Canadians still love to pirate music and video: report – National | 24CA News

I’ll admit it: If you undergo the information on my pc, you’ll discover songs that I downloaded from Napster and different unlawful file-sharing websites. At the time — for me it was 2001-2003 — downloading songs illegally was seen as a goof, even innocent. How may a few downloaded tracks trouble a multi-national file label or some millionaire rock stars?

That perspective was completely, totally improper, in fact, and by the point I woke as much as this actuality, the recorded music business was beginning to spiral downwards. Fast. CD gross sales had begun to plummet and it turned clear that piracy was one of many large contributing components.

My pirate methods had been killed perpetually by iTunes. It was simply simpler to pay 99 cents/$1.29 for a high-quality audio file than endure horrible sounding, typically incomplete, typically virus-ridden MP3s downloaded from god is aware of the place. Who wished the effort of discovering torrents and seeding websites with new materials?

Then there was the problem of metadata, ensuring that the songs had been labelled appropriately. Oftentimes, a torrented music would have the improper title, spell the title of the artist improper, or not embody all the mandatory tags. You must then set up the songs one way or the other in your library. Besides being improper and immoral, music piracy took an excessive amount of work.

I’ve since amassed hundreds of authorized digital downloads. As I write this, iTunes tells me I’ve 79,640 gadgets (564.5 gigs) in my library. Not all are paid-for downloads, in fact. There are many, many CD rips together with different audio similar to interviews, with a lot being related to my work with The Ongoing History of New Music.

When streaming began to take off in Canada round 2010, most believed that this could be the top of music piracy. Why would you trouble to steal one thing when you could possibly: (a) pay a modest month-to-month price and have all of the music you could possibly presumably need; and (b) join the free tier on Spotify and for the worth of getting to hear to some adverts, pay nothing in any respect for all of the music within the universe?

Piracy was conquered. Except it wasn’t. And Canadians are nonetheless stealing stuff.

According to the latest report by the International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA), a gaggle that represents the pursuits of not simply the recorded music business, however TV, motion pictures, videogame publishers, and extra, we Canadians are thieves. At 241 pages, it’s a protracted report, however it may be summarized on this assertion: “It is nearly impossible to overstate the magnitude of the piracy problem in Canada.”

Drawing from data in a report from the Canadian Internet Registration Authority (which administers all of the .ca domains, amongst different issues), Canadians are among the worst with regards to pilfering American copyrighted works. We already watch numerous TV and flicks and take heed to loads of music, however the stories contend that the true numbers are increased because of folks consuming pirated content material.

I quote: “Evidence persists, however, that the digital marketplace for copyrighted content in Canada continues to face challenges in realizing its full potential due to competition from illicit online sources. In 2022, 22.4% of Canadians accessed pirate services.”

Nearly 1 / 4 of us? Wow.

We’re doing numerous stream-ripping, apparently. This entails utilizing software program to file the stream of a YouTube video or songs streamed from Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon, or another DSP (Digital Streaming Provider). “Dozens of websites, software programs, and apps offering stream-ripping services find an eager marketplace in Canada,” says the report.

It continues: “Use of peer-to-peer (P2P) sites remains high, with BitTorrent indexing sites including Rarbg, The Pirate Bay, and 1337x popular in Canada. Cyberlocker sites, such as Mega, Uptobox, GoFile, and Rapidgator, are also a common way to illicitly access recorded music.”

Theft of music is a giant problem, however video piracy is the place nearly all of the motion is. The report says that we’re “actively involved” in all of the other ways we will get round digital locks and technological safety measures.

Pirate IPTV (Internet Protocol Television) companies — typically seen marketed on mild poles at intersections — have loads of prospects. And chances are high a man who is aware of a man who can repair you up with extra free TV than you’ll be able to deal with with a particular set-top field. Just Google “IPTV Canada” and watch what comes up. I’ve even seen these packing containers on the market in retail shops.

More from the report: “Mimicking the appear and feel of reputable streaming companies, infringing streaming web sites proceed to overhaul P2P websites as a extremely well-liked vacation spot for Canadians in search of premium content material in each English and French. … Canadian piracy operators stay concerned within the coding and growth of infringing add-ons and Android software packages (APKs) that allow subscription piracy companies and mass-market [set-top boxes] to entry streaming companies with out authorization.

“Few resources are dedicated to prosecutions of piracy cases; prosecutors generally lack specialized training in prosecuting such offenses, and too often dismiss the file or plead the cases out, resulting in weak penalties.”

So what’s being achieved? The IIPA believes that the RCMP is simply too busy to research the state of affairs. Local police forces even have their palms full with day-to-day policing. There have been just a few crackdowns right here and there, however nothing to essentially dent the pirate market. The IIPA is demanding extra federal funding to combat piracy, the creation of specialised teams to pursue unlawful IPTV websites/sellers, and is encouraging Canadian officers to work along with their American counterparts.

And you thought that Canadians had been so good and law-abiding.

—

Alan Cross is a broadcaster with Q107 and 102.1 the Edge and a commentator for Global News.

Subscribe to Alan’s Ongoing History of New Music Podcast now on Apple Podcast or Google Play

&copy 2023 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.