Walking through a busy Pali market in Bandra, Mumbai, on Saturdays, it’s almost certain to see ladies haggling over the size and shape of fruits and vegetables with their vendors, small eateries readying themselves for the weekend onslaught, pariah dogs trying to nick a meal from what they can get their paws on and then finally a small queue near the local DVD pirate who is briefing his usual customers ranging from the watchmen of the buildings waiting to see their bhojpuri flicks to the busboys of local restaurants buying the 4-in-1 pack of the latest hindi blockbusters to the stunning foreign models that live in the lanes of Pali Village buying the newest Hollywood movies.

What is so stunning about this local pirate that the dying of the disc medium has not crippled his practice?

As more and more of his faithful clients get smartphones, he has an innovative solution for that as well. He will direct you to a nearby smartphone seller that has the pirates entire content collection stored digitally, and for a small premium will transfer your desired choice of content to your smartphone.

While teens and upper classes of society that are computer savvy know that watching the content got from these local pirates is not really the way to go. Its not really enjoyable to watch a grainy camera captured print when you can so easily download a torrent file of the exact same title in perfect, crisp 1080p resolution for free from the internet (excluding bandwidth charges). While however you choose to avail of pirated material, the common factor here is that piracy is still taking place and it doesn’t look like it is going to slow down anytime soon.

While piracy still remains rampant in a growing media and entertainment market like India, the costs borne by this activity will be paid in the end by the consumers. Consumers may feel that they have a right to watch something for free if it’s freely available on the Internet but this right is one that they are completely misusing. When the studio decides to greenlight a project, it’s an economic decision made by them.

There is an economic cost to this endeavor.

As piracy grows, it’s true that the content will receive a higher reach, even though it’s through the unofficial channels but the loss of revenue felt by the studios and distributors has a more long term effect than short. When pirated content is viewed, the immediate benefactors are the stars and characters that the content portrays or the director behind the film.

Piracy works when people want to cry over the new Shah Rukh Khan film or quench their bloodlust watching the next Anurag Kahsyap thriller drama. No one seems to care about the production house or studios that have produced the content or the distributor that has created strategies to make the content reach the audiences. The long term cascading effect of this is that over time studios will not back content that doesn’t have the mass appeal stars or directors behind it.

The avenues for independent filmmakers or niche content creators hoping to garner mass appeal will become even more bleak. The economics of using star power in films only works when the return of investment for the studios is substantial and the revenues are gained through official channels. The costs of making such content sky rockets and there are no resources left to back smaller projects that require the help of the larger studios and distribution channels to make it to the front. What this creates is a much smaller market of content produced and thus a much smaller choice for audiences. A glut in supply will lead to higher prices for the audiences and thus could lead to greater piracy as price is one of the strongest determinants of piracy.

The human costs associated with piracy are also very big. Most projects are determined on their return on investment and as piracy starts eating into the earnings of a film, to maintain a steady rate, the costs have to go down somewhere.

While the stars of these films will not be ready to take less than what is owed to them, it will be the lower levels of technical staff that will have to bear the brunt of the minimized budgets. This could either lead to strikes or a lot of people leaving the market for the kind of profession they are in. For the end consumer, it will lead to delay in content or lower levels of quality, both of which are bad for consumers.

For consumers, it is in their best interest to wage a war against piracy and stop it as soon as possible. Without piracy, studios will be able to finance smaller projects, there will be an overall increase in the number of projects getting financial backing and thus much more choice for the consumer. When there is a greater level of supply, new distribution channels will open up and there will more competition.

This competition is going to lead to innovation and will drive prices lower even more. Therefore to uphold and preserve the right to entertainment, consumers everywhere must realise that as with other rights such as fundamental and human rights it is very important to give back as much as you receive.