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degban · 12-01-2009, 12:43 PM

A short Case study of internet piracy and its effect on pornography industry

Anti Piracy Team, Degban Ltd.
November 29, 2009

Content piracy is one the most important issues that has been challenging internet based content producers for nearly a decade now. Internet piracy unlike other business issues affects the small and less publicized producers much more than the larger producers. Pornography industry is one of these industries. Porn industry is one that is consisted of a huge set of small to mid size producers that lose thousands to millions of dollars every year due to internet piracy. The nature of the content production which is more artistic than technical does not really help the producers in fighting piracy. The fact that a bigger part of the society still has the wrong view and false moral high ground toward the porn industry prevents the bigger and more technically capable companies from entering the industry to provide high level protection and opens the ground for sudo computer technicians to take advantage of an honest and creative industry.
Here we will begin by presenting the modern methods of piracy that are the most popular today. We will provide some of the advantages and disadvantages of each method, go over some general statistics for these methods and conclude by presenting some real statistics about two major porn content producers that are available on the internet i.e. RealityKing for the mainstream porn and the ElitePain for the BDSM market.

Definition of some terms:
The definitions are arbitrary to this article and we make no claims on the universal correctness of the definitions.
Producer: The person who holds the rights to a production.
Pirate: The person who for the first time distributes the content to others without the permission of the producer.
Leecher: A person who uses some of form of technology to acquire access to some production without paying the right costs or charges to the right owners.
Hub: Hub is any website that allows one to share some link to a content with everyone else.

Main methods of Piracy:

There are three main methods of distributing pirated material that are currently in use by pirates. The use of each specific method depends on parameters that will be discussed very shortly here.

? Peer to Peer networks: Peer to Peer networks are the most advanced platforms for content piracy, currently in use by pirates. In order for a leecher to be able to use P2P he needs to be a) Familiar with the technology b) Able to install third party softwares such as the Java platform, the network program etc c) Able to acquire special permission on the network to be able to use P2P, most universities and companies completely disallow use of P2P by use of firewalls. This trend is followed by most ISPs as well but in a less strict fashion meaning that the ISP only limits the bandwidth dedicated to the P2P system d) Able to acquire good upload bandwidth, a user with low upload bandwidth will receive low download bandwidth as well, this is because the system rewards users who contribute more e) Be very patient person! The download speed on P2P tends to be very slow ranging between 40KB to 256KB generally.
? Streaming and tube websites: In this method the pirate needs to upload the content on a streaming server and then distribute the links to that specific file to leechers on the web. In order for a leecher to use this content, he needs to have a high speed internet connection that allows for streaming of the content in real time. There are a few of disadvantages for use of the streaming websites by the leecher: a) leecher will not be able to fast forward or rewind through the clip in an efficient manner. b) Leecher will not be able to download the content to the hard drive for later use easily. c) Tube websites tend to provide low quality content only, which is due to the cost of the underlying technology. d) The tube websites are infested with ads and viruses which are very unpleasant for the leechers. But on the other hand the fast on demand access is a big advantage for the users.
? HTTP based Free File Sharing Hosts (FFSH): A new technology that is getting more popular everyday is FFSH. FFSH are websites that allow users to upload digital content onto them. After the contents are uploaded on the website, the website will generate an URL which can later be used to access the previously uploaded content. Pirate then shares the link among others on the web using some hub. Others can later follow that link and acquire direct access to the file. Theses websites allow for up 16 MB/s download speed for the users. Most websites providing this service claim that they do not keep any IP history for the uploaders or downloaders or what file they have uploaded or downloaded. This provides for some form of anonymity for the uploaders and downloaders. One downside of these services are that a leecher needs t pay a fee to acquire the full download speed and avoid a waiting period for download of contents. But as the free download speeds tend to be up to 4 times faster than P2P system and the waiting periods are mostly less than a minute this doesn?t stop the leechers from using the service.

Now having said all this each of the methods have their own target leeching audience based on the requirements and capabilities available. In the next section we will look at some general statistics regarding the use of each technology for pornography piracy.

Statistics and popularity:

To find out the level of popularity and frequency of usage for each of these methods we ran some simple tests and collected some data on publicly known websites and piracy sources. To keep the case study short and simple here we are presenting a very small portion of this data and restrict our view only to Fetish and BDSM as one group and then Mature and MILF as one group.

P2P have the least amount of content and the FFSH has the most amount of content. This is the result of users balancing the disadvantages of each method. As there are more amateur leechers out there compare to the professional ones, most leechers choose the easiest method being FFSH. An other nice observation is that unlike on the tube sites the fetish and BDSM are much more popular among the FFSH users.

Estimated Damage:

Let?s take the 1000 as the lower average download or view per month for each piece of content available on the net. Let?s say every piece of content is only worth 1 USD for the producers. If we restrict the internet piracy to the websites above than we can estimate a small lower bound for the damage that is resulted from the piracy so far.
P2P: 98650 *1000 * 1USD = 98,650,000 USD
Streaming: 135000 * 1000* 1USD = 135,000,000 USD
FFSH: 900000 * 1000 * 1USD = 900,000,000 USD

Case Study of Elite Pain

Elite Pain (http://www.elitepain.com) is a brand of Mood Picture (http://www.mood-pictures.com/) a Hardcore BDSM content producer. Due to the nature of its content it is anticipated to have smaller set of audience compared to other main stream porn productions. Since end 2008 this company has maintained a fast pace of production and release nearly 4 to 8 new DVDs every month. These DVDs are available for nearly 100 Dollars per copy. After spending a fair amount of time investigating the piracy status for this website in the last months we have found out these valuable information:
Time to appear as a Pirated version: 3-7 days
Updated site-rip alive: over 14 different sets
Download of the new set in the first week: over 1000
Main source of distribution of pirated content: FFSH
Estimated damage for every new released DVD: at least 100K USD in the first week.
Sample
Site-Rips: http://filesmonster.com/folders.php?...PywUqiGSi7h5zA
http://bdsm-gate.net/ (This one includes almost every major BDSM production company such as Kink.com )

Reality King :
RK is one the most popular producer in the world. Unfortunately every releases from this website can found on multiple different hosts on different websites. After investigation on the material from this producer we have came to following conclusions:
Time to appear as a Pirated version: 2-14 days
Updated site-rip alive: over 150 different sets
Download of the new set in the first week: over 5000
Main source of distribution of pirated content: FFSH, Tube, P2P
Smaple:
http://www.pornbb.org/milf-next-door...highlight=milf (more can be found in the same forum)

Conclusions:

We can simply conclude that porn piracy is a major issue in the industry and needs immediate attention of the sponsor and the producers. Although it can be argued that the producers and sponsors need to move in a new direction to better their chances of profiting but in the mean time they have to protect what they own or this trend will push them to the cliffs of bankruptcy. The threat of FFSH is very clear and real and needs to be dealt with before it turns into an unstoppable plague.

Disclaimer: This is a completely experimental case study and Degban Ltd. Will not support the claims by any form of evidence and nor will held responsible for the exact truth of the claims and statements in this article.

12-01-2009, 12:43 PM
degban Confirmed User Industry Role: Join Date: Nov 2009 Location: United Kingdom Posts: 246	A short Case study of internet piracy and its effect on pornography industry (RK, EP) A short Case study of internet piracy and its effect on pornography industry Anti Piracy Team, Degban Ltd. November 29, 2009 Content piracy is one the most important issues that has been challenging internet based content producers for nearly a decade now. Internet piracy unlike other business issues affects the small and less publicized producers much more than the larger producers. Pornography industry is one of these industries. Porn industry is one that is consisted of a huge set of small to mid size producers that lose thousands to millions of dollars every year due to internet piracy. The nature of the content production which is more artistic than technical does not really help the producers in fighting piracy. The fact that a bigger part of the society still has the wrong view and false moral high ground toward the porn industry prevents the bigger and more technically capable companies from entering the industry to provide high level protection and opens the ground for sudo computer technicians to take advantage of an honest and creative industry. Here we will begin by presenting the modern methods of piracy that are the most popular today. We will provide some of the advantages and disadvantages of each method, go over some general statistics for these methods and conclude by presenting some real statistics about two major porn content producers that are available on the internet i.e. RealityKing for the mainstream porn and the ElitePain for the BDSM market. Definition of some terms: The definitions are arbitrary to this article and we make no claims on the universal correctness of the definitions. Producer: The person who holds the rights to a production. Pirate: The person who for the first time distributes the content to others without the permission of the producer. Leecher: A person who uses some of form of technology to acquire access to some production without paying the right costs or charges to the right owners. Hub: Hub is any website that allows one to share some link to a content with everyone else. Main methods of Piracy: There are three main methods of distributing pirated material that are currently in use by pirates. The use of each specific method depends on parameters that will be discussed very shortly here. ? Peer to Peer networks: Peer to Peer networks are the most advanced platforms for content piracy, currently in use by pirates. In order for a leecher to be able to use P2P he needs to be a) Familiar with the technology b) Able to install third party softwares such as the Java platform, the network program etc c) Able to acquire special permission on the network to be able to use P2P, most universities and companies completely disallow use of P2P by use of firewalls. This trend is followed by most ISPs as well but in a less strict fashion meaning that the ISP only limits the bandwidth dedicated to the P2P system d) Able to acquire good upload bandwidth, a user with low upload bandwidth will receive low download bandwidth as well, this is because the system rewards users who contribute more e) Be very patient person! The download speed on P2P tends to be very slow ranging between 40KB to 256KB generally. ? Streaming and tube websites: In this method the pirate needs to upload the content on a streaming server and then distribute the links to that specific file to leechers on the web. In order for a leecher to use this content, he needs to have a high speed internet connection that allows for streaming of the content in real time. There are a few of disadvantages for use of the streaming websites by the leecher: a) leecher will not be able to fast forward or rewind through the clip in an efficient manner. b) Leecher will not be able to download the content to the hard drive for later use easily. c) Tube websites tend to provide low quality content only, which is due to the cost of the underlying technology. d) The tube websites are infested with ads and viruses which are very unpleasant for the leechers. But on the other hand the fast on demand access is a big advantage for the users. ? HTTP based Free File Sharing Hosts (FFSH): A new technology that is getting more popular everyday is FFSH. FFSH are websites that allow users to upload digital content onto them. After the contents are uploaded on the website, the website will generate an URL which can later be used to access the previously uploaded content. Pirate then shares the link among others on the web using some hub. Others can later follow that link and acquire direct access to the file. Theses websites allow for up 16 MB/s download speed for the users. Most websites providing this service claim that they do not keep any IP history for the uploaders or downloaders or what file they have uploaded or downloaded. This provides for some form of anonymity for the uploaders and downloaders. One downside of these services are that a leecher needs t pay a fee to acquire the full download speed and avoid a waiting period for download of contents. But as the free download speeds tend to be up to 4 times faster than P2P system and the waiting periods are mostly less than a minute this doesn?t stop the leechers from using the service. Now having said all this each of the methods have their own target leeching audience based on the requirements and capabilities available. In the next section we will look at some general statistics regarding the use of each technology for pornography piracy. Statistics and popularity: To find out the level of popularity and frequency of usage for each of these methods we ran some simple tests and collected some data on publicly known websites and piracy sources. To keep the case study short and simple here we are presenting a very small portion of this data and restrict our view only to Fetish and BDSM as one group and then Mature and MILF as one group. P2P have the least amount of content and the FFSH has the most amount of content. This is the result of users balancing the disadvantages of each method. As there are more amateur leechers out there compare to the professional ones, most leechers choose the easiest method being FFSH. An other nice observation is that unlike on the tube sites the fetish and BDSM are much more popular among the FFSH users. Estimated Damage: Let?s take the 1000 as the lower average download or view per month for each piece of content available on the net. Let?s say every piece of content is only worth 1 USD for the producers. If we restrict the internet piracy to the websites above than we can estimate a small lower bound for the damage that is resulted from the piracy so far. P2P: 98650 1000 1USD = 98,650,000 USD Streaming: 135000 * 1000* 1USD = 135,000,000 USD FFSH: 900000 * 1000 * 1USD = 900,000,000 USD Case Study of Elite Pain Elite Pain (http://www.elitepain.com) is a brand of Mood Picture (http://www.mood-pictures.com/) a Hardcore BDSM content producer. Due to the nature of its content it is anticipated to have smaller set of audience compared to other main stream porn productions. Since end 2008 this company has maintained a fast pace of production and release nearly 4 to 8 new DVDs every month. These DVDs are available for nearly 100 Dollars per copy. After spending a fair amount of time investigating the piracy status for this website in the last months we have found out these valuable information: Time to appear as a Pirated version: 3-7 days Updated site-rip alive: over 14 different sets Download of the new set in the first week: over 1000 Main source of distribution of pirated content: FFSH Estimated damage for every new released DVD: at least 100K USD in the first week. Sample Site-Rips: http://filesmonster.com/folders.php?...PywUqiGSi7h5zA http://bdsm-gate.net/ (This one includes almost every major BDSM production company such as Kink.com ) Reality King : RK is one the most popular producer in the world. Unfortunately every releases from this website can found on multiple different hosts on different websites. After investigation on the material from this producer we have came to following conclusions: Time to appear as a Pirated version: 2-14 days Updated site-rip alive: over 150 different sets Download of the new set in the first week: over 5000 Main source of distribution of pirated content: FFSH, Tube, P2P Smaple: http://www.pornbb.org/milf-next-door...highlight=milf (more can be found in the same forum) Conclusions: We can simply conclude that porn piracy is a major issue in the industry and needs immediate attention of the sponsor and the producers. Although it can be argued that the producers and sponsors need to move in a new direction to better their chances of profiting but in the mean time they have to protect what they own or this trend will push them to the cliffs of bankruptcy. The threat of FFSH is very clear and real and needs to be dealt with before it turns into an unstoppable plague. Disclaimer: This is a completely experimental case study and Degban Ltd. Will not support the claims by any form of evidence and nor will held responsible for the exact truth of the claims and statements in this article. __________________ Http://www.Degban.com The Digital Asset Protection Company Last edited by degban; 12-01-2009 at 12:47 PM..