As you probably know already, 2014 saw the least number of cinema-goers since 2009, a fact that had led media moguls scratching their heads. What’s keeping movie lovers from watching the year’s big-budget releases on the big screen as they used to in the past. TorrentFreak might have the answer after all, and it is quite obvious actually: piracy.
Earlier this week the 2015 Oscar nominees were announced, an event that inspired many people to check out the contenders. This increased interest is noticeable in legal channels and on various pirate sites, where nearly all of the 36 Oscar contenders are readily available. TorrentFreak has called this year’s level of leaking “unprecedented”; the MPAA would probably call it a “disaster”. Big-name, in-theater movies like the latest Hobbit have been torrented well over a million times, and almost all the other nominees are available online and popular.
The films that are available don’t all come in perfect quality of course. “Beyond the Lights,” for example, only leaked in a CAM (camcorded) version. Most, however, are available in relatively decent screener, DVDRip or comparable quality.
Ironically enough, nearly all of the pirated screener copies appear to have been leaked from Academy sources. It’s obviously a problem that the MPAA is trying to address, unsuccessfully. To crack down on screeners, the MPAA adds watermarks, which works about as well as any other anti-piracy mechanism. targeting the pirate sites isn’t working either. You’ll notice that this year’s leakfest came a couple months after The Pirate Bay unceremoniously got the boot from the internet. Big lawsuits don’t work. Scary letters to the torrenters don’t work. In fact, there’s only one thing that consistently reduces piracy: changing the broken way movie theaters distribute content.
And, no, we aren’t going to tell you where to find those Oscar-worthy movies online, if you don’t already know.