[kictanet] Music Piracy in Kenya - Government can Help

Fri Sep 28 10:22:42 EAT 2012

John,

Your comments are correct. We have to employ various methods to achieve a
certain level of non-piracy. 100% non-piracy if we can would be greatest.

Our strategy includes other initiatives as well:

1.       Artist, Producer education on their rights in a song.

2.       Engage Kenya Copyright Board and MCSK,KAMP, PRISK to try and create
a functional licensing framework.

3.       Provide options for consumers to access content legally - these
already exist we just need highlight them.

4.       Educate the consumer on benefits of caring about music and rights.

5.       Take legal action on parties that are unwilling to cooperate on the
corrective measures.

Am sure there are afew more I can remember right now but we have already
started talking to a number of companies seeking support.

Regards

From: John Gitau [mailto:jgitau at gmail.com] 
Sent: Thursday, September 27, 2012 1:02 PM
To: Bernard Kioko [Bernsoft Interactive Limited]
Cc: KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions
Subject: Re: [kictanet] Music Piracy in Kenya - Government can Help

Bernard,
So knowing you understand how this works both for the people hosting the
content, the service provider and the other parties (musicians,you,producers
etc), closing one site won't really be a viable long term solution (think
back to telkom blocking voip and how hard we worked to go around them). They
will just move things around, especially if they are somehow making money
off the free downloads. 

However, and you seem to have it figured out, the biggest culprits need to
be locked down; somehow, unfortunately if they have a good hosting provider
it will be tricky for the service providers to do it without incurring
additional cost. But it can get done. 

The best solution is a situation where people are sensible enough to
actually CHOOSE to buy, in which case you need to ensure they have a
platform to get the music from. Which means your best bet is to make sure
the campaign is successful. Sometimes people don't get how much work goes
into making a song or movie or painting enough to respect it enough to buy.
(I hear miguna's book on pdf was downloaded by several factors of the guys
that actually bought the book).  Most of the initiatives you have outlined
should start to hopefully work.

Another tactic is to get a list from ISP's of everyone that has ever
downloaded a song, pick the top 100, send them letters to pay up very
publicly and let the users know they can't hide if they commit an online
crime. The old logs might be unavailable but they can start tracking now.
Might be cost a bit but it should drive the message home and ties in well
with your campaign. I can think of at least two ISP's with systems that can
do this. 

On this email I'm just weighing in the fact that trying to block the sites
might not really have the desired effect in the long run. It however will
cause some desirable disruption. And starts a debate that pretty much seems
to have started your awareness campaign. So thanks.

jgitau

On Fri, Sep 28, 2012 at 8:41 AM, Bernard Kioko [Bernsoft Interactive
Limited] <bkioko at bernsoft.com> wrote:

James,

As I said copyright can be complicated and it's taken me two years and 2
trips to South Africa to understand this fully.

My point was, ALL copyright owners of a song MUST authorize the song to be
sold. If only 2 persons out of 4 owners  allow the song to be sold, then
copyright infringement takes place for the other 2 persons. Of course this
changes if the 4 persons had appointed the 2 persons to represent them.

Please remember my complain, there is a website that is offering our content
FREE and although we have channels to sell our content consumers go for
FREE. Example,  at one point, this website and all other "legal" website
existed on the a network operator's wap home page.

On your issue about hottest downloads.

The hottest downloads are in a website where content is being pirated. If
music is to be offered for free, let the OWNERS of the music do the free
offers.

Regards

-----Original Message-----
From: James Kariuki [mailto:jkariuki at gmail.com]

Sent: Thursday, September 27, 2012 11:50 AM
To: Bernard Kioko [Bernsoft Interactive Limited]
Cc: KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions
Subject: Re: [kictanet] Music Piracy in Kenya - Government can Help

> Not every Kenyan can play music from other forms. Some people still
> have Cassettes and CD players. The issue of how music is sold to you
> is secondary AFTER its copyright has been managed. Lets not confuse
> the issue of copyright infringement with that of access to music.

Today am having a long and slow day - forgive me if am missing something.
You raise this issue here first because the music is 'pirated' and sold not
as recorded/burnt CDs but as downloads off a website. You also say that
those accessing the music from some of the hosting sites are doing so
illegally because there is copyright infringement. If there no access issue,
copyright infringement would not arise in the first place. My question to
you is: how have you placed yourself in the music industry to cater for a
growing need of electronic access (through downloads) of your music? I ask
this because the lack of a legal access to the music could have created an
avenue for others to profit illegally.

>
> Licensing limited number of duplicates just means an artist can tell
> the person making CDs to make 100,000 for now and when they need to
> make more, they contact the artist. On the internet though, downloads
> can move from 1 to 1m in day....

If this is your view. But I think this is a 20th century way of managing
copyright and restricting access.

On a different note, have you tried through your sources to establish if the
hottest downloads are also the fastest moving sales? I remember reading
something a while back to the effect that availing your music freely for
download could bolster your sales.

--James

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**Gitau

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