teddy>> music producers do have monopoly power. there’s only a few big music labels like BMG, universal, EMI….it’s basically a oligopolistic market structure…if they band together to research on some anti-copying technology plus perhaps the regional coding technology, it could be implemented….
then if ppl buy a cd in china, they might not play it in US….

vhanded>> gov comps using pirated softwares? u serious? yes i agree that we must have education/campaign to educate the public on respecting intellectual property….but i’m trying to solve piracy using the free market way….coz even with education, piracy will still persists bcoz the products are too expensive to be bought by the average person, thus in dollar and cents sense, he /she will make the more affordable decision. currently the gap btw ori n fake is too big. it’s a no brainer. but if it’s small enough, then ppl will respect IP

Even government is doing some work, like cleaning the pirated vcd selling, and ask people don’t buy it, people will just blame government because they thought government try to suck their wallets. What government need to do, is to explain the reason why pirated should not happen,(because it’s like stealing people’s creation, although not in physical form, but still people’s idea).

I admit in my PC not fully original software, like Adobe Flash and Photoshop, but I am trying to use legal way to get required software, like getting from MSDNAA or using open source, for more important software like OS, I spent RM800 for it, not because I am rich, is I realise the hardwork that require at the background to develope this OS for 5 years, and perhaps I am a software engineer in the future. And if counted everyday, if I use it for 5 years, everyday I just pay RM0.43, much lesser than Astro RM2 subscription per day.

About Software piracy in Malaysia, not because software is expensive, but most of the people don’t know to differentiate original or pirated, as the quality is the same, plus there is only a few percent of Malaysians are computer literate, even government computers using pirated Windows, while the other hand keep singing “Guna IT~~”. The only way to overcome is education and publicity. In most Malaysian’s mind, pirated only happen in t-shirt and vcd and dvd. Software? They don’t know.

Ah wells monopoly power is a must for price discrimination, but it is really hard for record labels to have a complete or a significant control over the market due to the presence of people who still copy and redistribute music and films. The only way to ensure complete control is by using some anti-copying technique, which needs a great deal of, gasp, research and development.

Market segmentation is another hurdle to across, because judging the current world situation it isn’t prohibitively hard or expensive to transfer CDs or media files across borders. People could burn music or films into portable harddrives, so checking for hidden CDs in tourists’ luggage still doesn’t really work. The only way again is to devleop some kind of technology that prevents copying of media files from authentic CDs / DVDs.

Just my 2 cents, anyway.

That’s why there’s such a thing called regional coding for DVD’s

pamsong>>i would also much prefer to use original products but they are just too overpriced….

Good post, btw.

However, people may abuse this pricing structure. One may buy products like CD or software in India and sell it to others in Europe. No one will do that with Big Mac because by the time it reaches Europe 2 days later, it is already gone bad.

Look at Nike sports shoes. Its price is about 30 to 50 pounds a pair and the conversion is done accordingly too when it is sold in Malaysia. In fact, don’t forget most Nike shoes are manufactured in Indonesia or China.

So, in this case, not every product can follow Big Mac method (though we would love to).