of the sixteenth century, until it became a practice
called privateer, in which “private vessels were granted permission of the
crown to loot and attack ships of other nationalities, and in return paid part of
the booty to the government”13
(KNIVET, 2008, p. 14, freely translated).
Figure 2: The Jolly Roger flag
Source: Wikimedia Commons
14
12
Originally, “pirataria, por definição, é para ganho privado”.
13
Originally, “navios privados recebiam autorização da coroa para saquear e atacar navios
de outras nacionalidades, e em troca pagavam parte do butim para o governo”
14
Available in <http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Jolly-roger.svg>, captured at: May 15
th
2014.

19
Kuhn (2010) interprets the golden age of piracy as an alternative government,
just driven by different rules. The greatest symbol of the golden age of piracy
is the flag that shows a skull with two crossed bones, as can be seen in
Figure 2. This flag, called Jolly Roger, is typical of pirates and widely used
today in representations.
Pringle (2001) points out that, before the traditional flag with skull and
crossbones, ships hoisted a red flag as a warning for the enemy ship to
surrender. The legend says that this red flag was painted with enemy blood.
The black flag started to be used later. It is difficult to find the date at
which the red flag began to be used by the pirates but, according Pringle
(2001), the first record of the use of the black flag is from 1700. The author
points out two different theories related to the use of the name “Jolly Roger”.
The first version tells that the French pirates called the red flag joli rouge,
which means, in English, intense red. Being spoken by English pirates, the
name of the flag was corrupted to Jolly Roger due to the pronunciation and,
later, the name started to be associated with the two flags: both the red and
the black. The second theory is that a group of pirates of the eastern seas
called The Chiefs of Cannonore had, in Tamil language, the title of Ali Raja,
which means king of the sea. The English pirates said they actually ruled the
seas, and the title given to them was gradually changed to Ally Roger, Olly
Roger, Old Roger, and then Jolly Roger.
The name Jolly Roger became widely known due to this flag and
ended up being replicated with another meaning inside fictional stories.
Several fictional books and movies of a pirate who takes the name of Jolly
Roger, usually presented in children's works as a fellow pirate, nice and friend
of children, as can be seen in Figure 3.

20
Figure 3: Covers of contemporary children’s books that tell the story of the pirate Jolly Roger

21
Source: Google Books and Amazon
15
The transformation of the pirates from political and economic actors to
characters in fictional narratives was due to the wide circulation of fictional
works. All these works bring pirates in an outstanding position, often as
catalysts of decisive situations of the narratives, a fictional updating of the
imaginary established about such characters.
In these works, frequently the pirates are well received by audience. It
is interesting to think about the fact that a figure known for stealing and doing
evil be so well received by the public. Good examples are the characters of
Hook, represented by the actor Dustin Hoffman on the movie Hook16
(1991)
and Jack Sparrow, represented by the actor Johnny Depp the franchise of
films Pirates of the Caribbean (2003, 2006, 2007 and 2011). One possible
explanation for these characters being so beloved by the audience is given by
Robertson (2010), who says that the pirates are fascinating because, even
though they were “brutal and violent delinquents, unscrupulous selfish and in
moral decay”17
(p. 08, freely translated), they knew how to have fun and
showed a lot of physical strength, courage, loyalty, entrepreneurial spirit and a
strong sense of equality, features that approached them to heroes. The
15
Jolly Roger, the pirate. Available in
<http://books.google.com.br/books?id=cQx3CrJ2nckC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=
false>, captured at: May 15
th
2014.
Jolly Roger and the Treasure. Available in <http://books.google.com.br/books?id=-
Pqk_fyLnsQC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=fal
se>, captured at: May 15
th
2014
Jolly Roger and the Pirates of Captain Abdul. Available in <www.amazon.com/Jolly-Roger-
Pirates-Captain-
Abdul/dp/0763625396/ref=pd_sim_sbs_b_1?ie=UTF8&refRID=0T1A9G5JX7K272H24B65>,
captured at: May 15
th
2014
Jolly Roger and the Pirates of Abdul the Skinhead. Available in <www.amazon.com/Jolly-
Roger-Pirates-Abdul-
Skinhead/dp/0671668439/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1400187454&sr=1-
1&keywords=9780671668433>, captured at: May 15
th
2014
Inside Jolly Roger's Pirate Ship. Available in <www.amazon.com/Inside-Jolly-Rogers-Pirate-
Ship/dp/1846661498/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1400187273&sr=1-
1&keywords=9781846661495>, captured at: May 15
th
2014
Roger, the Jolly Pirate. Available in <www.amazon.com/Roger-Jolly-Pirate-Brett-
Helquist/dp/0064438511/ref=pd_cp_b_1>, captured at: May 15
th
2014
16
Movie that presents a modern version of the story of Peter Pan, the boy who wanted to be
a child forever. In this movie, Peter Pan grows and starts to worry too much about the job,
leaving the family aside. Until the Captain Hook kidnaps his family and Peter Pan needs to
return to Neverland to get them.
17
Originally, “delincuentes brutales y violentos, egoístas sin escrúpulos y en decadência
moral”.

22
entrepreneurial spirit recognized in the Pirates is still admired by real
entrepreneurs. Steve Jobs, founder of Apple Inc., said to his employees that
“It’s better to be a pirate than to join the navy”, with the aim of encouraging a
rebellious spirit on the team (ISAACSON, 2011), which developed the first
Macintosh computer in 1983.
Many images that are part of the Pirates of these fictions continue to be
repeated: the eye patch, a scraggly beard on the face, the sword and the gun
always close, the black flag with skull and crossbones - the Jolly Roger -
hoisted on the sailboat, a parrot on the shoulder and the promise of a hidden
treasure documented on a map. These are images that suggest a life on the
margins of society and the known nations, far from their moral and strict
codes, with indications of violence and always ready to return: a typical anti-
hero, contradicting the traditional conventions.
Retaking the definition of imaginary by Maffesoli (2001), he explains
that the fact that an imaginary about something exists determines the shape
of the images related to this subject. The author refers to the construction of
the ideal related to the city of Paris. For him, the city is what it is as a result of
the imaginary that it has. Bringing to pirate context, we can see that, from the
time that the imaginary of the pirate is formed (and, for Maffesoli, this is a
historic building), the works that use that figure tend to reproduce it in a similar
way, because, recalling, the imaginary according to Maffesoli is always a
collective construction.
As we can see, on the exploration of the imaginary bound to the term
pirate, we find suggestions of adventure, easy enrichment and life outside the
system and their contracts. Mediated by the representations of these
characters in literary, theatrical and cinematographic works, the term was
being introduced into the daily lives of people who had contact with these
works and, little by little, reduced to a minimal set of visual symbols and
attitudes, widespread as a metaphor for activities of fraud or forgery.
Nowadays, the term became also used to deal with unauthorized
circulation of intellectual and artistic content. These actions are commonly
treated as a synonym of piracy and attenuate the criminal connotation of the
original meanings of the word when updating the imaginary about it as a
widespread practice – a choice of media consumption, not a life path and

23
professional like the pirates of centuries earlier. Anyway, the two types of use
for the pirate term deal with people who appropriate something that is not
theirs and reuse in their own way. In maritime piracy, the intent was to take for
them. Now, it's spreading.
Although far from the representation of a pirate with wooden-leg, glass
eye and bad face, the maritime piracy still exists and pirate attacks are not
uncommon. According to Defoe (2008), the current pirate attacks are most
numerous in the West Indies than anywhere else in the world. The study on
the maritime piracy served as the basis to understand where the name of
piracy, which we employ in this dissertation, came from: the practice of
copyright infringement. In this sense, although the maritime piracy still exists,
from now on we are going to use the term piracy referring to the copyright-
related piracy.
1.2. Definitions and concepts about piracy
Piracy is a term widely used and applied to various contexts. As we
have seen, in a contemporary context, away from the seven seas we got to
the term its original meaning, piracy has become a metaphor understood as
the unauthorized appropriation of products or services under the shield of
copyright. In this chapter, we want to conceptualize piracy accurately to,
henceforth, know exactly of what practice we're talking about. We will do this
by taking as starting point concepts of authors that talk about piracy in
general, without relating it, at that point, with some specific material.
In this subchapter, we will show piracy concepts related to areas close
to the one that is the focus of this research (piracy of audiovisual material).
These definitions are important because, through them, we can understand
how piracy is dealt with in other areas of cultural industry. With this
knowledge, we can more properly define the term.
We will also take as a basis for piracy concept the definitions that some
official agencies (related to government or not) give to the term. We will use
as a basis some Brazilian Laws: Law No. 9.610, of February 19th
1998

24
(Copyright Law); Law No. 9.279, of May 14th
1996 (Industrial Property Law);
Law No. 8.078 of September 11th
1990 (Consumer Protection Code); Law No.
9.609, of February 19th
, 1998 (Law of Intellectual Property of Computer
Program); Law No. 12.965, of April 23rd
2014 (Civil Rights Framework for the
Internet).
To begin, it is important to point out that "piracy has always been a
problem for the established powers" 18
(RIBEIRO, 2010, p. 27, freely
translated). This is valid for both the pirates who plundered ships and took the
place of the cities’ fishermen, and the pirates that defy the laws and make
unauthorized copies of copyrighted materials. By definition: “Piracy is a
violation of copyright law. It involves the unauthorized reproduction,
distribution or performance of a creative work” (BRYANT, 2011, p. 434). In the
same sense, Marshall (2005, p. 110) affirms that piracy is a label “given to
activities which involve the unauthorized reproduction of copyrighted
material”.
In fact, when analyzing the Law No. 9.610, of February 19th
1998,
called Copyright Law, we realize that the transgression of this law goes far
beyond reproduction, distribution and execution of protected material. The law
considers publication, transmission or emission, retransmission, distribution,
communication to the public, reproduction and finally, counterfeiting, which
means unauthorized reproduction of works. Thus, we see that the settings
that we found with regard to the term piracy do not reflect the complexity of
the term. Therefore, we will present below some piracy definitions relating to
specific practices, which are not related to the movies, but to related areas.
The definitions of the term concerning delimited practiced of piracy – leaving
the generalization that we talk so far – will help us better understand how the
practice is seen in other areas for, after, focus on the piracy of audiovisual
material, focus of this research.
The Copyright and Industrial Property Laws exist to protect the authors
and the industries related to movable property, a term that applies to materials
that are not fixed, in other words, that can be written, rewritten, shared, etc.
The justification is that piracy harms both the authors and the industry
18
Originally, “a pirataria sempre foi um problema para os poderes estabelecidos”.

25
responsible for the production and commercialization of those goods. To
protect these individuals and entities, some institutions, many linked to the
government and others independent, are responsible for monitoring and
controlling these assets. These entities are related to different types of
materials: some to the audiovisual industry, some to music, some to
copyright, industrial property, intellectual property, among others. Each one of
them has its approach about what is piracy, relating the practice with the type
of material that it regulates.
Now, we will present the definitions of piracy given by entities related to
different cultural areas for, afterwards, showing how these concepts related to
the audiovisual area. To begin, we bring a concept of software piracy, which
currently has the most consistent definition. According to the Dictionary of
Informatics and Internet (SAWAYA, 1999, p. 436, freely translated), software
piracy is the “theft (with misappropriation of a hardware or software project) or
the unauthorized distribution and use of a computer program”19
. We realize
that the authors that define software piracy converge in their concepts.
Moores and Dhillon (2000, p. 88) state that “software piracy is defined as the
unauthorized use, duplication, distribution or sale of commercially available
software”. That includes, according to Prasad and Mahajan (2003, p. 337),
“unauthorized copying of software, the purchasing of unauthorized software
copies and the practice of loading several machines with software licensed for
use on one machine only”. In this same line, Flynn (2009, p. 143) defines
software piracy as “the unauthorized duplication and use of licensed computer
software”.
To try to define what is software piracy, Nancy Flynn, with the help of
Software & Information Industry Association, created a series of questions
and answers that included "what exactly is software piracy?" The answer to
this question was as follows:
Software piracy includes the following: (1) Purchasing a single-user
license, and then loading the software onto multiple computers or a
server. This is called softloading. (2) Making, distributing, and/or
selling copies that appear to be from an authorized source. This is
called counterfeiting. (3) Renting software without permission from
19
Originally, “roubo (com apropriação indébita de um projeto de hardware ou software) ou a
distribuição e uso não-autorizados de um programa de computador”.

26
the copyright holder. (4) Distributing and/or selling software that has
been unbundled, or separated, from the products with which it was
intended to have been bundled. (5) Downloading copyright software
from the internet or bulletin boards without permission from the
copyright holder (FLYNN, 2000, p. 119).
On the software industry, ABES – Brazilian Association of Software
Companies represents the companies of the area in defense of intellectual
property and combating piracy. They explain that a user does not becomes
the owner of software when acquire it, but is only allowed to use it and
therefore have no right to copy, sell or rent without permission of the owner of
the work. On its website20
, the organization defines software piracy as “the
practice of illegally reproducing a computer program, without the express
authorization of the proprietor of the work and consequently without the
proper use license”21
(freely translated). ABES differentiates individual piracy,
when a user shares software with relatives and friends, from corporate piracy,
which is when a company uses software on different computers without the
Use Licenses. Still, ABES also has a short guide explaining the difference
between legitimate and pirate software. Some of the characteristics that differ
these two materials, they said, are price, product appearance, manuals and
lack of receipt.
Representing the categories of video and games, the entity responsible
for defending the industry's interests is the UBV&G – Brazilian Union of Video
and Games. According to information from their website22
, UBV&G controls
the policies related to the sector, notes the compliance with laws relating to
copyright, develops programs to encourage the home video market and also
operates in combating piracy. On its website, the organization maintains a
form for anonymous report of piracy. The data reported in this form is sent to
the APCM, which is responsible to call the competent authorities and go to the
location of the complaint, if not related to digital piracy. According ANCINE,
through C.A.C.P.23
, there are some specific police stations that can be
20
Available in <http://www.abessoftware.com.br/propriedade-intelectual/saiba-mais-sobre-
pirataria-de-software>, captured at: June 23
rd
2014.
21
Originally, “a prática de reproduzir ilegalmente um programa de computador, sem a
autorização expressa do titular da obra e, consequentemente, sem a devida licença de uso”.
22
Available in <http://www.ubv.org.br/ubv>, captured at: June 23
rd
2014.
23
Support Centre for Combating Piracy. Available in
<http://cacp.ancine.gov.br/instituicoes.htm>, captured at: June 23
rd
2014.

27
activated in this case, for example, the Police station for the Repression on
Crimes Against the Immaterial Property, the Police Station for the Repression
on Computer Crimes, the Police Station of Offenses Committed by Electronic
Means, the Nucleus for Combating Cybercrimes, the Police Station of Crimes
Against the Economy and Consumer Protection, the Police Station
Specialized in Crimes Against the Consumer Relations, the Police Station
Specialized in Crimes Against the Consumer and Competition, the Police
Station Specialized in Counterfeit and Defrauding, among many others.
The UBV&G has, in its website, videos24
from the anti-piracy campaign
and also a handbook25
made in partnership with the APCM and the MPA
(Motion Picture Association). In this handbook, they explain what is piracy,
who buys the pirated products, what is required by law, what is the
cinematographic industry, who can help in the fight against piracy, among
other information.
Entering the question of the music industry, which regulates this
industry in the North American context, is the RIAA – Recording Industry
Association of America. RIAA is responsible for protecting intellectual property
and rights of artists and songs, orients consumers, industry and researchers
and monitors state and federal laws, regulations and policies. According to
them, piracy is a term very "nice" to set all the damage this practice causes to
the music industry.
In their website, they differentiate “online piracy”26
from “piracy on the
street”27
. Concerning “online piracy”, the RIAA explains that the music theft is
real and increasing. According to them, although online music sales have
increased, it does not compare to the drop in music sales in the traditional
way, on physical media. They show some examples of copyright infringement
committed in the online environment, such as making an MP3 copy of a
purchased CD (since this copy is permitted to the holder of the CD) and
making it available on the internet for million people to access; to join a file-
24
Available in <http://www.ubv.org.br/pirataria/videos>, captured at: June 23
rd
2014.
25
Available in <http://www.ubv.org.br/downloads/cartilha.pdf>, captured at: June 23
rd
2014.
26
Available in <http://www.riaa.com/physicalpiracy.php?content_selector=What-is-Online-
Piracy>, captured at: June 23
rd
2014.
27
Available in
<http://www.riaa.com/physicalpiracy.php?content_selector=piracy_details_street>, captured
at: June 23
rd
2014.

28
sharing network, that provides unauthorized copies of material protected by
copyright; share music files protected in instant messaging services, among
others.
RIAA says that, even if downloading one song doesn’t look like a
crime, the illegal download of millions of songs impacts the industry, which
has fallen, since the appearance of Napster in 1999 until now, 53% of sales. It
is estimated that 30 billion songs were illegally obtained from file sharing
sites28
.
Regarding piracy in the streets, the RIAA explains the rules of
copyright, showing what can and what can not be done according to the law.
The entity also provides tips for consumers to avoid buying pirated CDs,
identifying the material through some features, such as very low price, lack of
bar code, suspect package, among others. They provide on the site, also, an
illustrated guide29
that teaches consumers to differentiate original and pirated
products.
In Brazil, the entity related to the music industry is the ABPD –
Brazilian Association of Record Producers. The entity states on its website
that the entity that protects the rights of the sector in Brazil is actually the
APCM, but they are still responsible for representing their members in
defending their copyright. According to its website30
, the APCM – Anti-Piracy
Association of Cinema and Music “has as main objective to protect the
copyright of their owners, providing a more ethical market, and to offer means
for performing actions that aim to combat piracy”31
(freely translated). They
have, on their website, a much more complete definition of the term,
differentiating, even, piracy from internet piracy. To them32
,
Piracy is the appropriation, reproduction and use of works (written,
musical or audiovisual) protected by copyright, without proper
authorization. It can happen in different ways, from buying counterfeit
28
Available in <http://www.riaa.com/physicalpiracy.php?content_selector=piracy-online-
scope-of-the-problem> captured at: June 23
rd
2014.
29
Available in <http://www.riaa.com/physicalpiracy.php?content_selector=piracy-street-avoid-
counterfeit-cd>, captured at: June 23
rd
2014.
30
Available in <http://www.apcm.org.br/>, captured at: June 20
th
2014.
31
Originally, “tem como objetivo fundamental proteger os direitos autorais de seus titulares,
proporcionando um mercado mais ético, e oferecer meios para realização de ações que
visem combater a pirataria”.
32
Available in <http://www.apcm.org.br/pirataria.php>, captured at: June 20
th
2014.

29
CDs and DVDs, to download files over the internet. Independent of
the means, piracy is qualified as a crime, and is punished as such.
Because it is a phenomenon that grows well currently, mainly due to
the broadband internet expansion, it is necessary to know how to
identify and combat piracy
33
With regard to internet piracy, the definition given by the site34
is part of
a speech used for some time by entities related to the government, which
have the characteristic of being conservative. This type of discourse shows
that regulators companies see the internet in a very distant point of view,
showing little knowledge of what happens on the network.
Internet piracy is the download or the unauthorized distribution of
contents protected by copyrights, such as movies, music, television
shows, video clips or computer programs, with or without profit
purposes. The illegal distribution and downloading of such contents
occurs in various ways, even through P2P (peer-to-peer) file-sharing
networks, as e-donkey, bit torrent and gnutella, and through virtual
disks (such as rapidshare and megaupload). In these networks and
systems, a single file available can result in millions of illegal
download. The Internet is also widely used for the sale of physical
media containing musical and audiovisual works reproduced illegally,
context in which become relevant social networks and auction sites,
constantly under monitoring
35
Besides this definition, they also talk about the activity of subtitling and
dubbing movies, which is illegal due to translating works without the
permission of the copyright holder, regardless of target profit or not. APCM
exposes also that the availability of covers and graphic materials of the
movies on the internet also violates the intellectual property rights. Finally,
33
Originally, “pirataria é a apropriação, reprodução e utilização de obras (escritas, musicais
ou audiovisuais) protegidas por direitos autorais, sem devida autorização. Ela pode
acontecer de diferentes formas, desde a compra de CDs e DVDs falsificados, até o download
de arquivos pela internet. Independente dos meios, a pirataria é qualificada como crime, e é
punida como tal. Por ser um fenômeno que cresce bastante atualmente, principalmente por
conta da expansão da internet de banda larga, é necessário saber identificar e combater a
pirataria.”
34
Available in <http://www.apcm.org.br/pirataria_internet.php>, captured at: June 20
th
2014.
35
Originally, “pirataria na internet é o download ou a distribuição não autorizada de
conteúdos protegidos por direitos autorais, tais como filmes, músicas, programas de
televisão, videoclipes ou programas de computador, com ou sem intuito de lucro. A
distribuição e o download ilegal desses conteúdos se dá de diversas formas, inclusive por
meio de redes P2P (peer-to-peer) de compartilhamento de arquivos, como e-donkey, bit
torrent e gnutella, e por meio de discos virtuais (como rapidshare e megaupload). Nessas
redes e sistemas, um único arquivo disponibilizado pode resultar em milhões de downloads
ilegais. A Internet também é amplamente utilizada para a venda de mídias físicas contendo
obras musicais e audiovisuais reproduzidas ilicitamente, contexto em que ganham relevância
redes sociais e sites de leilão, constantemente sob monitoramento”.

30
they raise the issue that the false sense of anonymity brought by the internet
makes many people feel protected to practice piracy, an illegal activity. The
APCM also brings in its site a comparative table showing truths and lies about
pirate activities on the internet.
Similarly to the handbook created by RIAA, which gives tips for the
public not to buy pirated material, the APCM has on its website a page that, in
a naive way, aims to teach the reader to determine if the material is pirated or
not (Figure 4).
Figure 4: Identification guide of Pirated Material – APCM
Source: APCM’s website – Identify Pirate Material
36
On this page, they explain some differences between an official and a
pirate DVD, guiding the reader with pictures. The main differences cited by
them are the packaging, the cover and the disc color. If we look good, we will
see that this guide is somehow naive, whereas it is technically possible that
sellers of pirated material produce a cover as complete as the original, with a
print quality as good as and ever print any number on the DVD, forging an
identification number. From a technical point of view, all that has been done
has the possibility of being re-done (i.e., can be copied). And more: “almost
anything worth copyrighting is worth pirating” (CRAIG, 2005, p. 03).
An interesting question to be raised about the pirated material
identification guide created by the APCM (which also can be related to the
illustrated guide created by the RIAA) is: do the people buying pirated material
know that such material is not official? The pirated material usually has a
simpler presentation, cheaper than the original, as shown in the guide, and
36
Available in <http://www.apcm.org.br/identifique.php>, captured at: June 20
th
2014.

31
this presentation demonstrates to the buyer that he is buying a material that is
not original, but has the same content, which leads us to think: is content
enough? If the content is what matters, why people buy physical media?
Marx (1996) understands that the goods have what he calls the relative
value, which goes beyond the amount of money that is given for them, and
has to do with social status. Thus, the goods are not only utilitarian, but also
reflect the social characteristics of men. In the same sense, Bourdieu (2006)
explains that people have, in addition to a capital relative to goods and
money, a symbolic capital, which is relative to a social position and is defined
as “the set of mobilized resources (financial capital, but also information,
etc.) through a relationship network (...) which aims a competitive advantage
ensuring to the investments higher incomes”37
(p. 265, freely translated). For
the author, social capital has to do with having what the other person of the
same social group does not have, such as products, power or perks. Thinking
along these lines, the increase of the social capital can be thought of as one
of the justifications to buy physical media in a time when you can get only the
content of a particular work.
Approaching the focus of the research, we aimed to know what the
entities related to the audiovisual industry have to say. In Brazil, the entity that
regulates the audiovisual material is the ANCINE – National Agency of
Cinema. According to its website38
, the entity “has as assignments the
fomentation, the regulation, and the supervision of the cinema and audiovisual
market in Brazil”39
(freely translated). To curb piracy, ANCINE created through
its Superintendent of Supervisory, the C.A.C.P. – Support Centre for
Combating Piracy, through which it works with educational activities showing
the effects of piracy in the audiovisual industry. At the program’s website40
,
the practice of piracy is referred to simply as an offense, the trade in
counterfeit products.
37
Originally, “o conjunto de recursos mobilizados (capitais financeiros, mas também
informação, etc.) através de uma rede de relações (...) que visa uma vantagem competitiva
garantindo aos investimentos rendimentos mais elevados”.
38
Available in <http://www.ancine.gov.br/ancine/apresentacao>, captured at: June 20
th
2014.
39
Originally, “tem como atribuições o fomento, a regulação e a fiscalização do mercado do
cinema e do audiovisual no Brasil”.
40
Available in <http://cacp.ancine.gov.br/>, captured at: June 20
th
2014.

32
In the American context, the entity responsible for advocating on behalf
of major movie and television studios is the MPAA – Motion Picture
Association of America. MPAA’s mission41
is “advancing the business and art
of filmmaking, protecting the creative and artistic freedoms of filmmakers, and
ensuring the satisfaction of our audiences worldwide”. To do so, they also
declared war against piracy. In fact, the MPAA does not refer directly to the
term piracy on its website (only in posts in the blog, linked to the site). To talk
about it, they use terms such as "copyright protection" and "illegal activity on
peer-to-peer networks".
Besides all these institutions responsible for different sectors of the
industry, there are other entities that deal with issues correlated to the
practice of piracy. The FNCP – National Forum Against Piracy and Illegality42
is an association formed by entities, companies and unions and represents all
economic sectors, from batteries and cigarettes to computers and video
games. They have on their website a page that contains researches43
that
shows the adhesion of the public for pirated products and also a page where
people can report44
places that are practicing piracy and/or illegal activities. In
the report form is required to fill the address of the location containing street,
neighborhood, city and state, which excludes the possibility of a complaint
about an online activity. The site also presents a tab of frequently asked
questions45
, which contains answers to several types of questions, coming
from store owners, consumers, businesses, carriers and others.
Now that we know the way that entities related to the industry or
government treats the practice of piracy, we also want to understand how this
practice is treated in the legal context. Thus, the next sub-chapter presents
laws that deal with the issue so that we can understand how this material is
regulated from a legal point of view.
41
Available in <http://www.mpaa.org/our-story/>, captured at: June 23
rd
2014.
42
Available in <http://forumcontrapirataria.tempsite.ws/web/>, captured at: June 23
rd
2014.
43
Available in <http://forumcontrapirataria.tempsite.ws/web/forum/pesquisas>, captured at:
June 23
rd
2014.
44
Available in <http://forumcontrapirataria.tempsite.ws/web/forum/denuncie>, captured at:
June 23
rd
2014.
45
Available in <http://forumcontrapirataria.tempsite.ws/web/forum/denuncie-perguntas>,
captured at: June 23
rd
2014.

33
1.2.1. Copyright and Industrial Property
Although worldwide organizations help us in the task of conceptualizing
the terms worked in this chapter, we can not do the same with regard to the
law, whereas it varies from country to country. Because of this, we will use as
reference in this subchapter national and international entities, but the laws
refer only to the Brazilian context.
The large area that controls the originality or not of the products is the
Intellectual Property. According to the INPI46
, in an exchange of emails with
the author of the dissertation, the Intellectual Property is divided into two
areas:
- Industrial Property: Patents of Invention and Utility Model, Brand
Registration, Industrial Designs, Geographical Indications and plant
variety protection.
- Copyright: literary, artistic or scientific works, computer programs,
integrated circuit topography, internet domains and related
47
(INPI,
2014, freely translated).
As we have seen in previous conceptualizations, piracy is a practice
that goes against the rules of copyright and industrial property. In Brazil, two
main laws rule these practices: Law No. 9.610, of February 19th
1998
(Copyright Law) and Law No. 9.279, of May 14th
1996 (Industrial Property
Law). In this work we will analyze also two complementary laws that help us
understand how, legally, piracy related to computer programs and consumer
rights works: Law No. 9.609, of February 19th
, 1998 (Law of Intellectual
Property of Computer Program) and Law No. 8.078 of September 11th
1990
(Consumer Protection Code) and a law that deals with the issue of regulation
of internet use in Brazil, Law No. 12.965, of April 23rd
2014 (Civil Rights
Framework for the Internet)48
.
46
Information received from a member of the General Coordination of Communication of INPI
(CGCOM/INPI).
47
Originally, “– Propriedade Industrial: Patentes de Invenção e de Modelo de Utilidade,
Registros de Marcas, Desenhos Industriais, Indicações Geográficas e proteção de cultivares.
– Direitos Autorais: Obras literárias, artísticas ou científicas, programas de computador,
topografia de circuito integrado, domínios na Internet e conexos”.
48
All laws are available at the Presidential Palace’s website, of the Republic Presidency of
Brazil. Available in <http://www4.planalto.gov.br/legislacao>, captured at: June 24
th
2014.

34
The Copyright Law “regulates copyright, being understood under that
name the rights of the author and those which are related”49
(BRASIL, 1998a).
This law considers, among others, publication, transmission or emission,
retransmission, distribution, communication to the public, reproduction and
counterfeiting of works.
Are protected by the Copyright Law the intellectual works “expressed
by any means or affixed in any support, tangible or intangible, known or to be
invented in the future” (BRASIL, 1998a), as, for example, literary works,
conferences, choreographic works, musical compositions, audiovisual works,
photographic works, drawings, translations of the original works, computer
programs (and these last ones have specific legislation, as we will see
shortly), among others. The Law, on the other hand, does not protect some
types of goods, such as ideas, mathematical concepts, plans or rules for
performing mental acts, blank forms, laws and decrees, the names and titles
alone, the information of common use, such as agenda and calendars, among
others.
Two articles of this law are very interesting to us: Article 28 and Article
29. Article 28 notes that "it is up to the author the exclusive right to use, enjoy
and dispose of literary, artistic or scientific work" (BRASIL, 1998a), what
means that only the owners of the copyrights can use the work as they want.
Now the Article 29 says that if anyone else wants to use the work, need
permission of the author. The authorization must be granted for those who
want to use the work in the following ways:
I - partial or complete reproduction;
II - editing;
III - adaptation, setting to music or any other transformation;
IV - the translation to any language;
V - the inclusion in phonogram or audiovisual production;
VI - the distribution, if not in a contract signed by the author with third
parties for use or exploitation of the work;
VII - the distribution for offering works or productions by cable, fiber
optic, satellite, waves or any other system that allows the user to
select the work or production and receive it at a time and place
previously determined by who makes the demand and in cases
where access to works or productions is made through any system
which results in payment by the user;
49
The original text can be found at <http://www.planalto.gov.br/ccivil_03/leis/l9610.htm>,
th
2014.

35
VIII - the use, direct or indirect, of the literary, artistic or scientific
work by:
a) performance, recitation or declamation;
b) musical performance;
c) use of speaker or analogue systems;
d) sound or television broadcasting;
e) capturing of broadcasting transmission in places of collective
frequency;
f) background music;
g) audiovisual exhibition, cinematographic or resembled process;
h) use of artificial satellites;
i) use of optical systems, telephone or other wires, cables of any kind
and similar communication means that may be adopted;
j) exhibition of plastic and figurative artworks;
IX - the inclusion in database, the computer storage, the microfilming
and the other forms of archiving of that kind;
X - any other existing methods of use or that may be invented
(BRASIL, 1998a).
Situations where these items are violated are what we commonly call
piracy, although this practice is not mentioned in the law under that name.
The failure to comply with this law implies several penalizing consequences,
including the seizure and destruction of the copies, the return of the value of
the materials already sold and fines (BRASIL, 1998a).
However, there are some uses of the works that do not violate the
rights of the author and, therefore, do not require the permission of the
copyright owner to be made. These uses are set out in Articles 46, 47 and 48
of the Copyright Law, which read as follows:
Art. 46. It does not constitute violation of copyright:
I - the reproduction:
a) in the daily or periodical press of news or informative article,
published in diaries or periodical, showing the author's name, if
signed, and the publication of which were transcribed;
b) in diaries or periodical, of speeches given at public meetings of
any kind;
c) of portraits, or other form of representation of the image, made on
request, when performed by the owner of the object ordered, with no
opposition of the person represented in them or their heirs;
d) of literary, artistic or scientific work, for the exclusive use of the
visually impaired, whenever the reproduction, without commercial
purposes, is made using the Braille system or other procedure in any
support for those recipients;
II - the reproduction, in a single copy of short extracts for private use
of the copier, provided it is done by him, without profit intent;
III - the quote in books, newspapers, magazines or any other means
of communication, of passages of any work, for study, criticism or
controversy, in the justified extent for the specific purpose, indicating
the author's name and the origin of the work;

36
IV - the caught of lessons in educational institutions by those to
whom they are addressed, prohibited its publication, fully or in part,
without previous and express authorization of those who ministered
them;
V - the use of literary, artistic or scientific work, phonograms and
radio and television broadcasting in commercial establishments,
exclusively for customer demonstration, provided that these
establishments commercialize the support or equipment that allow
their use;
VI - the theatrical representation and musical performance, when
performed on the family recess or, for exclusively teaching purposes,
in educational institutions without any case of profit intent;
VII - the use of literary, artistic or scientific works to produce judicial
or administrative proof;
VIII - the reproduction in any work of short extracts from preexisting
works of any kind, or full work, when of plastic arts, whenever the
reproduction itself is not the main objective of the new work and does
not jeopardize the normal exploitation of the reproduced work, nor
cause an unjustified prejudice to the legitimate interests of authors.
Art. 47. Are free the paraphrases and parodies that are not true
reproductions of the original work nor imply it disrepute.
Art. 48. The works permanently situated in public logradouros can be
freely represented, through paintings, drawings, photographs and
audiovisual procedures.
(BRASIL, 1998a).
We note that in both articles dealing with actions that hurt the copyright
as those dealing with actions that do not require the permission of the author,
little is said about actions commonly practiced in digital environments. It is
worth remembering that the law was established in 1998 and since then many
new possibilities for accessing and sharing emerged.
As previously mentioned, there is a law that specifically addresses the
intellectual property of computer program, the Law No. 9.609, of February 19,
1998. This law, in its first article, defines computer program as
the expression of an organized set of instructions in natural or coded
language, contained in physical support of any nature, to be used
necessarily in automatic data processing machines, devices,
peripheral instruments or equipment, based on digital or analog
technique, to make the in order to and for certain purposes
50
(BRASIL, 1998b).
When talking about computer programs, the term intellectual property
is used instead of industrial property. This is because a computer program
refers not only to industrial property, but to a good that is under the umbrella
of industrial property and copyright. Moreover, like the Copyright Law
50
th
2014.

37
determines, computer programs do not require registration or patent to be
protected.
Some actions do not constitute infringement of the right of the author
of the computer program. According to the article 6 of this law (BRASIL,
1998b), the reproduction of a copy legitimately acquired, the partial quote of
the program, the similarity of one program to another in accordance with the
functional characteristics and the integration of a program to an operating
system are actions permitted and covered by the law.
The law that aims to protect the consumer, understanding that it is the
most fragile part in consumer relations, is the Consumer Protection Code,
Law No. 8.078 of September 11th
1990. According to Article 18, paragraph 6,
section II of this law, counterfeit, corrupt and fraudulent products are unfit for
use and consumption. That said, Article 56 of the Law points out that
violations of these rules are subject to fines, seizure or destruction of the
product, revocation of product registration, manufacturing prohibition,
suspension of supply, activity or permission of use, and others (BRASIL,
1990).
The protection related to the industrial property rights is different from
what we have seen so far. Law No. 9.279, of May 14th
1996, regulates the
rights and obligations relating to industrial property in Brazil. Unlike the
exposed in Copyright Law and Law of Intellectual Property of Computer
Program, for the goods to receive the protection concerning the industrial
property, they need to have a registration or patent (or, at least, the
application for registration or patent, for the purpose of identifying who was
the first author of the work to be registered). Due to this issue, we understand
that materials relating to the cultural industry (music, movies, books, etc.) are
protected by the Copyright Law, while products (electronics, clothing,
processes and industrial designs, etc.) are protected by the Industrial Property
Law.
Articles 8, 9 and 10 of the Industrial Property Law explain the goods
which are and those which are not patentable. In short, patentable inventions
are those that meet the requirements of novelty and are industrial
applications. According to Article 42 of the Law, “the patent confers on its
holder the right to prevent third parties, without his consent, from making,

38
using, put up for sale, selling or importing with these purposes”51
the patent
product or the product obtained from a patented process. The law also
foresees various items that are not suitable to be registered as a trademark.
Some examples of these are coat of arms, flag, letter, date, generic or merely
descriptive sign, colors and their names, geographical indication, family name,
literary work, artistic work, scientific work, technical term, etc.
The crimes against the industrial property are divided in 6 chapters: (1)
crimes against patents, (2) crimes against industrial designs, (3) crimes
against the marks, (4) crimes committed by brand, property title and
advertising sign, (5) crimes against geographical indications and other
indications and (6) unfair competition crimes.
Currently, the Civil Rights Framework for the Internet (Law No. 12.965,
of April 23rd
2014) helps to regulate the application of the laws in the network
environment, establishing principles, guarantees, rights and duties. In short,
the principles of this law, according to Article 3, are the following:
Art. 3. The discipline of the use of internet in Brazil has the following
principles:
I - guarantee of freedom of expression, communication and
manifestation of thought, under terms of the Federal Constitution;
II - privacy protection;
III - protection of personal data, as provided by law;
IV - preservation and guarantee of network neutrality;
V - preservation of stability, security and functionality of the network,
through technical measures compatible with international standards
and by encouraging the use of good practices;
VI - accountability of agents according to their activities, in
accordance with law;
VII - preservation of the participatory nature of the network;
VIII - freedom of business models promoted on the internet, provided
they do not conflict with the other principles established in this Law.
52
(BRASIL, 2014)
In practice, this law has little effect on the use of the internet but, from the
creation of the Civil Rights Framework, the user will have the guarantee of
privacy, free expression and will receive integrally the amount of traffic paid
for, regardless of what is accessed on the internet. The network neutrality, a
more specific issue treated in this law, prevents the operators who deliver the
51
th
2014.
52
The original text can be found at <http://www.planalto.gov.br/ccivil_03/_ato2011-
2014/2014/lei/l12965.htm>, captured at: June 24
th
2014.

39
internet service to prioritize a service over another. These companies can
create different speed internet plans, but can not, for example, sell a plan that
only provides access to emails and social networks, and prohibit the client to
access some sites. In this sense, the network neutrality ensures the user that
he can access what he wants on the internet without restrictions. In short, the
Civil Rights Framework aims to remove of the network the nickname of
"lawless", as has been known.
After understanding how the term piracy is defined in different areas,
based on arguments presented by institutions and also in legal terms, we start
to observe the current scenario, with the desire to understand (now in
possession of a greater understanding of the term) how is the relationship
between companies and users with the practice of piracy.
1.3. Current overview on piracy
The products or services protected by copyright law may be related to
audiovisual production, but also to any other item that is able to be duplicated,
such as music, software, clothing, electronics, etc. Currently, access to
pirated materials can happen, according to Ambrosi, Peugeot and Pimienta
(2005), by professionals seeking monetization through the sale of this
material, by service providers, that give support for the material to be shared,
by people who use the internet to exchange content or by consumers who
copies - whether for personal use or to share with family and friends.
We observed empirically that there is a strong desire by the public to
access content on the Internet, especially on entertainment. When such
content is presented in an easy way to be accessed and without perceived
cost, the traditional industry’s model is questioned. Peter Chernin, president of
NewsCorp, argues that piracy often comes from the union of the
inconvenience due to the limited circulation of materials and inappropriate
price, situations imposed by industry (MURRAY, 2003). These two
characteristics do not exist in the parallel way of obtain material, where one
can get free content and access it when convenient. According to Phillips

40
(2005, p. 112), “The main problem is that we don’t perceive the value in the
content that the industry wants us to pay: the explosive growth in illegal file
sharing over the internet demonstrates this”. In this sense, it is very difficult for
the industry to compete with something that is for free or that, even if illegally,
can be obtained for free.
Although there are attempts of groups of authors to hold the distribution
of books in digital form by libraries and bookstores, this act does not infringe
copyright because they fit in the category "fair use". The Fair Use allows a
cultural work to be used without the permission of the copyright holder.
According to the article 9.2 of the Berne Convention 53
, available for
consultation on Unesco’s website54
,
To the legislation of the countries of the Union reserves the right to
permit the reproduction of such works in certain special cases,
provided that such reproduction does not affect the normal
exploitation of the work and not cause unjustified prejudice to the
legitimate interests of the author
55
In the same direction regarding the fair use of literary or artistic works,
the article 10.2 of the Convention provides that
The countries of the Union reserve to themselves the faculty of
regulate, in their national laws and private agreements already
concluded or to be concluded between themselves the conditions
under which they may be lawfully used, to the extent justified by the
specific purpose, literary or artistic works under teaching illustration
in publications, radio broadcasts or sound or visual recordings on the
condition that such use is in accordance to the good practices
56
53
The Berne Convention is an international treaty that protects literary and artistic works
between countries. If a job is registered in Brazil, he is also protected in other countries that
have signed the convention.
54
Available in
<http://www.unesco.org/culture/natlaws/media/pdf/bresil/brazil_conv_berna_09_09_1886_por
_orof.pdf>, captured at: July 5
th
2014.
55
Originally, “Às legislações dos países da União reserva-se a faculdade de permitir a
reprodução das referidas obras em certos casos especiais, contanto que tal reprodução não
afete a exploração normal da obra e nem cause prejuízo injustificado aos interesses
legítimos do autor”
56
Originally, “Os países da União reservam-se a faculdade de regular, nas suas leis
nacionais e nos acordos particulares já celebrados ou a celebrar entre si as condições em
que podem ser utilizadas licitamente, na medida justificada pelo fim a atingir, obras literárias
ou artísticas a título de ilustração do ensino em publicações, emissões radiofônicas ou
gravações sonoras ou visuais, sob a condição de que tal utilização seja conforme aos bons
usos”.

41
These two fragments show us that the countries that signed the Berne
Convention are somewhat independent to regulate fair use and determine
which actions become permitted without the authorization of the copyright
holder. To summarize, we can say that some exceptions to the rules of
copyright correspond to fair use. These exceptions allow some materials to be
used without the permission of the author, enabling the use of protected
materials in situations related to research and parodies, for example.
In general, common sense must be taken into consideration in the fair
use application. Simplifying Siva Vaidhayanathan explains that
for example, if a teacher copies three pages of a 200 page book and
distribute them to his students, his conduct is covered by fair use. But
if the teacher photocopies the entire book and sells it to the students
at a lower price than the original, the teacher has probably infringed
the copyright of the author of the book
57
(VAIDHAYANATHAN apud
BRANCO, 2007, p. 74, freely translated).
The practice is more dynamic than the law (and we believe that is why
the copyright law does not have a session intended for the regulation of digital
practices), but some government agencies are starting to look differently to
the relation of the users with the goods. The World Intellectual Property
Organization (WIPO) and the Brazilian National Institute of Industrial Property
(INPI) explains that some laws some laws should be changed soon in
accordance with the possibilities brought by digital technologies. One of the
points raised by WIPO is that it is no longer possible to recognize duplicate
materials, since the quality of the copy remains identical to the original
material. This calls into question “the continuity of the reasons for such
limitation to the rights of reproduction, since it has become very difficult to
control the unauthorized reproduction” 58
(WIPO, 2013, p. 11, freely
translated).
We can already see some changes in the market due to changes in the
public setting. Aware of the constant increase of the Internet audience, the
market realizes that it is increasingly difficult to walk in the opposite route and
57
Originally, “por exemplo, se um professor copia três páginas de um livro de 200 páginas e
as distribui entre seus alunos, sua conduta está coberta pelo fair use. Porém, se o professor
copia o livro inteiro e o vende aos estudantes por preço mais baixo do que o do original, o
professor estará provavelmente infringindo os direitos autorais do autor do livro”.
58
Originally, “a continuidade das razões dessa limitação ao direito de reprodução, uma vez
que se tornou muito difícil controlar a reprodução não autorizada”.

42
limit the circulation of content. According to an article published in Folha de
São Paulo newspaper (GAMA, 2013), museums and libraries are adhering to
content release policies and opening their collections for free download at
good resolution, without restriction of use, renewing, thus, its public role of
dissemination of culture.
In Brazil, the piracy of physical material still has strength, but has been
decreasing due to the growth of Internet piracy. According to the National
Council to Combat Piracy (CNCP)59
, of the Ministry of Justice, the value of
apprehensions of pirated products has tripled from 2004 to 2010, moving from
R$ 452 million to R$ 1.27 billion, according to the report of the project Brazil
Original. The CDs and DVDs are in second place in the list of the most seized
products, but decreased between 2010 and 2011. Ana Lúcia Medina,
executive secretary of CNCP explains that this reduction "may be related to
the fact that people use the internet more to download files" 60
(freely
translated)61
.
In a single operation the Finance Secretariat of the State of Rio de
Janeiro, in order to not allow the entry of pirated materials in the state during
the World Cup in 2014, apprehended a hundred thousand reais in pirated
products62
. In contrast, a 2005 research done by Informa Media Group and
presented by John Cones (2010) states that digital piracy of audiovisual
content made, at the time, by the film industry had a profit loss of US $ 850
million per year. The loss of industry due to the physical media piracy of
audiovisual material, in contrast, was estimated at U$ 3.4 billion,
demonstrating that piracy of physical material is more harmful to the industry
than piracy on the internet. According to this survey, the expectation was that
the value related to digital piracy reached U$ 1.7 billion by 2010 and that
59
Available in <http://portal.mj.gov.br/data/Pages/MJ7111CEC5PTBRNN.htm>, captured at:
July 3
rd
2014.
60
Originally, “pode estar relacionado ao fato das pessoas utilizarem mais a internet para
baixar arquivos”
61
Available in <http://portal.mj.gov.br/main.asp?View=%7B61EDAA11-AF6B-43B2-BC4E-
85B7B960DAB6%7D&BrowserType=NN&LangID=pt-br&params=itemID%3D%7B0E06C0A8-
1F56-47E6-ABD4-172E68720E69%7D%3B&UIPartUID=%7B2218FAF9-5230-431C-A9E3-
E780D3E67DFE%7D>, captured at: July 3
rd
2014.
62
Available in <http://www.fazenda.rj.gov.br/sefaz/faces/menu_structure/sitios/sitios-
educacao-fiscal-
navigation/folder1/inicioEducacaoFiscal?_afrLoop=1433765018666000&datasource=UCMSe
rver%23dDocName%3AWCC227193&_afrWindowMode=0&_adf.ctrl-state=r8a60j3h7_27>,
captured at: July 3
rd
2014.

43
digital piracy would be responsible for drastically decrease the growth of the
physical media piracy, making the value of this came only to U$ 4.5 billion, a
small increase compared to digital piracy. The research also shows that, if the
pirated movies were part of the official distribution, controlled by the film
industry, counterfeit DVDs would represent only 4.3% of sales worldwide, and
movies illegally downloaded would represent only 1.1%, which proves that
piracy (mainly digital) does not represent a loss as significant for the industry,
as is claimed in many of the speeches.
To try to reduce the discourse that affirms the necessity of piracy due
to the difficulty of access to materials, we perceive a concern of companies
related to the audiovisual industry in freely provide content under copyright
guard. An example of this was the time when YouTube announced63
, in 2009,
would start showing movies and television shows in an official way, made
available by the broadcasters and producers themselves64
. These spaces are
important, but do not exist yet in sufficient quantity to curb the demand.
Added to piracy, these spaces ended up posing as important
competitors of other windows, such as cinema and television. Proof of this is
that Sessão da Tarde, an important space reserved for movies on the daily
schedule of Rede Globo, the largest broadcaster of the country, is losing
ground and may be discontinued in the near future. The point is that the
movies programs of the Brazilian public television have lost half of its public
from 2006 to 2013, because of the rivalry “of the paid TV, the piracy and the
video on demand services”65
(JIMENEZ, 2013, online, freely translated),
although the video on demand is still luxury item in Brazil66
.
The Sessão da Tarde isn’t the only program affected by audience loss.
According to Jimenez (2013), Tela Quente, another movies program of Rede
Globo, had an average of 34.1 ratings points in 2006, going to 19.8 in 2013.
The Cine Espetacular, from SBT (another important broadcaster), went from
11.7 ratings points in 2006 to 6.7 in 2013 and Tela Máxima, from Record (also
63
Announcement made on its official blog. Available in <http://youtube-
global.blogspot.com.br/2009/04/watch-shows-and-movies-on-youtube.html>, captured at: July
3
rd
2014.
64
Some of these films are available for free, while others depend on payment to be displayed.
65
Originally, “da TV paga, da pirataria e dos serviços de vídeo sob demanda”
66
Available in <cultura.estadao.com.br/noticias/geral,video-sob-demanda-ainda-e-item-de-
luxo-imp-,1048636>, captured at: July 27
th
2014.

44
an important broadcaster in Brazil), that made an average of 10 points in
2006, has moved to 5.6 in 2013, even though broadcasters invested heavily in
contracts with major distributors. Each rating point is equivalent to 62
thousand homes in the area of São Paulo, which shows that the number of
people who are migrating to other circulation windows is considerable.
In addition to competing with the aforementioned pay TV and piracy,
broadcast television also need to deal with sites that, without authorization,
transmit content by streaming67
and with a new enemy: the piracy of pay TV.
A research from Business Bureau shows that, in Brazil, 24 million houses
have access to pay TV, "7 million more than the 17 million declared by the
companies of the sector and reported to Anatel. This difference represents the
number of houses that receive signal irregularly”68
(SANFELICE, 2013, online,
freely translated). According to Antonio Salles, director of Seta (Syndicate of
Pay TV companies), the culture of thinking that the services of operators are
expensive (and consequently look for free ways to get the same services)
encourages piracy. Despite the complaints and the speech that there is little
effective action curbing piracy in these services, he also admits that the
market continues to grow in the country (SANFELICE, 2013).
The search for audiovisual material from the public is confirmed in
several instances, and is not exclusive to the Brazilian market. A good
example of this demand is what happens with the American television series
Game of Thrones that often breaks records of piracy when releasing new
episodes. Particularly, the final episode of the fourth season of the series
drew a lot of attention due to have had, simultaneously, more than 250
thousand people sharing a single torrent file. Soon after the episode was
broadcasted on HBO, it was already available in various file-sharing sites.
According to an article on the TorrentFreak website69
, around 1.5 million
67
According to article of the site LawInSport. Available in
<www.lawinsport.com/blog/sheridans/item/premier-league-wins-battle-against-foreign-piracy-
websites>, captured at: July 4
th
2014.
68
Originally, “7 milhões a mais que as 17 milhões declaradas pelas empresas do setor e
reportadas à Anatel. Essa diferença representa o número de residências que recebem sinal
de maneira irregular”
69
Available in <http://torrentfreak.com/game-thrones-season-finale-sets-piracy-record-
140616/>, captured at: July 3
rd
2014.

45
pirated copies of the episode were transferred only during the first 12 hours in
the air.
Precisely 254.114 people were sharing a single episode at the same
time, shortly after it aired on paid TV. This is effective proof that, besides
many people seek free content on the Internet, these users do not want to
wait until a broadcaster of their country buy the series, do subtitling and
distribute officially in on television. This desire of people to get the material
they want, in the quality they want and when they want it is not exactly new.
The difference is that now they can.
Even with the massive piracy on the series, do not appear attempts by
the producer to stop this practice. Jeff Bewkes, CEO of Time Warner, of which
HBO is part, states “piracy resulted in more subscriptions for his company,
and that receiving the title of ‘most-pirated’ was ‘better than an Emmy’”
(ERNESTO, 2014, online).
Aware of the discourse that claims that digital piracy happens for
convenience, the MPAA made a list of sites that distribute movies and series
on the Internet lawfully, called Where to Watch70
. This list is an attempt to
show the public that there are ways to consume audiovisual content as good
as the parallel, but official. It turns out that most of the listed sites charge for
the content, which ends up, from one point of view, invalidating the efforts of
the MPAA.
Despite the claims made by the film industry, Cones (2010) poses an
interesting point in saying that some observations indicate that
many of the films being downloaded are of such poor quality that
they are less likely to influence someone’s decision not to purchase
the film through legitimate channels. In other words, the downloading
of poor-quality films mat actually be serving as an extended
promotional trailer for the movie, creating and increased the desire to
see a better-quality version of the same film (p. 87).
In a summarized manner, we can try to define the term piracy based on
what was treated in this chapter. Piracy is the use - copying, editing,
appropriation publication, transmission or distribution, whether commercial or
not - unauthorized of a material under protection of intellectual property laws.
70
Available in <http://www.wheretowatch.org/>, captured at: July 3
rd
2014.

46
It is always present in the market, parallel to the traditional models of
distribution, raising questions about their supremacy.
This chapter showed where the term piracy came from and what it
currently means, pointing out some of the situations in which it is applied.
Thereafter, we will approximate to the audiovisual context, which is the
analysis focus of this work.

47
2. PIRACY ON CINEMA – AND BEYOND
Piracy exists since the beginning the history of cinema, walking in
parallel to the conventional distribution strategies. It is due to piracy that we,
nowadays, have access to works filmed at the nineteenth century and early
twentieth century that, through unauthorized copies that remained alive over
time, even after its distributors went bankrupt or the original copies of movies
were damaged, burned or misplaced71
. It is also due to piracy that we have
access to words produced anywhere in the world, outside the conventional
agreements that govern the distribution and the official exhibition spaces,
depending only of an internet access point.
Although there were fewer manners to pirate, the practice of piracy
follows the cinematographic industry since its beginning, in the late nineteenth
century, according to Toulet (1995). The unauthorized copies ended up being
indirectly responsible for the preservation of movies like A Trip to the Moon
(originally, Voyage Dans La Lune), movie from 1902 directed by Georges
Méliès.
Méliès was visionary and knowledgeable of filming techniques and
trickery of the film. He intended to show, with his films, a fanciful reality, out of
daily life, making the film already a form of entertainment, idea that
accompanies the cinematographic industry until today. To make this possible,
Méliès needed a place with controllable settings, such as light and
background, an impossible situation when shooting outdoors. To that end, he
created in 1897, the first permanent studio in the world (EZRA, 2000, p. 14)
and in the same year, he began Star Film, the company that produced most of
his movies.
The more Méliès films were known, the more they became the target of
unauthorized duplication by competitor studios. To avoid his movies to be
copied improperly, Méliès began recording using two cameras side by side,
which generated two almost identical negatives. One of the copies stayed in
71
Like the case of the movie Metropolis (Fritz Lang, 1927), which had been reported as being
lost until a copy of the film was found in Buenos Aires eight decades later. Information from
the El Mundo newspaper. Available in
<www.elmundo.es/elmundo/2008/07/03/cultura/1215122171.html>, captured at: December
6
th
2014.

Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul Audiovisual Piracy BitTorrent Protocol Unofficial Distribution Feature Films

Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul Audiovisual Piracy BitTorrent Protocol Unofficial Distribution Feature Films

Recomendados

Recomendados

Mais conteúdo relacionado

Semelhante a Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul Audiovisual Piracy BitTorrent Protocol Unofficial Distribution Feature Films

Semelhante a Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul Audiovisual Piracy BitTorrent Protocol Unofficial Distribution Feature Films (20)

Último

Último (9)

Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul Audiovisual Piracy BitTorrent Protocol Unofficial Distribution Feature Films