A new UK report by telecom regulator Ofcom has been released and shows that the debate about piracy isn’t as clear-cut as many would lead you to believe. The study has found that 10% of the country’s most prolific infringers are responsible for close to 80% of all infringement online. Before you get your pitchforks though, that 10% spend 300% more than “honest” consumers who don’t infringe at all. The study looked at habits as well as attitudes including suggestions on what might combat piracy and looked at the consumption of movies, music, television shows, video games, software and books.

The infringers were broke into several groups based on their attitudes and their motivations.

• Justifying Infringers – This group demonstrated the highest levels of infringing behavior, but were also the most receptive group to consider fairly priced legal alternatives. these folks felt they’ve already spent a lot on content and consider their habits a “try it before they buy it.” – 9% of all infringers, 24% of total volume, 2% of digital consumers.
• Digital Transgressors – This group had the least remorse from their behavior, and consumed more films and television shows than “justifiers.” They also had the highest fear of getting caught and therefore are receptive to internet providers’ “strikes programs.” – 9% of all infringers, 22% of total volume, 2% of digital consumers.
• Free Infringers – This is the largest group. They download content because its free and also pay for the least amount of legal content compared to other infringers. – 42% of infringers, 35% of total volume, 10% of digital consumers
• Ambiguous Infringers – These folks had the lowest level of digital consumption and the highest proportion of legal paid content. They also don’t really justify their infringing. – 39% of infringers, 20% of volume, 9% of digital consumers.

There are lots of interesting facts in this report. The top 10% of infringers (1.6% of all Internet users over 12) are responsible for 79% of all infringed content. When you expand it to the top 20% it’s 88% of all infringements.

But, that top 20% is actually important to entertainment companies. That 20% accounts for 11% of all legal content consumed, and they also spend the most. While they steal a lot, they also buy a lot. No matter the content type, the top 20% of infringers spend more than the rest of the 80% of infringers, but they also consume more than people who never pirate.

Over the six month monitoring period, here’s the purchased amounts:

• Top 20% of infringers – £168 about $257.95
• 80% of infringers – £105 about $161.22
• “Honest consumers” – £54 about $82.91

Here is the results as to what would get these folks to stop pirating content:

So what does this report tell us:

• Don’t believe the “sky is falling” claims of creators and publishers. The issue is much more complicated than presented. These aren’t just parasites that creators and corporations depict.
• Comic publishers should be engaging these individuals. There’s a large amount of paying customers who also pirate, and they buy more than non-pirating customers. A pirate today might be a customer tomorrow.
• Legal channels to obtain materials are key. By making sure material is available in numerous channels and with numerous ways to pay, piracy will decrease. Skipping runs, not having day and date, ludicrous pricing all hamper sales and increases piracy.

While this study is just the UK, it’d be interesting to see if it’s also applicable in the United States as well.

You can read the full report here.

This Tax Day, take a break and take on the corporate Tax Evaders in this awesome video game. Since its launch on April 10th, the Tax Evaders project has been blasting corporate tax evaders from coast to coast, on over 10 cities!

It’s been an extraordinary collaboration, bringing together artists, activists, policy wonks, researchers and technologists into a unifed, creative effort. If you want to see some mindblowing photos of the illuminated actions across the country check out these awesome pics.

Today, just in time for Tax Day, we are launching a new video game that let’s you blast corporate Tax Evaders! The game, a spin on the classic Space Invaders, pits you against corporations, like GE, Exxon, Verizon, Goldman Sachs, Boeing, Google, Pfizer and Microsoft, who rake in billions, but pay no taxes. It’s the latest example of video games to educate and push a political agenda.

Why did this game happen? Because some of the largest, most powerful corporations actually pay less taxes than you or I. They aren’t just avoiding paying their fair share and leaving the rest of us to pick up the tab, their tax dodging schemes are are forcing us to make serious cuts to social security, health care, housing, education and all the basic services that keep our society running.

That hurts real people.

The launch of the game coincides with a series of ‘illuminated’ actions taking place across the country between now and April 15th, where, Light Brigades will be taking the message to the streets and to the very doorstep of these corporations, while mobile Guerilla Projection Teams will be projecting the game in public space for people to play outdoors and on the streets.

But, it’s not just a video game. Not only is it fun, entertaining and educational, but it actually allows you to blast these tax dodging corporations for reals using a “twitter bomb” feature.

Shockingly, the debate in Congress today is about cutting Social Security. The real question is why are we even discussing these cuts before going after the hundreds of billions that corporate Tax Evaders steal from our budget every year? A recent report reveals that we are losing nearly $100 Billion every year from corporate tax dodging.

We need to stop closing hospitals and schools, and start closing corporate loopholes!

Blast the corporate Tax Evaders!

My Heroes is a new social-issues comic aimed for African teens. This totally non-profit project is for the Namibian government and is currently a joint project between volunteers from the non-profit Pact (which gets some funding from the U.S. Agency for International development) and some teenagers from a government-run gome in the Namibian capital, Windhoek. The final book will teach orphaned and vulnerable children all over Namibia how their children’s homes should be run.

Namibia has the seventh-highest rate of HIV worldwide, which adds to its large number of orphans and vulnerable children: about 250,000 in 2010, an estimated 28% of whom were orphaned by AIDS. By 2012 there were 849 children living at children’s homes.

The final book is scheduled to be published in 2013. You can find some examples of what’s being put together at http://spin-doctors.tumblr.com which posts regular artwork and behind the scenes material.

The Supreme Court in a 6-3 ruling, held that the doctrine of first sale, which allows for legally acquired copyrighted works to be resold by their owners, does apply to works made overseas. This is a huge deal. In Kirtsaeng vs. Wiley a Thai national (Kirtsaeng) came to the U.S. to study at Cornell and U.S.C. To help pay for his expenses, he resold textbooks his family purchased at bookstores in Thailand. We’re talking several hundred thousand dollars worth of textbooks. The profit was in the range of $100,000. This caught the attention of Wiley (a textbook publisher) who sued for copyright infringement. The district court found for Wiley and imposed statutory damages of $600,000.   The Second Circuit affirmed.

This decision reverses the Second Circuit court decision which ruled that “lawfully made” limited the first sale doctrine to those items made in the areas that the U.S. Copyright Act is law. So that means you couldn’t resell items made in China for instance.

This had a potentially huge impact on the geek community as video games, comics, movies, etc. are rarely made here in the United States. If the Supreme Court upheld the original decision, it would have decimated the second-hand market.

The Supreme Court decided though there is no “geographical limitation” on the copyright law.

The fact that the Act does not instantly pro­tect an American copyright holder from unauthorized piracy taking place abroad does not mean the Act is inapplicable to copies made abroad.

Numerous organizations, associations and more were also acknowledged for their comments on the case in that this would have curtailed the “progress of science and useful arts.”

Geeks heads exploded yesterday as President Obama, our Commander in Geek, merged his Star Wars with Star Trek by saying the he can’t perform a “Jedi mind meld” to get Republicans to agree to a sequester deal.

I’ve posted about the President’s geek cred before. The man collected Spider-Man and Conan comics and seemed to generally get his pop culture references. But this slip adds a little burnish to the luster. As the Washington Post points out, this hurts his nerd cred. This is after the internet winning response to a petition to build a real life Death Star.

Today the President is likely to pick of and chuck a basketball, not some dice. When the President heads to enjoy the outdoors, it’s for golf, not the L.A.R.P. He’s attacked video games numerous times in attempts to score political points. This is a President that embraces nerdom when it’s a good photo-op but seems to fumble when it comes to soundbites.

The White House new media team hopped on the goof and #jedimindmeld became a popular hashtag on Twitter. The White House released this, hyping their side on the sequester fight.

But the fun wasn’t just to be had by the President and his team. The RNC tweeted:

.@WhiteHouse You know who else was supposed to bring 'balance' to the force? #JediMindMeld—
  (@NRCC) March 01, 2013

We brought you news that Congressman John Lewis‘ graphic novel March will be seeing release by Top Shelf in August. Below is a look at what you can expect when it is released. March is co-written by Cong. Lewis’ staffer Andrew Aydin and art by Nate Powell.

The Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV) and the Communication Foundation for Asia are teaming up to produce a comic book, C.H.A.M.P.S. The comic features superheroes whose mission is to encourage voting in the youth in the Philippines. The project was inspired by The Avengers according to the PPCRV chair Henrietta de Villa.

C.H.A.M.P.S. stands for clean, honest, accurate, and peaceful. That’s the election slogan for the PPCRV. One of the characters will “destroy election anomalies.”

The team will not only take on election issues but will also encourage  beating corrupt officials at the ballot box.

The PPCRV will also be creating a board game called “Voters Tsunami.”

Comic books have been found to be great materials to teach the young about voter education which is an ongoing process in the country. The focus is on provinces where efforsts are going on now.

The comic will be released at the end of February or early March.

The project is set for official launch in the last week of February or first week of March.

(via PhilStar)

The open records site the Government Attic has obtained a list, 68 pages worth, of words that can’t be used on Washington D.C. vanity license plates. Here’s the geeky ones banned that I found:

• Doctor Who
• Bruce Wayne
• TARDIS
• Batman
• Cheetah
• Jedi420
• GUNDAMX
• GUNDAM1
• IRONMAN
• DOCWHO

The collection of banned names, ominously known as the “Forbidden Tag List,” is kind of entertaining and you can see the full list below.

(via Washington City Paper)

It seems the geeks have inherited the Earth, but when it comes to American politics, comic geeks (and geeks in general) seem to be the ones in charge. President Obama is an admitted comic book fan, having read and collected Spider-Man and Conan. Congressman Grayson who was re-elected to congress is a comic fan who has often quoted comics and used them in political speeches.

The Senate, now has a new number two man, who also happens to be a comic fan. The new President Pro Tempore (pro tem) of the United States Senate is Senator Patrick Leahy (D – Vermont). Leahy was sworn into the position on December 17, after the passing of Senator Daniel Inouye.

The President Pro Tempore is a position created by the Constitution, and is the chamber’s second-highest-ranking official, after the Vice President. Basically, that person runs things when the VP isn’t around. By tradition, the Senate unanimously elects the most senior senator in the majority party to fill the position, which also makes the person third in the line of succession.

Senator Leahy is a huge Batman fan and has appeared in some of the Batman movies and voiced characters. That was Senator Leahy standing up to Heath Ledger’s Joker in the Dark Knight.

That fandom and those appearances have also raised some eyebrows. Senator Leahy has stood up for and fought for Hollywood when it comes to things like intellectual property protection.

Nonetheless, it’s another example of comic fans dominating politics.