South Africa’s film industry has embarked on a multimillion-rand marketing campaign to help consumers understand that supporting piracy is supporting crime.
The campaign, featuring a sinister, hooded figure, breaks on Wednesday on television, in cinemas, in print, on radio, online and outdoors, as well as in retail and rental outlets, at a time when the film industry estimates that as much as 50% of all DVDs in South Africa are illegal, pirated copies.
The campaign is being driven by the South African Federation against Copyright Theft (Safact), the non-profit body representing all sectors of the South African entertainment industry involved in the production and distribution of films and interactive games.
“The industry is losing many millions of rands in lost sales every year — but the real victim of piracy is the consumer, who’s getting poor-quality stolen goods dumped on them at a massive profit, thus robbing them of the world-class movie experience to which they’re entitled,” Safact communications adviser Neil Jacobsohn said.
He added that only consumers themselves can turn back this tide, by refusing to buy pirated DVDs from street sellers, flea markets and even some stores. This is a key message of the marketing campaign.
Safact’s campaign is being widely supported by the media and entertainment industry in South Africa, with television and radio stations, newspapers and magazines and many suppliers providing millions of rands’ worth of services and advertising space.
“The fact that the entire entertainment industry has rallied around this cause, to explain to consumers that piracy is a crime, is evidence of just how serious it has become,” Jacobsohn noted.
Major government departments, including the Department of Trade and Industry and the Department of Justice; Customs and Excise; and the South African Police Service are also deeply involved in the fight against piracy, and are working closely with Safact.
By the end of October this year, Safact and the police had seized 458 175 pirated DVDs — more than double the total number seized last year.
In September and October this year alone, Safact and the police conducted 100 raids on pirates, seizing more than 105 000 illegal DVDs and more than 95 000 pirated games. This amounts to nearly two raids every day.
The organisation added that this is the tip of the iceberg. Thousands of illegal DVDs and games are being smuggled into the country every week, despite a number of recent seizures of huge loads of smuggled goods by customs officials at airports.
“The bottom line is that this is organised crime, and these are stolen goods — nothing more, nothing less,” Jacobsohn pointed out.
“The purpose of our campaign is to ask consumers to think before they buy. You wouldn’t buy a hijacked car. You wouldn’t buy a stolen TV. So why support crime by buying pirated DVDs and games?”
Thus the campaign’s slogan is “By supporting criminals, you become one”, Jacobsohn added. — I-Net Bridge