TorrentFreak

The MPAA tends to leave no opportunity unused in its quest to show that online piracy is devastating the movie industry. However, this supposed devastation is not visible at the box office this year. In 2012 North American movie theaters showed more movies than ever before, and for the first time in history domestic box office grosses surpassed $10.7 billion The new record comes in a year where two academic studies have shown that “piracy” isn’t necessarily hurting box office revenues .

BitTorrent is used by millions of people every day, including people who work at major Hollywood studios. Those who are said to be suffering the most from online piracy are no stranger to sharing copyrighted files themselves. New data reveals that employees at Paramount Pictures, Warner Bros., Disney, Sony Pictures and 20th Century Fox are openly pirating movies, games and other forms of entertainment while at work.

The MPAA is still not happy with Google’s efforts to reduce online piracy and says that the search giant continues to facilitate a “staggering amount of copyright infringement.” For their part Google is warning policymakers of the damaging effects the recent surge of DMCA takedown requests is having on the flow of information online. Both Google and the MPAA agree that the current DMCA takedown procedures are not ideal, but the solutions both parties have in mind are quite different.

In a filing to the Office of the US Trade Representative the major movie studios describe how successful the shutdown of Megaupload has been. According to the MPAA the file-hosting industry was massively disrupted, with carry-over effects to linking and BitTorrent sites. Nonetheless, the movie group says the work is not done yet and lists The Pirate Bay, Extratorrent, isoHunt, Kat.ph and several other file-hosting and linking sites as remaining threats.

The MPAA and file-hosting service Hotfile are ramping up their battle in court. In a new filing the movie studios back up their request to shut Hotfile down, describing the company as the most blatant inducer of copyright infringement ever to appear before a court in an online piracy case. In response the file-hosting service accuses the MPAA of foul play and points out that it’s merely a service provider.

Despite the ever increasing threat of online piracy, Hollywood is allocating less money to their flagship anti-piracy outfit. Tax records reveal that in a period of three years the major movie studios cut their payments to the MPAA in half. As a direct result the budget of the movie industry group reached a new low of $49.6 million, causing wage and legal fee payouts to plummet.

“Hollywood is keeping piracy alive by failing to make content available legally.” It’s an often heard argument, but one that’s not “borne out by the facts” according to the MPAA. However, the “facts” presented in a rebuttal by the movie industry group are twisted and show utter contempt for those trying to do the right thing.