Advertisements, programmes, websites, etc.
Comparing the various measures companies and organisations take against copyright infringement, educational campaigns can be considered the ’softest’ one. Used very frequently, it may involve using advertisements, programmes, websites, road shows and/or pledge cards to tell the public about the harm DCI causes.
Back to topLed by a few groups of organisations
Educational campaigns are usually led by companies and organisations which create copyrighted work. In all, three main groups of organisations often take charge of the educational campaigns against DCI:
- Musician groups (e.g., AFM and the RIAA);
- Copyright enforcement organisations (e.g., IPD of Hong Kong, IPOS); and
- Software corporations (e.g., Microsoft).
What goes on during these campaigns?
In most of the educational campaigns, the supposed harm copyright infringement does to the relevant industries often take centre stage. In the campaigns, statistics may be employed to illustrate the severity of the problem. They may also stress that not only does copyright infringement harm large, rich corporations, it also affects the Joe Everyman dependent on the relevant industries for a living, and that these people should be empathised with.
That piracy funds organised crime, that one using pirated products is in danger of copyright viruses and other arguments against piracy may also be mentioned as part of the campaign.
Back to topUnfortunately, limited success is achieved
Most of the time, such anti-copyright infringement campaigns achieve limited success. While it seems that the public’s awareness of the harm DCI causes has gone up, two university researchers in the United Kingdom wrote in 2005 that “people [they surveyed] are more accepting of [copyright infringement], even if they didn’t engage in it themselves”.
