Lost book sales can't be quantified, making it impossible to calculate e-piracy's full economic impact. But the sheer number of illegal copies available for download gives an idea of the scope. It translates into a staggering amount of royalties being stolen from authors.
At least 5.2 million copies of Activision Blizzard's Call of Duty: Black Ops were illegally downloaded between its Nov. 9 release and the end of 2010. All told, more than 19 million people illegally downloaded five of the top-selling games of 2010. As broadband spreads, so does the piracy.
Aiming to ease a major concern among Hollywood studios, Intel is set to introduce new chips that will have antipiracy measures built in. This will allow the streaming of top-quality 1080p movie images to PCs, something pretty much not possible up to now.
LimeWire, a peer-to-peer file sharing network that was recently found liable to recording artists for massive copyright piracy faces an additional threat to its existence: Music publishers are suing it too, alleging the same piracy.
The Hurt Locker won an Oscar but lost at the box office. Its producers now plan to sue thousands of suspected pirates for downloading the film illegally on BitTorrent, where the movie was downloaded more than 10 million times.
Several big entertainment groups say the nation's security is at risk because of DVD and CD piracy, which can fund terrorism and organized crime. But they may be exaggerating their case and diverting resources from more dangerous threats.
Counterfeit products such as fake watches and bootleg DVDs may have some unintended economic benefits, according to a new government report. Consumers use bootleg copies of CDs, movies and video games to sample goods, and if they like what they've tried, they purchase the real thing.
As Viacom's three-year-long copyright lawsuit against YouTube/Google reaches a crucial moment, the public finally gets to see each side's briefs in the case. Which company has the better argument? DailyFinance legal correspondent Abigail Field offers us an opinion, and a brief history of the alleged crimes.
