Introduction
The current globalised society is marked with a lot of activities that are meant to explore the society and improve societal conditions. In almost each industry in the society today, people are embracing creativity not only as a means of bettering the industry, but also as a way of securing income. The search for economic security in the modern times has resulted to a resurgence and growth of cultural industries, where people invest their time and resources in order to come up with salable pieces of artwork.
Therefore, it is vital to protect these pieces of work since they are born out of creativity and are meant to benefit those who invested their resources in producing such works. One of the most vocal sectors in the global cultural industries is the entertainment sector.
While technology is applauded for enhancing creativity in the cultural industry, it has also been blamed for encouraging infringement on the rights of the pieces of work in the global cultural industries, and it is an undoing for the industries (Thierer, Crews & Cato Institute 2002).
This paper discusses the need for the protection of intellectual property rights in the global entertainment sector. The paper explores recent technological developments and their contribution to copyright infringements in the global entertainment sector.
The importance of the protection of intellectual property rights
It is critical to know what is meant by cultural industries before exploring the essence of embracing intellectual property rights in these industries. Cultural industries are those industries that are born out of the embrace of soft technologies by individuals. In this context, soft technologies refer to the creativity of the mind, which is not transformed into the making of equipments, but the expression of creative thoughts through artworks.
According to UNESCO, cultural industries are also referred to as creative industries. These industries deal with the production and distribution of cultural goods and services (Correa 2010). Such goods are often safeguarded by the intellectual property rights. A substantial number of people argue that cultural industries across the globe are increasingly adopting the emerging digital technologies amidst the existence of international and national regulatory policies.
This affects the manner in which these goods and services move between countries. The commonality of cultural industries lays in three main features, which include cultural knowledge, the utilization of creativity and intellectual property rights to come up with goods and services that have a cultural and social meaning to people (Correa 2010).
Technology and creativity in the global entertainment sector
Technology is the most desired thing in the world today. Technology itself, especially information and communication technologies, is an outcome of creativity. However, the most exciting part of technological development is that it acts as a denominator for creativity in a wide range of industries in the world today.
This implies that technology is a platform for the growth and development in the global entertainment sector, which forms the largest sector in the global cultural industries. However, a lot of complaints have been raised by the players in the entertainment sector about the rate at which people are utilizing the emergent technologies to embrace malpractices in the sector (Hull, Hutchison & Strasser 2010).
The most commonly reported malpractice that is enhanced by information and communication technologies in the entertainment sector is compromise of the copyrights of the pieces of works that are produced by people who invest in the industry. This raises one main concern, which is whether technology is meant to empower the entertainment industry, or whether it is meant to enslave people in the global cultural industries.
It can be argued that the utilization of technology in enhancing ill practices in the entertainment sector is what makes people to view technology from a negative inclination. Otherwise, most people agree with the argument that technology has been of great aid to the entertainment sector. There is the need for people to embrace better utilization of technology in the entertainment sector.
In this context, better utilization of technology means the deployment of technology in the production of pieces of entertainment works, rather than the utilization of technology for infringing on the intellectual property rights of the pieces of work produced by artists in the industry (Hull, Hutchison & Strasser 2010).
What needs to be asked at this point is whether the problem of the violation of intellectual property rights in the entertainment sector through the use of technology denotes lack of morality or the weakness of the systems of management in the sector.
The importance and role of information and communication technologies in the global entertainment industry cannot be overemphasized as it is obvious to everybody that the desired outcomes in the industry cannot be enabled without technology. It is argued that technology has brought about a revolution in the global entertainment sector (Sigismondi 2011).
This argument is backed by pointing at a number of innovative achievements in the sector, like the production of three-dimensional movies and music videos. These are the most current developments in the global entertainment sector. Looking at it from a historical perspective, it can be argued that video technology has been critical in the production of movies for an extended period of time.
As of now, everybody talks about the digital technology. This technology is quite useful for the fans, the producers and the artists in the entertainment sector. It increases the efficiency and quality of entertainment works for the producers. The quality of these artworks by the artists determines the amount of value that is attached to the artworks, creating a market for the artists (Sigismondi 2011).
Artists would be more relaxed and richer than they are today, if only they had the surety that their artworks are safe from piracy and copyright infringement. However, the availability of technology to almost everybody in the world today has made it easy for people to enhance piracy. This should be looked at from the simple practices of copying or burning a CD or a DVD on the computer.
While this may look simple to one person doing it, another one million people could be doing the same thing, thus a crisis in the sector is created. What needs to be asked is whether the problem of technology in the entertainment sector is caused by the virtue of the availability of the technology itself, or it is the absence of sound policies to enhance the management of technology in the sector (Sigismondi 2011).
The problem of intellectual property rights in the entertainment sector is not a recent phenomenon. This means that there have been policies to manage the sector and protect the rights of the people who earn their living from the industry.
However, in the midst of the high level of technology adoption and usage, irresponsible use of technology has spread quickly, thus making it hard for policy makers to implement policies that govern technology usage. What this means to the people working in the entertainment industry is that they will keep losing billions of dollars to the unscrupulous business people and individuals who utilize technology to enhance unlawful business activities.
What this means for the sector is that creativity will be killed since no one will be willing to invest time and other resources to produce a piece of entertainment, only for that piece of work to land in the hands of pirates and people who enhance counterfeits. This implies the selling of an intellectual property at no price (Alikhan & Mashelkar 2009).
Policies and legislative mechanisms have proved to be ineffective in combating the problem of intellectual property rights. Researchers are exploring the possibility of utilizing technology itself as a basis on which to address the problem of intellectual property rights in the global entertainment sector (Hesmondhalgh 2012).
However, it is emerging that even the technology itself is not safe from the problem of patents and copyright. For instance, a substantial number of people in the world today are using counterfeit computer programs. This does not, however, mean that technology cannot be a remedy to the problem of intellectual property rights in the entertainment sector.
The implication is that it is quite difficult to have full assurance that the technology used in the production of artworks is write-protected in the sense that the piece of work cannot be duplicated by another party. As it is today, the survival of the entertainment sector is based on wishful support from the fans. What ought to be done is the instilling of ethics in the audience so that they can learn and exercise the true sense of enhancing protection of the rights of the artworks that are produced in the industry (Hesmondhalgh 2012).
Yu (2007) observed that there are a lot of investments in the global entertainment sector. Therefore, the sector is treated as one of the income earners for a large number of people in the world. As artists invest their time in the composition and production of songs and videos, they expect to get returns on the investment.
It is critical to note that the entertainment sector of the world has been one of the most vulnerable sectors due to the fact that it is becoming reliant on technology (Sigismondi 2011). However, it has been observed that the vulnerability of the sector to the issue of intellectual property rights is something that began long time ago, even before the modern technologies were adopted by the people who operate in the industry.
The rate at which copyrights are abused in the entertainment sector is quite high, thus threatening the growth of the industry (Hull, Hutchison & Strasser 2011). A substantial number of people have raised concerns about the availability and enforcement of policies to protect people who work in the global entertainment sector.
The question that ought to be posed at this point is whether the concerns have resulted in any response from the people who are responsible for enforcing laws in the industry (Martin 2004). What comes out is that there are a lot of malpractices in the industry; therefore, technology alone cannot be blamed for the intellectual property rights issues in the entertainment sector.
It is people who conspire to utilize technology in advancing the breach of intellectual property rights. Therefore, it is difficult to attain the respect of copyrights in the industry, if people are not enlightened on the responsible use of technology. Until people see other abusers of copyrights brought to book, it will be hard to stop the trend of abuse of intellectual property rights in the entertainment sector (Steffen & Pennoyer 2001).
Conclusion
Cultural industries are ranked among the leading creative industries in the world today. Cultural industries contain many sectors that utilize the creation of the mind in order to depict or present culture. The entertainment industry is one of the most elaborate sectors in the cultural industries. This paper has explored the essence of protecting the intellectual property in the entertainment industry.
In the paper, it has come out that intellectual property rights in the entertainment sector are often infringed by people. While there are efforts to ensure that the pieces of artwork that are produced in the industry are protected, it is evident that technology is one of the main impediments to enhancing the protection of intellectual property. While technology enhances artwork in the entertainment sector, it does not seem to foster the protection of the pieces of artwork that are produced by artists in the sector.
There is need for policymakers in the entertainment industry to foster the development of technologies, which can help players in the entertainment industry to protect their work from piracy. This is because the existing policies and legislation on copyright and patents in the sector have failed to enhance protection of the products and services that are produced in the industry.
Reference List
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