Abstract
Antipiracy campaigns have traditionally centred on the illegality of film piracy and copyright infringement, framing piracy within a discourse of crime and criminality. However, as film piracy has retreated from hard copy piracy to online downloading and file sharing, these traditional discourses and framing of piracy have become increasingly redundant. This article examines the work of The Industry Trust responsible for antipiracy campaigns in the United Kingdom, since 2003, and how they have changed the discourse of piracy, reframing the pirate as antisocial miscreant rather than criminal. The article also examines the Trust’s antipiracy campaigns that attempt to make legitimate film texts increasingly more real and add value to counter the effects of the increasingly ephemeral online film download.
In 2003, Disney began production on the film Pirates of the Caribbean: the Curse of the Black Pearl (Gore Verbinski, 2003), based upon the successful theme park ride at Disneyland, Orlando. This had been the first major pirate genre picture in some years and something of a gamble, considering the poor performance of pirate films like Cutthroat Island (Renny Harlin, 1995). The film’s high-budget production was reported throughout the Hollywood press, detailing aspects of production design and casting, which included Orlando Bloom, Keira Knightly and Johnny Depp as the film’s ‘hero’, Captain Jack Sparrow. The British media similarly followed the production focussing on Depp’s characterisation of Sparrow as a drug-fried, drunken, anarchic rock star after the actor realised that 18th-century pirates were considered akin to contemporary musical giants. 1 Depp’s characterisation of Sparrow differed from previous swashbuckling stereotypes and made pirates sexy, interesting and imitable. His performance received much praise; the film was nominated for five Academy Awards including best actor for Depp. Jack Sparrow breathed life into the archetypal pirate character framed within a discourse of celebrity, anarchy and cool. Pirates became big business; the film’s success generated new interest in the pirate genre and three sequels were produced. Thanks to Depp’s performance, pirates were back from their watery grave and popular again.
Whilst Johnny Depp was re-imagining pirates for the 21st century, other sectors of the film industry were similarly re-framing cultural representations of ‘pirates’. These pirates, however, were profiteering from the exchange of illegally pirated films rather than cursed Aztec gold. The film industry has battled with piracy since its inception; employing technological and distributional strategies to restrict access to copyright protected material. It has also raised awareness, through marketing campaigns that highlight the poor picture and sound quality of pirated material and the dangers of breaking copyright laws. In recent times, the industry has had to tackle with the increased threat of Internet downloading, where piracy had become faster, popular and increasingly more normative. The Internet’s ability to empower audiences to download films and exchange encryption software threatens the established model for the global distribution of film. The industry has had to change its approach to dealing with a very different type of ‘pirate’, one that was able to download the latest films faster from the comfort of their home computer. Piracy was becoming, for some, both more accessible and a popular alternative to traditional film consumption. So whilst in the same year that Depp was popularising the pirate, the industry were devising new strategies to make piracy a less attractive alternative. This article will examine these strategies within the UK film industry, focussing on how the industry attempted to de-glamorise the film pirate, re-connect audiences with film and reward authorised film consumption. It will also examine what informed policy changes deal with Internet film pirates and recent attempts to provide greater access to authorised film content online.
Responsible for restricting piracy in the United Kingdom was the Federation of Copyright Theft (FACT) founded in 1983. Its remit was to protect the UK’s film and broadcasting industry against counterfeiting, copyright and trademark infringements (FACT, 2011). One of the key ways in which FACT did this was to raise awareness of the dangers of counterfeiting through antipiracy campaigns released through legally purchased videotapes. Campaigns framed film piracy within a discourse of criminality, with threats of legal action for repeat offenders. After the terrorist attacks of 2001 on the World Trade Centre, FACT was quick to frame piracy within a terrorist crime discourse, claiming that piracy was funding-organised terrorism. In a report heavily reliant upon FACT’s claims, the trade body responsible for theatrical distribution in the United Kingdom, the Film Distributer’s Association (FDA, 2011), claimed that paramilitary gangs carried out 80% of organised intellectual property crime in Northern Ireland, and Interpol General Secretary Ronald K Noble stated, ‘Intellectual property crime is becoming the preferred method of funding for a number of terrorist groups’. Its £1.5-million antipiracy campaign, funded by the UK’s home entertainment sector, attempted to expose the nasty underbelly of DVD piracy, shattering the illusion that DVD pirates were harmless rogues. In a FACT-produced film, pirates were depicted as a large, sweating, bald-headed ironmonger in a dark, urban industrial workshop where he brands media CDs, videotapes and so on. 2 Dark, disturbing music connotes a sense of fear, establishing the protagonist in the video as a threat. A voice-over explains that piracy is linked to organised crime and has long-term effects on the music and film industry’s future development. The trailer ends with the FACT logo prompting the audience to call a phone number to report illegal piracy activity.
In the same year as the release of Pirates of the Caribbean, the FDA (2011) had called for a better strategy in promoting the dangers of piracy. It called for ‘a cutting-edge contemporary campaign, [borrowing] the vocabulary, and with it the serious connotations, of the hard drugs trade. Piracy means trafficking. Dealing in stolen gear. Curtailing choice [and] risking and wrecking livelihoods’ (FDA, 2011). In response, FACT, the UK Film Council and members of the film industry joined forces in 2004 to form The Industry Trust. The Trust would be responsible for coordinating action on piracy and promoting copyright awareness. Its initial goals were to limit copyright theft in terms of consumption of counterfeit physical copies and illegally downloaded digital content. It would also limit the damage of counterfeit DVDs and illegal downloads, not just to the creative industries but to the economy, consumers and communities as well as be a voice for the film and TV industry on issues regarding the protection of copyright, its contribution to society and the value of creativity. 3
The early campaigns of The Industry Trust continued the ‘piracy as a crime’ discourse. The You Wouldn’t Steal a Handbag campaign took a more dramatic approach to film piracy. The campaign video mixes US crime TV conventions; rapid camera work, sweeping graphics and a fast and aggressive music score. The video plays similar to a film trailer and contains no voice over, allowing the video to be shown in multiple language markets. On-screen text to question the audience (‘you wouldn’t steal a car’ or ‘you wouldn’t steal a handbag’) appears over footage of a leather-jacketed criminal crowbarring a car window and stealing a handbag. 4 The film pirate is represented as a young girl downloading films on her computer, before she heads off to school. The campaign shifts the focus, framing the audience as complicit in illegal piracy with the direct suggestion that downloading is theft. This represents a key change in representation, framing the audience as possible pirates. Prior to this piracy had been framed outside the home as ‘other’, positioning pirates as underground villains operating an organised cartel in pirated material that the public purchase. The new campaign positions the audience as responsible for their own actions, positioning the audience as possible pirates whilst reflecting the shift from hard copy piracy to digital piracy. The campaign provided a link between film piracy and wider, more serious crime by concentrating on the victims of crime. Piracy could, to many, be considered to be soft crime, to not have any noticeable impact. The new campaign challenged this by drawing parallels with realistic common urban crime; something the audience may have been victim to.
Continuing the ‘piracy as crime’ discourse, the Trust decided to shock audiences with its next campaign, exploiting tabloid moral panics of paedophilia, terrorism and drugs with The Market. 5 The campaign offered connections between organised crime and piracy but drew specific attention to the role of the consumer/audience member in making decisions that were informed by the knowledge that piracy is a serious criminal activity. The campaign, which used trailers on DVD releases, showed a market trader offering the latest DVDs which a local member of the public purchases. After walking off, the market trader offers some of his other wares, illegal imported drugs, automatic weapons and finally an illegally trafficked young eastern European girl. The purchaser of the DVD announces, ‘What do you take me for?’ to which the seller replies ‘a customer’. This campaign tries to reinforce the connections between film piracy (in this case hard copy piracy) and organised crime but draws specific attention to the role of the informed consumer making decisions based on an awareness of the links between piracy and crime. The campaign placed the consumer as complicit in criminal activities, exposing consumer ignorance of the purchasing of illegal copyright infringement to make piracy unattractive, positioning the consumer as responsible for making informed choices at the point of purchase.
Framing piracy within a discourse of serious crime relied on some stark messages and a little exaggeration, which led to them being quickly parodied online. 6 Framing piracy within a criminal discourse also served to mobilise the growing community of hackers and pirates that felt that piracy was a way of protesting against media institutions. Henning-Tharau, Henning and Sattler (2007) argue that along with the benefits of saving money, mobility and storage, file sharers were also motivated by anti-industry beliefs. They state that ‘consumers might consider “stealing” a movie by watching an illegal copy a legitimate kind of revenge on the industry’ (Henning-Tharau, Henning and Sattler, 2007: 13) and go on to conclude that individual downloaders should not be chased and that current polices like the threat of legal fees did not have any effect. The Market was to prove to be the last campaign in the Trust’s ‘piracy is a crime’ policy; with the groundwork laid, the Trust would go on to adopt a more long-term approach to promote legal consumption and reframe the cultural representation of film piracy.
From pirate to knock off: ideological and behaviourist practices
The year 2007 saw a sea change in policy and practice at The Industry Trust prompted by the newly appointed Director General Liz Bale. The Trust would move away from framing piracy within a crime discourse to develop more subtle and effective methods. The new approach of the Trust marked a shift away from other antipiracy campaigns that have focussed on delivering enforcement messages and stressing the criminal nature of the people behind the mass production of fake DVDs (Industry Trust, 2007a). During the initial transition period, traditional antipiracy messages still had a voice in the campaign, but messages raised awareness of the contribution of the film industry to the economy and to society. The change in policy was reflected in The Industry Trust’s home page introduction (Table 1):
The Industry Trust homepage entries for 2007 and 2011.
The UK’s FDA (2011) also felt that a change in approach was needed, one that maintained the dominant position of the cinema for film exhibition, stating that ‘We must remind audiences […] that the cinema is the greatest way to experience a film’. The FDA felt the need for a move away from the ‘romantic connotations’ of piracy, using a ‘long-term process of persuasion’ whilst ‘every step must be taken to add value to the cinema experience, so that temptations to watch an impending or current cinema release on a rip-off DVD might be ignored’. Any new approach had to also reflect the increasing cultural problems associated with piracy. Piracy had become more popular and attractive; not only by its financial benefits but also by the cultural representation of piracy. The FDA claims ‘we're not best served by the word piracy in this context. Pirates are either swashbuckling heroes or panto characters with eyepatch and parrot’ (FDA, 2011). Although the eighteenth century portrayal by Johnny Depp was a world away from the reality of film piracy, previous ‘piracy as crime’ campaigns had made piracy seem exciting and dangerous.
Several authors have argued that representing file sharers as pirates may not have had the intended consequences. Rojek (2005: 362) situates peer-to-peer exchange against the backdrop of social banditry in which companies such as Napster ‘present themselves as folk heroes who rob from the rich to give to the poor’ as they increase consumer choice whilst facilitating copyright infringement. Similarly, The Pirate Bay has regularly taunted the legal representatives of the major film studios, publishing their responses for all to see. 8 Discussions regarding the threat of emergent media practices (such as computer games, mobile phones and internet subscriptions) to traditional consumer expenditure have been charted by Leyshon et al (2005: 184) in relation to music consumption. Henning-Tharau, Henning and Sattler (2007: 13) argue ‘The declared war on movie piracy might limit the industry’s ability to cope with and draw its attention away from societal developments such as the massive increases in consumer spending on video/computer games […] cell phone [and] DVD has had a substantial effect on theatre visits and alternative kinds of movie consumption’. Despite this they see a solution in stressing the unethical element of appropriating copyrighted material could increase the moral costs of illegal file sharing. The Trust’s change in approach attempted to address the unethical status of film piracy whilst providing greater access to film texts and opportunities for audiences to interact. To do this, the Trust developed a series of campaigns that stressed the antisocial and unethical nature of film piracy by examining the wider social effects of film piracy, attempting to change behavioural practices in those likely to be film pirates.
Behavioural practices
In 2007, The Industry Trust launched its new campaign designed to both entertain and reinforce the social stigma of the unethical and unsocial aspects of film piracy. The Knock-off Nigel campaign was intended to ‘connect with people, using social stigma to cause them to think twice before obtaining illegal film and TV content … and also raise awareness of the contribution of the industry sector to the economy and to society’. The campaign adopted a behavioural change policy, one that attempted to create audience support through addressing the impact of piracy on society and the economy through stressing the antisocial and unethical nature of film piracy. Behavioural practices involving film piracy have their origins in the 1980s when Warner Bros offered a $5,000 reward to any employee with information that led to a film piracy conviction (Segrave, 2003:111). Employees were also asked for any ideas to prevent future piracy within the industry. The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) would later adopt a similar technique providing rewards of up to $5,000, supported by the major studios, for any members of the public with information that led to a conviction. This change in approach was actively looking for support from the public, creating a social stigma around piracy and encouraging people to report on friends or family that they know may be involved in film piracy.
The Knock-off Nigel campaign was led by PR agency, Blue Rubicon, experts in behaviour change campaigns (Industry Trust, 2007a). The campaign attempted to reframe the pirate, not as an attractive criminal but as a seedy cheapskate. The campaign took on the task of developing a new discourse surrounding film piracy; Liz Waller, Senior Consultant at Blue Rubicon, acknowledged that ‘the new campaign will introduce fresh terminology to change the way people talk and think about copyright theft’ (Industry Trust, 2007a). The term ‘pirate’ does not appear in any of the campaign literature or TV spots. Instead they associate film piracy with an unsocial, anticommunity spirited, unattractive ‘Nigel’ character – the name having unattractive associations within British culture. The campaign aimed to associate film piracy with ‘down-market, grubby behavior’ (Industry Trust, 2008b: 2) rather than the glamorous associations of pirate with the attractions of the criminal in crime films. The campaign was specifically targeted at young males, using cinema trailers, magazine advertisements in Zoo magazine, and branded coasters in the Wetherspoons pub chain. The idea of the campaign was to make DVD piracy ‘socially abhorrent’ (Industry Trust, 2008b) and create opportunities for people to name and shame their own ‘Nigel friends’ (Industry Trust, 2008b).
TV advertisements revolved around a young man in his late 20s in a traditional social space, the public house or work place, where he would be harassed by a musical interlude, which steadily gained social support. ‘The Public House’ advert 9 used the backdrop of a traditional working class setting and the social contract of a date, showing Nigel enjoying a drink with his girlfriend. The pub’s local folk singer enters and sings, with an evident Scottish accent, about the man’s antisocial habits announcing that the watch Nigel has just given his girlfriend as a gift was actually found in the street, prompting the girlfriend to leave, dropping the watch in his pint as she departs. The song continues to alert the pub’s clientele to Nigel’s nefarious ways, breaking social contracts, trading ‘knock-off’ films, scrounging his drinks and even suggestions that he would steal from his own grandmother. Customers in the pub join in with the song entering into the chorus of ‘He’s a Knock-off Nigel … buys knock off DVDs’.
The overall effect of this sequence is to reframe the pirate or Nigel as antisocial and selfish. The use of music, particularly folk music, and the social setting of the pub serves to frame piracy as anticommunity, as something modern not traditional. The advert represents the pirate as someone who regularly breaks social contracts, interested in their own well-being over that of the wider community. This position also reflects the wider social reframing of criminality in Britain at the time, particularly including the introduction of antisocial behaviour orders (ASBOs) established in 1998. This message was continued in the second Knock-off Nigel TV spot, which was again set in a social setting, the office workplace. The advert employed nostalgia in its use of 1970s film stock, lighting, fashion and music, giving the piece a period feel evoking the golden age of sitcom in order to portray traditional British culture in opposition to piracy (seen as modern, technological and un-British). ‘The Office’ advertisement starts with Nigel at his desk in an open plan office – he is young, in his early 20s – operating a laptop computer. A purple suited, moustachioed singer from the 1970s enters singing the Knock-off Nigel song. 10 Lyrics this time refer to stealing from ‘whip-rounds’ and other employees’ food from the office fridge. Both advertisements seek to address piracy as unethical; drawing attention to antisocial crimes like stealing from others in the social environment, reframing the victims of piracy away from the major film industries to the smaller community of film audiences. As before, fellow colleagues join in with the song, including two attractive female co-workers who now find Nigel unappealing. This advert specifically targets the film downloader with its musical coda of ‘Knock-off Nigel … downloads knock-off films’ and in mirroring the actions of his Internet service provider, Nigel has his laptop taken away from him.
It was essential that the Knock-Off Nigel campaign had an online presence, one that was equipped to exploit viral media and reach online pirates. The website ‘Knock-Off or Not’ 11 continued the campaign’s antisocial discourse by employing social media technologies to encourage users to embarrass known pirate friends by sending personalised antipiracy messages. Part of the website allowed users to send a song ‘Ambush’ to people via their mobile phones (see Figure 1), the song sent being the theme music to the TV campaign. The ‘Song Ambush’ tool also allowed users to upload a picture of their ‘mate’ to embarrass them on the website. The campaign’s use of social media documents a change in the industries’ practice in controlling film piracy; although the ‘piracy as breaking social contract’ discourse is not new, this is the first attempt at using social media to distribute a message directly to pirates regarding the antisocial effects of film piracy. This approach also raises important questions about privacy as personal information and pictures of possible pirates are uploaded to the website. This viral, social media technique is used again elsewhere on the site under the guise of Mexican wrestling antipiracy superhero ‘El Burrito’.
Knock-off Nigel Song Ambush at http://www.knockoffornot.com/song_ambush/.
The ‘El Burrito’ tool allows users to send a personalised message to the phones of known pirates from El Burrito; a shiny suited Mexican wrestler with a strong Newcastle accent. The ‘El Burrito’ page (see Figure 2) asks users to provide some basic details about the Knock-off Nigel you wish to send the message to; this includes their name, where they go at night, what they wear and a number of questions about their social habits. The site then generates a personalised message and sends it to the email address of your pirate ‘mate’. The message contains an animated video clip of ‘El Burrito’, highlighting the social stigma of film piracy (cf Industry Trust, 2008b: 1–2). The message frames the pirate as social miscreant making specific references to aspects of underclass culture, referring to ‘tracky bottoms’ and poor personal hygiene. This message is continued on the ‘Knock-off or not’ page, which offers an online personality test to see whether you are a Knock-off Nigel. Questions revolve around the social aspects of being a knock-off, asking questions like have you stolen sweets from a child or travelled on a bus without paying a fare?
The ‘Knock-off Nigel’ campaign’s ‘El Burrito’ messaging tool at http://www.knockoffornot.com/elburrito/.
The use of personalised messaging and public spectacle takes a particularly medieval turn at the ‘Pelt a Knock-off Nigel’ game page, which allows users to again upload a picture of someone known to be a Knock-off and digitally pelt them with a mixture of virtual rotten fruit and dead fish, whilst they appear in medieval stocks. 12 The website’s use of games and personalised messaging attempts to add value for users of the site whilst promoting the message that piracy is antisocial, positioning the pirate as deviant. The use of public display, by uploading pictures, serves to demonise and embarrass pirates through social means rather than the traditional rule of law. However, it should not be forgotten that the Knock-off Nigel site is itself an institutional tool created by the UK Industry Trust and funded by the UK government and its members which include major film and television companies. The site encourages the user to input personalised information about themselves and more importantly known film pirates. Although a majority of users may be using the site for fun rather than for its intended use, it does raise questions about privacy as users are encouraged to upload personal email addresses, mobile phone numbers and even photographs to the site. What happens to this information and whether it is used for enforcement purposes or as surveillance requires additional investigation.
The success of Knock-off Nigel
The Knock-off Nigel campaign, though short-lived, was very successful and popular. The site received over 80,000 hits from people who took the Knock-off Nigel test and 62,000 people sent a message from El Burrito (Industry Trust, 2007b). An NOP poll conducted by The Industry Trust to measure the campaign’s success at changing behaviour documented a threefold increase in people who think that copyright theft is ‘embarrassing’ and the actions of a ‘cheapskate’ (Industry Trust, 2008b). The survey found that the number of people who think film piracy is embarrassing increased from 22% to 39%. Attitudes to online piracy had also changed with an increase in people believing that unofficial downloads and file sharing are ‘wrong’, increasing from 34% to 56%. After the campaign the number of people buying illegal DVDs dropped by 2% and borrowing illegal DVDs from friends dropped from 15% to 11% (Industry Trust, 2008b). The Industry Trust responded to the change in attitudes with the Interim Director-General Paul Archer commenting that:
To have achieved such a positive impact on attitudes in such a short space of time is extremely encouraging […] the new campaign has put copyright theft back on the public agenda by turning it into a social and moral issue, not just a legal one. It has acted as a catalyst for thousands of new consumer conversations about copyright, particularly online. This is a landmark achievement for the industry and has laid strong foundations we can build on in the coming year. (2008a)
The Knock-off Nigel campaign was the first phase in a new approach to tackling piracy, attempting to change behaviour and public opinion. Opinions had started to change and piracy had started to become framed within a discourse of social deviance, but it was only the first phase in a wider ideological campaign to control piracy. The next phase of the campaign was to concentrate on promoting legal consumption by promoting cinema as the site of authentic consumption. Also, the Knock-off Nigel campaign had been targeted at young males and had ignored other demographics; the next phase was intended to reach out to younger audiences and the parents that take them to the cinema. For the film industry, the cinema has traditionally been seen as the authentic site of consumption for film. Although the DVD market is an important profit maker for the film industry, the cinema is still an essential part of the institutional business model controlling exhibition and distribution of the film product. In the United Kingdom, the FDA (2011) felt that audiences needed to be reminded of the centrality of cinema as site of authentic, quality consumption, announcing that ‘we must remind audiences that the cinema is the greatest way to experience a film’. They acknowledge that this will be a ‘long-term process of persuasion’ (FDA, 2011) and that ‘every step must be taken to add value to the cinema experience, so that temptations to watch an impending or current cinema release on a rip-off DVD might be ignored’. The Industry’s response to this was to reward cinema audiences – by saying thanks.
The ‘Thank You’ campaign
The Industry Trust’s next phase of its campaign was to reward cinema audiences and people purchasing legitimate DVDs, by acknowledging their commitment to the film industry, thanking them for their choice in purchase and addressing how they are contributing to the UK film industry. The Thank You campaign was a two-pronged approach that reinforced the message of the Knock-off campaign, whilst at the same time addressing the impact of film piracy on the UK film industry and economy. The campaign attempted to engage the audience with the film product as ‘real’ rather than the increasingly ephemeral digital download. The campaign represented film as an industrial product by demonstrating the below and above line staff employed in the UK film industry whilst highlighting the ‘social contract’ of paying to see a film.
The campaign was rolled out in 2009 and used cinema trailers to thank the paying audience. The trailers used UK film talent, most notably Martin Freeman, Matthew Horne and Jaime Winstone, to address the wider effects of piracy on the UK film industry. The trailers were set in an empty white film studio, being built by a series of below the line workers whilst the celebrity speaks directly to camera. The trailer grounds the film product in the real world as a product of an industry, which employs the talent on screen but more importantly the crews in the background that are seldom celebrated. The campaign cast mid-range UK stars perceived to be famous, but not necessarily A-list stars, to avoid debates regarding the inequality of high star salaries and rising ticket prices. At the time, Martin Freeman would have been known to audiences from TV’s The Office (2001–2003) and films like Love Actually (Richard Curtis, 2003) whilst his fellow cast members, such as Hugh Grant or Liam Neeson, could be argued to have the opposite effect: serving to illustrate the excessive costs of stars and film budgets, the attraction of Hollywood for stars, and its dominance at the UK box office. In the trailer, the camera slowly closes in on the celebrity until their face fills the frame and the following is delivered with a sincere tone:
Thousands of people work in the UK film industry and we’d like to thank all of you who pay to enjoy the latest releases. But a small minority damages cinema by camcording films and posting them online or making copies. With your help we can restrict piracy and enjoy the real thing. Thank you.
In continuing with traditional restrictive practices, the trailers ended with the Crimestoppers logo and phone number to remind audiences of the illegality of film piracy and a warning to be observant for pirates during the screening. Similar strategies were previously employed in the United States when, in 1998, the MPAA employed the public’s help with a series of cinema trailers alerting the public to be aware of camcording pirates (Segrave, 2003: 128). FDA research carried out by OTX in 2009 found that the Thank You campaign had been successful with an increase in audiences recognising that ‘film is an important industry which needs supporting’ (FDA, 2010: 57). The Thank you campaign was the first to address the film text as tangible product, as part of a wider social community of filmmakers, and an essential part of the UK economy. This ‘making real’ approach responded to the growing ephemerality of the online digital download. For some audiences, film was becoming smaller and intangible.
Making reel: ‘Connected to British Film and TV’ campaign
The Industry Trust continued to focus on the reality behind film production through the Connected to British Film and TV campaign, which was launched in September 2010 in conjunction with The Sun newspaper. The campaign was aimed at educating young teenage audiences, using an interactive website containing competitions, surveys and videos. 13 The difference with the Connected campaign is that rather than carrying any specific messages about film piracy (in fact piracy is never mentioned), it draws attention to the UK film industry and other creative industries in the United Kingdom; attempting to make real the increasingly intangible film product by positioning the audience as a stakeholder in the UK’s creative industries. The website is designed as an interactive 3D street graphic with information appearing as graffiti on a wall in an urban environment (see Figure 3).
The ‘Connected to British Film and TV’ website at http://www.connectedtobritishfilmandtv.co.uk/.
Through moving the cursor, the user can navigate the various tools and campaigns from The Industry Trust, specifically designed for a younger audience. The tools are designed to connect the audience with film, addressing the national and local connections that the UK film industry has to the user and address employment opportunities in the creative industries. The ‘Reel Life’ feature shows videos of UK filmmakers and other below the line staff giving advice on how to enter creative industries in the United Kingdom. These contain insights by Stephen Frears and Noel Clarke. The ‘Your Name in Lights’ feature is a competition run in partnership with Twitter, prompting users to name the last film they watched and the method they used to watch it (only providing users with legal options). Winning entrants will appear on the Your Name in Lights Twitter feed and appear on video screens in Piccadilly Circus. The ‘Framespotting’ feature (see Figure 4) is a national film location search tool that allows users to view a map of famous film locations in the United Kingdom. The map features films like Batman (Tim Burton, 1989) and Goldeneye (Martin Campbell, 1995) and provides the location where UK film stars and celebrities hail from. The search tool also allows users to type in their location and find information on films that have been filmed nearby or actors who were born in the local area.
‘Framespotting’ feature search for Nottingham at http://www.connectedtobritishfilmandtv.co.uk/#/framespotting.
The site illustrates the importance of copyright and intellectual property by raising awareness of its impact on the national and local creative industries. By showing users local film locations and the birthplaces of celebrities, it serves to illustrate the impact of the user’s own consumption of film and TV products on these industries and the effect of illegal consumption on their long-term health. The site attempts to challenge the myth that downloading a film from the Internet is harmless; placing the text within a local context therefore making the globalised world of the film industry feel closer to home.
Positioning the audience as a stakeholder in the industry draws attention to the long-term impact of film piracy and its effect on the user’s ability to seek employment in the industry in the future and on future film creativity. This continued to be the theme for the 2011 Kodak Commercial Award; an Industry Trust initiative that asks filmmakers and schools to create advertisements that address the effects of film piracy on the local film industry. The winning entrant shows a film set in disarray, it appears cold and unkempt with below the line workers homeless desperate for food. The boom operator sweeps the snow with his boom pole, whilst microphone and lighting staff warm themselves around a par lantern. An out-of-work actor calls out in a Shakespearean tone begging for change. The piece ends with a film pirate selling material from his car boot, asking the viewer if they would like to buy a pirated DVD explaining, ‘it’s a small price to pay’. 14 The MPAA has similarly launched campaigns designed to address the impact of film piracy on the localised industry. The ‘Get the Real Picture Campaign’ takes a humorous approach to tackling film piracy on the streets of New York. The campaign’s website and videos show a street vendor offering pirated DVDs. He explains that the DVDs are cheap because they are pirated and if you buy them this ‘nice lady would lose her job’, signalling to the female boom operator standing behind him. One customer buys 3 DVDs explaining that he does not care about the boom operator’s job. The street vendor asks, ‘Is it because you don’t have a soul?’ The trailer goes to lengths to explain that the boom operator is a fellow New Yorker and the website profiles her and other below the line workers living in New York City.
The ‘audience as stakeholder’ approach shifts the victim of film piracy away from ‘stealing from a faceless industry’ to ‘stealing from yourself’ or your local community. In continuing with this approach the Trust’s next campaign was to illustrate the impact of film on wider culture. The ‘You Make the Movies’ campaign, launched in 2008, was designed to celebrate film through addressing the impact of film on popular culture. The campaign involved trailers and TV adverts, which parodied famous film moments, recreating dialogue and scenes from films juxtaposed into ordinary daily scenarios. In one TV spot a supermarket manager is receiving a delivery of money from a security guard who insists on the manager calling out ‘show me the money’ parodying the phone conversation between Tom Cruise and Cuba Gooding Junior in Jerry Maguire (Cameron Crowe, 1996). 15 This approach added value and entertainment to the antipiracy, pro-copyright campaigns using copyrighted source material to spread pro-copyright messages. A similar technique was also employed to reach younger audiences using familiar characters and settings. The Trust’s member videos trailers were antipiracy messages that appeared on DVD releases and at the cinema prior to new releases. The campaign was run in partnership with its member organizations, especially Disney and Pixar. Anthony Peet, Vice-President of Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment, commented on this partnership: ‘We are determined to continue to work together as an industry to drive innovative and impactful campaigns that will challenge people’s approach to copyright theft’ (cited in Industry Trust: 2008a). The videos used animated characters from recent Disney and Pixar releases highlighting the poor quality of illegal copies. Toy Story 3 (Lee Unkrich, 2010), Ratatouille (Brad Bird & Jan Pinkava, 2007) and WALL-E (Andrew Stanton, 2008) were all used in the campaign, which featured edited antipiracy versions of the above. The WALL-E video parodied a scene from the original movie wherein WALL-E and EVE watch Hello Dolly (Gene Kelly, 1969); as the two robots struggle to watch the poor quality image of a pirated version of Ratatouille a voice over explains that WALL-E ‘finds it hard to tell what’s rubbish and what’s not’. 16 The Ratatouille trailer took a slightly different approach, focussing on quality and authenticity. The film’s protagonist explains that ‘a good movie is like a good meal – its got to look great and its gotta sound great’ and ‘if you’re like me you’ll only want the best’.
Alongside the members’ videos the Trust targeted older children through the use of social networking. Launched in 2008, ScreenThing 17 is the Industry Trust’s Facebook site, designed to promote copyright awareness by inspiring and educating 11- to 15-year-olds, encouraging ‘respect for creativity by providing impetus and opportunities for engagement in the creative process’ (FDA, 2010: 54). The site encourages ‘young ambassadors’ to influence their peers in matters of legal film consumption (FDA, 2010). The site boasts exclusive trailers, interviews and information on how to enter the film industry. As of July 2012, the site had gathered more than 31,500 ‘likes’ (the Facebook barometer of user engagement) and regularly has competitions to win tickets to see the latest films. The site works in conjunction with ‘ScreenThing Champions’, a school competition in partnership with Film Education, encouraging film screenings within schools, and promotes discussion on copyright awareness and working in the film industry. The site allows teachers to download job descriptions ranging from directors to cameramen with testimonies from industry workers, including directors like Noel Clarke and cinema managers. 18
The Trust’s youth campaigns were successful in changing opinion. FDA (2010: 54) research suggests that the ScreenThing site has over 400,000 visitors and regular users are far less likely to view, buy or download unauthorised content (48% users less likely vs. 26% non users) and twice as likely to want to protect the industry. In reaching out to young audiences, the Trust’s pro-copyright message became aligned with future employment aspirations through exploring local creative industries. This long-term investment approach framed pirates, as having a negative effect on future film production and local economies. These campaigns made piracy less attractive by addressing quality and future investment, changing public opinion by facilitating debate both online and in the classroom. The Trust needed to shift focus onto the thing it was trying to protect, promoting legal consumption whilst responding to the weaknesses of pirated film, not only in terms of poor picture and sound quality but also in the unique ability of authentic legal content to move audiences.
Providing an alternative: moments worth paying for and findanyfilm.com
The Industry Trust’s ‘Moments Worth Paying For’ campaign was prompted by a research which found that one in three users regularly visit illegal sites first (Thorpe, 2011), seeking out authentic content only when an illegal alternative cannot be found. The campaign therefore attempted to highlight the benefits of authorised content, not simply in terms of quality, but in the unique ability of authorised content to create an emotional impact. The campaign worked alongside the Find Any Film website to provide an authorised alternative to illegal content by showing users where they can download or go and see the films they are interested in. The campaign frames cinema consumption as a unique experience, one with greater added value and emotional impact. The campaign was targeted at a demographic that was felt to be at greater threat of being ‘dabblers’ (Industry Trust, 2011b) in Internet piracy, namely 16- to 34-year-old males. According to The Industry Trust, the campaign was intended to
fulfil the first three basic principles of behaviour change, no finger wagging about the wrong behaviour, make an emotional connection to the copyright issue and provide simple steps to the right behaviour. PR will then fulfil the role of highlighting how easy it is to consume official content, making the issue personally relevant and normalising the use of official services. (Industry Trust, 2011b)
The Moments Worth Paying For campaign was launched in 2011 and was forecasted to reach 94% of its target audience through online campaigns and cinema advertisements with advertising space donated by Pearl and Dean. 19 Online adverts were placed in lifestyle and entertainment channels and social media with links that take people to the Find Any Film website. 20 The poster campaign contained various celebrities commenting on their favourite film moments. These included celebrities most likely to appeal to the targeted demographic. Harry Hill, Eddie Izzard and Kidulthood (Menhaj Huda, 2006) star, Adam Deacon, all comment on their favourite film moments.
The celebrity poster campaign worked alongside cinema trailers and posters that show close-up images of members of the paying public watching films in a cinema along with a short comment as to their favourite scene. These are often comedic in tone, often relying upon double entendres to respond to the targeted male audience. The cinema trailers showed audience members filmed in slow motion experiencing the emotional impact of the film image. These are split into 4 categories: shock, laughter, tears and awe 21 to highlight the unique emotional impact of film when viewed at the cinema. The campaign places the spectatorship at the heart of the campaign, framing the audience as part of the process of creating film meaning. This continues to frame the audience as ‘stakeholder’ in the cinema experience, positioning the paying audience member as equally responsible for the film text as the film’s producer or director. The Moments Worth Paying For website site explains that:
These are moments worth paying for. To be enjoyed as their makers intended: in official ways that help to protect the future of film and TV, thanks to that tiny, but powerful © aka copyright. … Moments Worth Paying For is the Industry Trust’s new pro-copyright campaign that celebrates those who make great movies possible – the audience.
Alongside the Moments campaign, the Industry Trust launched its online hub for audiences to gain access to film content. The site findanyfilm.com is designed to respond to downloaders who regularly search illegal sites prior to authorised consumption. Research from Global Web Index showed that web users turned to unlawful sites because the content they wanted was not available elsewhere. The survey showed that 45% of file sharers said they would consume films legally if the technology allowed them to (Wray, 2010) and 28% of those using P2P file sharing to view unauthorised content do so as it offers instant access. The Harris Interactive study for the BPI’s Digital Music Nation report in 2010 researched those who had stopped using illegal forms of media specifically P2P; 29% of respondents had stopped because a better pay service was available. Providing authorized access to media content online that both adds value and collects revenue has been explored by a number of recent ventures. Spotify’s online music platform offers lawful free music funded by subscriptions, advertisements, and downloads and LoveFilm’s online streaming service have all successfully developed authorized alternatives to free content.
Find Any Film is not the first service to offer online access to film content. In 2001, Sony Pictures launched an ‘honest alternative’ to downloading with its online film rental site, but not all studios joined, with Fox and Disney refusing to take part (Segrave, 2003: 139). In 2005, Movielink was launched as a joint venture between Sony/MGM, Paramount, Fox, Warner Bros and Universal, which allowed users to legitimately download films. Despite some success, a lack of total studio backing and therefore limited content led other competitor studios to join talks with Amazon, Apple, Microsoft and even BitTorrent to offer similar services. Movielink eventually went up for sale and was bought out by Blockbuster offering online rentals, ‘bricks and mortar’ rentals and mail order rental. Despite this, the company filed for bankruptcy in September 2010. In the United Kingdom, similar attempts have been made to offer online access. The UK Film Council and BFI’s ‘Full Stream Ahead’ campaign launched the blink box website in 2008, which provided legal access to hundreds of movies, even offering £20 worth of vouchers for content when first joining. The site allows users to download or stream movies to their TV, luring people away from illegal channels whilst capitalising on the growing demand for streaming services like BBC iPlayer.
What makes Find Any Film different is its combination of downloading, rental and cinema services filtered through a film search engine that allows users to search for legal versions of a film available in all platforms, both to purchase in tangible copies and to legally download and stream. It also details cinema listings, DVD and Blu-Ray releases, providing an opportunity to promote new releases. The site provides legal alternatives to illegal downloading whilst capitalising on the strengths of digital technologies to improve access and speed at the same time allow the Trust to track audience trends. Peter Buckingham from the UK Film Council stated at the site’s launch in January 2009, that the site is ‘Encouraging people to watch a wider range of films, and [keep] a watchful eye over the use and growth of “disruptive technologies” that could encourage movie piracy’ (cited in Beaumont, 2009). He goes on to comment that findanyfilm.com ‘is a case of modern technology meeting the needs of the audience for the benefit of the audience’ (Beaumont, 2009). The site is supported by advertising revenue for upcoming features and like the popular imdb.com carries data on stars, directors and film genres, whilst allowing users to navigate through the site’s catalogue of films. An ‘alert me’ function also allows users to gain information on upcoming releases, attempting to counteract the instant access that illegal downloading offers.
Find Any Film reflects an ongoing acceptance within the industry of the growing demand from audiences to have greater access to film content online. The Internet and mobile technologies are motivating audiences to seek out new ways to access film, challenging the traditional institutional business model which places cinema at the heart of authentic exchange. The industry is increasingly responding to these demands by providing legitimate alternatives to illegal content online. At the Insight 360° industry event in June 2011, The Industry Trust, in partnership with the BVA, launched a number of recent technological innovations by its partners, which exploit the recent increases in broadband access to provide alternatives to illegal consumption. LoveFilm launched their video on demand service through the Sony Playstation 3 console, allowing consumers to stream movies, rate them, read reviews and have full control over watching. 22 Lovefilm’s presentation 23 suggested a move away from physical distribution to total digital distribution within 10 years. Presentations by Apollo cinemas addressed the benefits of digital cinema as a site of authentic consumption through showing opera, sporting events and film premieres. Alex Green from Virgin TV and Online revealed Virgin’s next generation in personal video recording (PVR) technology, a 1-terabyte Internet connected television recorder that uses TiVO technology. Audiences can watch TV and film content on demand and search through menus from current and past TV and film whilst the TiVO component can suggest programming based upon personal taste.
These new technologies reflect both a changing set of audience demands and the industry’s attempt to respond to them. Traditionally, the industry has responded to new technological innovations, like TV and video, with concern due to their ability to de-stabilise traditional institutional practice (see Gillespie, 2007; Lessig, 2004, 2008; Patry, 2009; Wu. 2010). These concerns and debates were framed around piracy and the ability of audiences to gain access to what was a protected resource. The threat of piracy was managed through a series of restrictive practices that limited access to content and new technologies whilst the industry lobbied for global copyright laws and increased protection. Throughout this article, we have examined how the industry has sought to protect its revenue by framing piracy as an illegal act, enforcing piracy through legal restrictions and prosecutions. The Internet, however, has opened up piracy to a wider audience, allowing greater debate and criticism of industry practices online. The industry’s response of ‘changing behaviour’ approaches did have an impact and shifted the victim of piracy away from the film industry onto the audience themselves, reinforced by campaigns that addressed the central role of film in wider culture. Now that these foundations have been laid the industry has been able to exploit the Internet as a distribution network providing authorised content online. Websites like Find Any Film, however, reflect a total sea change in approach, providing legitimate access through the channels carved out by emerging audiences. This change in approach reflects a growing acceptance of new forms of consumption of film that would have traditionally been seen as a threat. The industry has come to realise that new forms of consumption, mobilised by the Internet cannot be easily contained or restricted and it is only with a growing acceptance and co-option of these new forms of exchange that the industry will be able to continue.