Pirates of the Digital Millennium
How the Intellectual Property Wars Damage Our Personal
Freedoms, Our Jobs, and the World Economy

By John Gantz and Jack B. Rochester
Financial Times Prentice Hall

IDC Inside

The idea for Pirates of the Digital Millennium began with IDC's landmark research for the Business Software Alliance in 2003 on the economic impact of software piracy (see www.bsa.org/idcstudy). In this study, captained by IDC Chief Research Officer and book co-author, John Gantz, IDC quantified the impact lowering software piracy would have on the jobs, tax revenues, and contribution to GDP in 57 countries. One chapter of the book, Global Fallout, reviews and augments this research with other studies and academic material. The book grew out of the authors' desires to expand upon IDCs research with more research and study of the entire issue of digital piracy.

Since that 2003 study IDC has gone on to become even more involved in software piracy research, conducting this year's annual study for the BSA of software piracy rates and economic losses in 86 countries. (see www.bsa.org/globalstudy.) IDC has also conducted custom consulting engagements on software piracy by segment and product type, studied deterrents and solutions to software piracy, and examined the channel dynamics of piracy.

In related research IDC studies the changing nature of software licensing, the emerging area of digital rights management and content security, the impact of peer-to-peer networks on commerce and society, and developments in online gaming and entertainment markets.

For the book itself IDC's Global Research Organization conducted a web-based survey of over 900 individuals in 30 some countries on their behavior and attitudes toward music and movie downloading. The results were quite counter-intuitive.