Piracy slashes record sales to all time low

If the government fails to completely eradicate the piracy problem, more recording companies both local and foreign are expected to suffer, or worst fold up.

Because of the high availability of pirated CDs (Compact Discs) or VCDs and DVDs that can be easily seen along downtown streets and other corners in the commercial districts, legitimate sellers of these recordings/products are suffering from profitability problem.

A source from the recording industry told The FREEMAN that sales in the recording industry has experienced its all time low since last year.

For the entire Mindanao region sales alone in the year 2000, big recording companies recorded an average of P1.5 million sales, but it went down to P300,000 in 2004, and is expected to dip further this year.

"The piracy problem has already affected a lot of people-the recording industry business, especially employment. Most, if not all recording companies had trimmed down its workforce nationwide, and maintain only one or two people per city or coverage area," the source said.

He said on top of the piracy problem, and pulled down further the recording industry is the free downloading of any music at the Internet. He said people if not buying pirated CDs, would also search the Internet for songs they like and easily copy it on their MP3 player, or blank CDs.

Recording giants like BMG Records and Sony were forced to merge their operations in order to fight the industry's difficulty due to piracy. Other's had to cut down their operational cost heavily, he added.

Among other recording companies that continues to fight for survival include; Viva Records, Alpha Records, Universal Music, Vicor, Ivory Records, Galaxy Records, EMI Philippines, Warner Music and Independent Labels.

Likewise, the video recording industry is also experiencing the same fate. In fact, more and more video rental houses have already closed shop because it cannot fight with the piracy problem.

Pirated DVD products for instance with a good quality is sold at an average of P80 per piece. An original DVD is sold at more or less P600.

However, the Department of Trade and Industry Cebu Provincial Office (DTI-CPO) hopes to minimize the rate of optical media piracy in Cebu, including the software piracy as soon as the Cebu City council pass the proposed ordinance to tighten the monitoring of rampant piracy in Cebu.

DT-CPO provincial director Nelia F. Navarro said stricter rules to seize the retailers and manufacturers of pirated products is very important for Cebu especially that the province has slowly gained its name as the preferred ICT investment hub in the Philippines.

"Hopefully, the passing of IPR [intellectual property rights] ordinance of Cebu City council could bring down the rate of piracy in software, music, and movies," Navarro said.

Likewise, she urged the Optical Media Board headed by actor Edu Manzano could delegate some of its authorities to Local Government Units (LGUs) to give more teeth to the proposed IPR ordinance in the City.