WASHINGTON — Yes, Disney had a display here at the Business of Show Business 2 of the model sets from the three Pirates of the Caribbean motion pictures, but this post isn’t about that. And for those not happy with the word “piracy” to refer to infringement, 1) like it or not, it dates back hundreds of years in this context, even before there was copyright law, and 2) I could quote a pnaleist here, Angels and Demons Executive Producer & Second-Unit Director Todd Hallowell, who said “It’s theft, pure and simple.”

This show was first held in 2007, you can read a summary I wrote of that event here. The show demonstrates that the motion picture industry is a business, one that creates 2.5 million American jobs and more than $41 billion in wages to American workers. (More on those numbers in the next post, where I discuss the brand-new economic impact study MPAA has released.)

U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke kicked off the program with a rousing start. I’m going to include a portion of his written remarks on IP at the end of this post, but let me just use this portion of what he said at the podium, after saying the federal government supported “cutting-edge solutions to Internet piracy”:

The Commerce Department will be a partner to you in ensuring the protection of intellectual property.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.), House Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Cal.) and Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) demonstrated their continued support for intellectual property protection. All three called for more movies to be made in their districts and states — a key theme of the show was how tax incentives are keeping motion pictures here at home instead of being made abroad, and are being produced across the country. Conyers said that while technology is enabling all sorts of new audiovisual production, “the creative part is what is copyrighted… someone owns it, these rights are part of the legal system.” Waxman emphasized the 2.5 million Americans who receive paychecks from the industry and decried the erosion to those paychecks from piracy. And Hatch, a successful songwriter, noted the many legislative accomplishments he has been a part of regarding Congress and IP promotion and protection, adding he does this even though his Mormon faith doesn’t let him watch as many movies as he would like.

Another key message from the show was that the motion picture industry is responding to piracy in part by aiming to better the consumer experience. On the panel I moderated, Chris Carey, executive vice president for Worldwide Technical Operations at Paramount, showed how many online platforms his studio is pushing motion pictures into, although he noted there needs to be more platform standardization and Paramount is part of a working process on that issue. Also on my panel, RealD CEO Michael Lewis demonstrated amazing new 3D technology, even showing how 2D movies could be retrofitted as if they had been produced in 3D. As he told me after our panel, 3D technology is a great deterrent because it can’t be pirated.

Hallowell on an earlier panel noted that many studios are moving toward day-and-date release to make it more difficult for foreign markets to saturate with pirated works before the theatrical release there. Blue Sky Studios Chief Technology Officer and Vice President Carl Ludwig, on the same panel, agreed with Hallowell that this is theft, but said “it’s not perceived as theft.” Part of the anti-piracy effort should be enforcement, he said, but a major part is education: “You want to remind folks that people are hurting.” Education is a key component of our message on infringement, most recently demonstrated in our Friday statement on the Pirate Bay sentencing.

Perhaps the most passionate speaker on this topic was Dan Mahoney, assistant director for the Motion Picture and Television Division of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, the folks who build sets (I was pleased that IATSE was one of 41 signatories on yesterday’s letter to President Obama supporting him on IP enforcement).

“Piracy is the biggest threat there is to this industry,” Mahoney said. “It’s the single biggest issue we face… the impact on all of those workers is devastating.” As I said when citing IATSE in testimony before the USTR on IP enforcement, Mahoney noted how IATSE members receive their health care benefits through a plan based on residuals from DVD sales. When someone downloads a movie for free they found on, say, Pirate Bay, instead of purchasing that movie, that is that much less money for health care for a carpenter or an electrician. IATSE members are found across the country, again a demonstration of how films are being made nationwide.

Mahoney and others emphasized the need for education in schools, and an American University film professor in the audience said he asks all of his students how they’d feel if someone stole their work. We at the Copyright Alliance use a focus on empowerment of students as creators in our teach-the-teacher program in K-12 schools.

Now we’ll wrap up with some of Secretary Locke’s prepared remarks:

Let me state further that when U.S. goods and services containing intellectual property arrive in world markets, they should benefit from basic safeguards similar to those they enjoy at home.

The cost of counterfeiting and piracy to your companies and to our nation is billions of dollars in losses and hundreds of thousands of American jobs.

The recent revelation that an illegal copy of the upcoming movie “Wolverine” had been posted on the Internet prior to its theatrical release underscores the problem the industry faces.

I’ve seen examples of this sort of piracy on the streets of China during my many visits there each year. I’ve walked past the stands of counterfeited movies.

Our ability to trade in a rules-based system around the world is critical to your success and our economic success as a nation. And as a former prosecutor, I believe in the full and impartial enforcement of the law.

The Obama administration is well aware of the impact of counterfeiting and piracy on our industries and workers, and we’re working to combat it.

At the Commerce Department, among other strategies:

We’ve placed IP attaches in strategic markets around the world, including China,India and Brazil.
We have a website (www.stopfakes.gov) to provide updates and links to Executive Branch IPR programs. The site also allows businesses to file complaints about IPR-related trade problems, which are answered by a trade specialist from our International Trade Administration.
We established the 1-866-999-HALT hotline answered by Patent and Trademark IPR experts, who work to help businesses secure and enforce their IP rights through international treaties.
We’ve created a range of tools to help U.S. businesses, especially small and medium sized firms, identify, register and protect their intellectual property at home and abroad.

I understand the extent of the problem and the need to challenge it on several fronts. I’ve seen it in Asia, first hand.

That’s why we need to work together – government and industry – to build international coalitions with like-minded foreign governments and film industries.

Efforts to effectively address the problem of IP theft will require collaboration among government and industries across borders.

By working cooperatively, we can ensure that the United States remains the leading producer of entertainment.

And, importantly, we also can ensure that we remain a leader in developing cutting-edge solutions to the growing problem of Internet piracy. I will pledge to you today that the Commerce Department will be a partner for you in devising ways to improve the security of your products.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 21st, 2009 at 4:20 pm by Patrick Ross and is filed under Obama, copyright law, creators, economy, education, events, interoperability, p2p, piracy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.