With many organizations clamping down on torrent and pirating websites, one would expect to see a decline in piracy. However, it seems like new websites keep cropping up, while people keep finding workarounds for any obstacles thrown their way. In fact, in Russia where thousands of websites were blocked for illegally distributing software via torrents ans such, the ‘market’ for piracy has doubled. Ad revenue generated by these websites have also gone up, some earning over a million/year.
This brings into question the effectiveness of blocking these sites in the first place. Maybe it’s a Russia specific issues, since UK and US have seen piracy go down with legislation and site blocking. However, even here in India, piracy is still an issue. One thing that is promising is the more affordable availability of services like Amazon Prime, Netflix, Steam and so on, which encourages people to pay for the content they enjoy. It’s still in the early stages of adoption, and as more people start using them, we should see a decline in piracy here as well.
Another aspect of this issue are the advertisers on these piracy sites, which brings in revenue for the sites in order to continue existing. This is a morally grey area with loopholes in legality. However, they are, indirectly, allowing piracy to fester and flourish.
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