Why do pirates demand movies? Empirical evidence from Italy

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to partition the general population of «pirates» into market segments: movie pirates are heterogeneous among their motivations and attitudes to use piracy and their willingness to pay for the original compared to the copy. The main research goals will focus on examining both consumers’ perception of pirated movies consumption and their motivations to pirate by dif- ferent means. We use data survey collected from a sampling of 2038 adults (over 15 years old) with the aim to identify different pirates’ groups as well as the un- derlying features that characterize different types of pirates. Using factor analysis and cluster analysis we are able to identify four clusters. This result allows us to investigate demand segments and piracy behav- iour and can suggest areas where policies and practices to fight against piracy could be strengthened.