Australians appear to be ditching their predilection for piracy and going legit in their consumption of streaming video content according to new research from Choice.
The onset of new affordable and competitive SVOD services such as Netflix, Stan and Presto has had a demonstrable effect on piracy usage in Australia. Consumer advocacy group CHOICE has found that in the last six months, the number of people using legal subscription and pay-per-view services has grown from 46% to 59% .
“The fact is the number of people regularly pirating in Australia has dropped by a quarter since Netflix launched,” says CHOICE Campaigns Manager, Erin Turner.
Turner added that the trends supports the view that making affordable content easy to access is the first and most effective tactic to reduce piracy, rather than internet filters or ISP notice schemes.
“The increase is directly related to the launch of Netflix in Australia and the emergence of a local streaming industry, with players such as Stan and Presto competing for customers and offering consumers real alternatives to piracy,” Turner said.
The research revealed that the number of people who pirate film or TV at least monthly has decreased by a quarter, shifting from 23% in 2014 to 17%. Overall rates of piracy have also reduced from 33% to 30%.
Significantly, of those who do pirate, 32% of illegal downloaders are downloading TV shows that they know they can’t buy in Australia, and 30% are pirating movies that can’t be bought in Australia.
The Choice findings also align with recent Federal Government research that found that the best options for limiting piracy were to; reduce the price of legal content (39%), improve availability of content (38%) and eliminate release delays (36%)
CHOICE conducted its initial survey ‘CHOICE Digital Consumers – paying for content behaviour and attitudes’ in November 2014, prior to launch of new legal streaming services in Australia, and prior to the passage of the Copyright Amendment (Online Infringement) Bill 2015 (the Copyright Bill).
Australians have a long held reputation of being in the top tier of the world’s most prodigious pirates. Local piracy levels hit a peak last year when 1.5 million people downloaded the season finale of Game of Thrones.
“It’s time for the content industry to stop ignoring the facts and end the massive waste of time and money pursuing their obsession with a useless internet filter and an education notice scheme. These policies won’t work, because they do not address the reasons people pirate. Unlawful downloading comes down to availability, timeliness and affordability,” Turner commented.
