Abstract:
The book provides a large-scale study of music, film and software piracy in the developing world. Industry estimates high rates of piracy in emerging markets: 68% for software in Russia; 82% for music in Mexico; 90% for movies in India. Tracing the explosive growth of piracy as digital technologies became cheap and ubiquitous around the world, the book follows the growth of industry lobbies that have reshaped laws and law enforcement around copyright protection. It argues that enforcement efforts have largely failed. The problem of piracy is better addressed as a failure of affordable access to media in legal markets.
