With the arrival of the digital age, faster internet speeds, and greater storage capacities in our computers, digital piracy is on the rise. Neither the illegality of piracy nor the unethical nature of doing so has stopped people from partaking in the act. Studies show that tens of billions of dollars of pirated goods are downloaded every year, yet our policies fail to solve the issue of digital copyright infringement. The biggest issues contributing to the problem are the lack of a policy that consumers take seriously in combination with some digital goods being too expensive in their current state of distribution. This thesis is aimed at taking a direct approach to reduce digital piracy from two different angles. The first angle deals with the incentive structure of society and the need for a government backed policy that has legitimacy in the view of United States citizens and the second angle is the creation of an alternative distribution model for digital software as a service based platform.

Digital piracy is an emerging cybercrime subtype with overarching implications for administrators and researchers alike. Within this body of knowledge, it is unclear what individual-level factors are linked to digital piracy. Using a college-based sample, while focusing on gender, race, and age, this study identifies fundamental individual-level variables associated with digital piracy commission. After conducting multiple independent samples t-tests and a multivariate logistic regression, results found age and computer proficiency were significantly associated with the likelihood of engaging in digital piracy. These findings can help establish the foundational characteristics of digital pirates. By shifting the focus back to basic individual factors, universities can identify preventive efforts and researchers can better understand who engages in digital piracy.

Downloading information from the Internet is an incredibly popular activity. Some of the information is used for scholarly or educational purposes, some is used for entertainment, as well as all sorts of other purposes. Books, movies, video games, and music are being downloaded by an increasing number of Internet users. Some of these digital files contain information that is perfectly legal to use and share but a great majority of these files are illegal to download. Recent technological developments in digital and Internet technologies have made the downloading of both legal and illegal digital content very easy and very fast. These technological developments have brought about a tension between two conflicting interests among Internet users. One of these interests drives people to download content illegally and the other interest drives people to act in ways intended to stop such illegal downloading. Much legal attention has been given to this issue in the past few years, but little sustained philosophical attention. In this thesis I discuss the moral issues that come along with the illegal downloading of information via the Internet with a focus on music files. I present the issue of illegal music downloading through the use of a scalar utilitarian theory with a focus on preference satisfaction. I conclude that the act of downloading is in aggregate morally permissible, and further, that the status quo bundle of intellectual property rights (copyright) that protect these files should be removed. Also, I provide a rough sketch of how all people concerned can satisfy both of the conflicting interests (mentioned above) through the use of copyleft protections.

Researchers have found that software piracy worldwide over the years has significantly contributed to billions of dollars in lost revenue for many software firms. Software developers have found it difficult to create software that is not easily copied, thus, creating a software protection problem. Software piracy remains a global problem despite the significant effort to combat its prevalence. Over the years, significant research has attempted to determine the factors that contribute to individuals' propensity to commit software piracy. Most of the research on software piracy has been limited to larger societies, with recommendations by researchers to extend similar studies to smaller ones. The literature indicating the need for additional research on this topic in different populations and cultures is significant. Given that, the key contributions of this study were to assess empirically factors such as personal moral obligation (PMO), cultural dimensions, ethical computer self-efficacy (ECSE) and the effect it has on individuals' propensity -- in cultures that support it -- to commit software piracy in smaller geographical locations. Therefore, this research empirically assessed the contribution that PMO, Hofstede's cultural dimension of individualism/collectivism (I/C), and ECSE have made on individuals' propensity to commit software piracy. The study extended the current body of knowledge by finding answers to three specific questions. First, this study sought to determine whether the PMO component contributed to individuals' propensity to commit software piracy in The Bahamas. Secondly, this study sought to determine the level of contribution of Hofstede's cultural dimension of I/C to individuals' propensity to commit software piracy in The Bahamas. Finally, this study sought to determine the contribution of ECSE to individuals' propensity to commit software piracy in The Bahamas. A total of 321 usable responses were collected over a one-month period from students from the school of business at a small Bahamian college, to determine their level of PMO, I/C, and ECSE contribution to individuals' propensity to commit software piracy. This represents, approximately, a 64% response rate. The results showed the overall significance of the models of the three factors in predicting individuals' propensity to commit software piracy. Furthermore, the results indicated that PMO and ECSE subscale PMO and ECSE_DB were significant, however, I/C, and ECSE (as a whole) were not.

Each year billions of dollars are lost due to illegal downloading and copying of intellectual property. Individuals often perceive little or no consequences as a result of digital piracy. Research has shown that perceived consequences could be used to alter an individual's ethical intention to engage in digital piracy (INT). In addition subjective norm (SUN) may also contribute to INT. Therefore, the goal of this study was to determine the factors of perceived consequences and to assess their contribution, as well as the contribution of SUN, to INT. This predictive study developed a quantitative instrument to measure the contribution of the factors of perceived consequences and SUN on INT. In phase one of this study, an anonymous exploratory questionnaire was used to gather a list of perceived consequences. That list was combined with a list of perceived consequences found through an extensive review of the literature and a survey instrument was developed and used in phase two. After data cleaning, a total of 407 responses remained. Exploratory factor analysis incorporating principal component analysis (PCA) identified eight factors of INT: Personal Emotional Consequences (PEC), Freedom Consequences (FRC), Minor Consequences (MIC), Personal Freedom Consequences (PFC), Personal Moral Consequences (PMC), Network Access Consequences (NAC), Self Worth Consequences (SWC), and Industry Financial Consequences (IFC). A model was developed using Ordinal Logistic Regression to determine the contribution of the eight factors of perceived consequences and SUN on INT. PEC, PMC, and IFC as well as SUN were found to be significant contributors to INT. The Mann-Whitney U test determined that INT was the only factor that showed a significant difference for males. Additionally, gender was a significant contributor to FRC, MIC, PFC, PMC, SWC, and IFC. Each of these factors was more significant for females than males. The Kruskal-Wallis test determined that there were no significant differences in the factors of perceived consequences, SUN, and INT based on age or computer usage. Important contributions of this study include the identification of eight perceived consequence factors not previously known as well as the development of a unified predictive model, addressing all forms of digital piracy.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-08-16T18:10:25Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 DISSERTACAO Ellen Caroline.pdf: 4155888 bytes, checksum: 3af9919437f1870587d52d02f5f53d43 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-08-30 / This paper discusses the relationship between art, technology and market from socio -cultural phenomena on the convergence between the markets and digital music. If, at first, the proliferation of music piracy in the late twentieth century raised the idea that the dynamics of metamorphoses of digital network declared bankrupt music industry consolidated in the thirties, which occurs at the end of the first decade of this century, is the implementation and optimization of a new market that combines both the traditional economic forms of the industry dictates decadent as increasing the possibilities opened up by the horizon of understanding of cyberculture. Attempts to deconstruct the discourse of decadence of the culture industry in the face of the multiplicity of the Internet featuring an underlying problem, and therefore more current, this question here vintage shifted the problem of ownership of content and marketing established between the music labels, artists and audience to the conflict between technology companies and content owners in the applications market. The convergence of media un-territorialized a univocal cultural market network and puts musicians, listeners, businesses, equipment and pirates. On this track, the network itself discusses, since the applications market presents itself as a reaction to the financial discontinuities promoted by peer-to-peer and laws, as phenomena later serve as traces of the dynamics of adaptation promoted by such constructs socio-economic and cultural. Deconstruction sometimes used as a lens designed to support the Oi Novo Som Project, the national telecommunications company Oi, who launched the independent band in the music Sobrado 112 from the network. This observation enabled us to verify, first, such as market access for new artists has been expanded from economic and technological tools, and deeper, as technology companies have diversified their marketing strategies in addition to its products and seeking to win the essential raw materials of this new market: connecting devices and storage (hardware) and content (software). While content, music becomes a commodities devices offering the means of enjoyment in the market. / Este trabalho discute as relações entre arte, técnica e mercado a partir de fenômenos sócio - culturais relativos à convergência entre os mercados musical e digital. Se, em um primeiro momento, a proliferação da pirataria musical no século XX tardio suscitou a ideia de que a dinâmica de metamorfoses das tecnologias digitais em rede decretariam a falência da indústria fonográfica consolidada nos anos trinta, o que se verifica, ao final da primeira década do século XXI, é a implementação e otimização de um novo mercado que agrega tanto as formas econômicas tradicionais dessa indústria dita decadente quanto às possibilidades cada vez mais abertas pelo horizonte de compreensão da cibercultura. Intenta-se desconstruir o discurso de decadência da indústria cultural face à multiplicidade da internet apresentando um problema subjacente e, portanto, mais atual, a essa questão aqui deslocada do problema vinteano da propriedade de conteúdo e comercialização estabelecido entre as gravadoras musicais, artistas e público para o conflito entre empresas de tecnologia e proprietários de conteúdo no mercado de aplicativos. A convergência de mídias desterritorializa um mercado cultural unívoco e coloca em rede músicos, ouvintes, empresas, aparelhos e piratas. Nessa esteira, a própria rede se problematiza, posto que o mercado de aplicativos apresentam-se como uma reação às descontinuidades financeiras promovidas por programas peer-to-peer e as legislações, enquanto fenômenos posteriores, funcionam como vestígios da dinâmica de adequação promovida por esses construtos sócio-econômico-culturais. A desconstrução ora elaborada utiliza como lentes de apoio o Projeto Oi Novo Som, da empresa nacional de telecomunicações Oi, que lançou a banda independente Sobrado 112 no mercado musical a partir da rede. Esta observação possibilitou verificar, primeiramente, como o acesso ao mercado para novos artistas vem sendo ampliado a partir das ferramentas econômico-tecnológicas e, mais profundamente, como as empresas de tecnologia vêm diversificando suas estratégias de mercado para além de seus produtos precípuos e buscando conquistar as matérias-primas essenciais desse novo mercado: dispositivos de conexão e armazenamento (hardware) e conteúdo (software). Enquanto conteúdo, a música passa a ser uma commoditie que oferece aos dispositivos o meio de fruição do mercado.

The Czech theatrical market faces a major digital piracy problem. The availability of illegitimate digital distribution channels represents a challenge for managers, especially when original movies are uploaded to the Internet before or during their theatrical release. The crucial managerial task is to solve the problems of losses caused by piracy, and to find a balance between antipiracy investment and the maximal benefits it brings. Therefore, to maximize stakeholder utility, management decision-making needs to be complemented and supported. Firstly, the research investigates the basis of digital piracy, discusses the effects it causes, focuses on relevant stakeholders. The thesis deals with knowledge management and system dynamics using its principles and approaches and proposes a model supporting strategic management decision-making. The created knowledge-based computational model simulates the market's development of the Czech theatrical industry related to digital film piracy in the following scenarios: current market settings, industry-based administration, government-based administration and a mixture of the last two; the results of the different scenarios are discussed, evaluated and compared. The findings indicate that with the current settings in the Czech theatrical industry, the losses caused by digital piracy keep increasing linearly. Industry-based administration implies that the losses level off with a negligible yearly increase and the government-based solution reduces the losses more than the industrial administration. Nevertheless, the results show minor differences in total box office revenues, while differences in antipiracy costs are vast. Therefore, the predictive experiment based on the current market environment represents the most efficient version of the experiments. Even though losses are, the highest, real box office revenues are only a little different. Simply put, a moderate increase in box office revenues paid for by massive investments into antipiracy seems inefficient.

Digital piracy, the illegal copying or downloading of copyrighted digital products without approval from the copyright holders, has brought great economic loss to the software and digital media industries. Previous studies using moral developmental theory have not found consistent relationships between moral judgment and attitudes towards digital piracy. While some researchers have developed individual test items to assess relationships between moral judgment and attitudes toward digital piracy, others have relied on the Defining Issues Test (DIT). However, in that the DIT represents a general measure of moral judgment based on broad social issues, it, too, may not adequately assess an individual’s reasoning specific to issues regarding digital piracy. The purpose of this study was to create a reliable instrument (i.e., DP-DIT) modeled after the DIT designed to assess moral judgment regarding digital piracy as well as to examine and compare the ability of both DP-DIT and DIT2-short to predict attitudes, intentions and behaviors regarding digital piracy of college students. Results indicated the reliability of both the DIT2-short and the DP-DIT were discounted, quite likely due to the small number of stories contained in each. DP-DIT appeared to have greater predictive ability due to its advantage in predicting attitudes toward digital piracy, especially using DP-DIT MNS. However, even though here DP-DIT MNS was the strongest predictor of attitudes toward digital piracy, it explained a limited amount of variance. Further research to improve reliability and validity of DP-DIT is warranted.