Today, FutureOfCopyright.com publishes an interview Wouter Rutten, Director of Communications of NVPI, the trade association of the Dutch entertainment industry. NVPI serves the interests of music companies, publishers of audiovisual content on digital media and online publishers of games and other interactive software. We asked Mr. Rutten about some recent developments in the entertainment industry.

A notable development in the Netherlands is the legal battle of BREIN against Dutch ISPs. BREIN obtained court orders to block IP addresses of The Pirate Bay, but The Pirate Bay keeps coming back with new IP addresses, for which new court orders are required. What do you think of BREIN's approach in fighting The Pirate Bay 

"It is indeed a cat-and-mouse game, but unfortunately, there is nothing else BREIN can do than asking for court orders to let ISPs block the IP addresses of The Pirate Bay. We support BREIN in their approach. I think the same problems will occur with gambling sites. This demeanor makes nobody happy and it shows that there is something wrong at this point. There is a political unwillingness against blocking content on the internet. In my opinion, this shouldn't apply to copyright infringements. It would be good if the law provides for a more effective regime for blocking content in such cases. One's freedom should stop where it impairs the freedom of others. In the offline world, this is common, but online it's still not accepted. Time and time again, the discussion on restriction of internet freedom is started in this context, even if it's the only way to protect the intellectual property rights of others. In the offline world, it is accepted that our freedom is sometimes restricted in order to protect the rights of others.  Therefore, the law should be amended to stop the current lawlessness on the internet. Anarchy has never led to a lasting system."

Recently, a significant attempt towards organizing the law on this topic failed. The European Parliament rejected ACTA, the controversial anti-counterfeiting treaty. What is your opinion about the developments around ACTA?

"The rejection of ACTA is harmful for the protection of intellectual property rights, the creative industry and international innovation. The EU missed it's chance to protect it's creative industry on the international market. It is remarkable that the European Parliament did not wait for the judgment of the European Court of Justice, on the question whether this treaty was compatible with EU law. ACTA was all about the export of our enforcement standards to other countries and fell completely inside the scope of the European regulation system. Maybe the commotion about the secret negotiations has had a negative influence on the whole procedure. "

Besides more effective digital enforcement, the industry needs new and attractive online platforms to market their content. How do you assess the current situation in that field?  

"The revenues from digital services do not yet compensate the decreasing income from physical products, like CDs and DVDs. However, the downward trend of the past few years is certainly stabilizing. Revenues from digital services are becoming more significant for companies. In some countries, turnover from digital services has even become larger than the market for physical products. 

The great potential of digital services is that consumers will be paying for access, rather than acquiring content. Nowadays, the average customer spends €10,49 on music every year. Let’s not forget that this is still a huge market for physical products. In 2012,13.5 million CDs were sold. It’s less than it used to be, but it’s still a lot. When considering that most customers still buy physical copies, this means, that judging by this low average of €10, there is a category of fans that spend their money on music, but the majority of people do not really buy music products. A Spotify Premium user pays this amount every month. So if we can engage the category of consumers that are not so interested in buying copies, by offering attractive access services, there must be a great potential there. It’s hard to change the traditional revenue model over night, though, because companies still have to invest in creative products before they can exploit them. The evolution lies in changing the payment models. Let consumers pay for access to content, in stead of letting them buy copies." 

There are several online services for streaming music, like Spotify, but there are less services for streaming  popular movies. Wouldn’t such a service be a great alternative for illegal downloading?

"A lucrative streaming model for movies is difficult to set up at the moment. Film projects are simply very expensive. Perhaps it would work for older movies, but not for recent movies, mainly because of the industry’s windowing strategy. Besides, DVDs still provide for a lot of revenue." 

We talked about music and movies, but NVPI also represents producers of games. Is there a difference in the digital development of music, movies and games?

"Games differ from music and movies. It’s easier to make money from digital games. A single game can be played for several weeks, whereas most films last two hours. This may increase the willingness to spend money on a game. In contrast to music and movies, games are a product of the digital world. Therefore, the market for games was organised differently from the beginning. Games have less exposure to illegality and DRM works without much trouble. When users have an illegal copy of a game, they might be unable to download updates or are denied access to the game. With consoles, like the X-Box or Playstation, an erroneous disc could destroy the machine. In other words: consumers disadvantage themselves when they make use of illegal games and are often aware of that."

FutureOfCopyright.com thanks Mr. Rutten for his view on the recent developments in the entertainment industry. 

By: Marjolein van der Heide