The conference on the protection of intellectual property rights “Fighting Piracy in Ukraine: 5 “what fors” and results of fight against content theft” announced its program

The fight against content theft in Ukraine is a continuous, long-playing, but promising and economically viable process. This statement is true for participants of III conference for rights holders “Fighting Piracy in Ukraine: 5 “what fors” and results of fight against content theft”  that will take place on September 17th during KMW.

Experts will share their experience that will help to boost and speed up this difficult process of industry transformation:

• Valery Zhaldak, Head of the Intellectual Property Department, Ministry of Economic Development and Trade
• Dace Kotzeva, Executive Director, Association for Legal Content, Latvia
• Mykola Faengold, Commercial Director, Digital & Pay TV, StarLightMedia
• Fedir Grechaninov, Director for Strategic Development, Media Group Ukraine
• Kirill Matvienko, Sales Director, Global Images Ukraine
• Alexey Shuldeshov, General Producer of TV channels, Star Media
• Olena Andrienko, Senior Associate, Publicis Groupe

Kateryna Fedorova, director of “Clear Sky Initiative” Public Union, will moderate the discussion.

They will try to find the answers to 5 questions:  

1. why rights holders fight with piracy, and how much money do they save 
2. why advertisers, banks and other businesses representatives stand against the intellectual property theft, and what benefits do they get 
3. why Ukrainian government should support fight against piracy
4. why international community fights against piracy, how it contributes to the international economy
5. why do users (in Ukraine and abroad) consume illegal content, why does it happen and what has to be done about it

Dmitro Levin, head of the Content Monitoring Center of TV group StarLightMedia told, “We have been working in this direction for a long time and we know perfectly what piracy means for us. We decided to call this not ‘piracy’ but ‘theft’”. 

Dmitro pointed out several reasons why the group fights against intellectual property rights violation. The first reason is a reputation, “We cannot turn a blind eye to crime. When they steal what was created by the holding, we must act”. 

The second reason is economical, “Hundreds of people work on the content production and this is a tremendous job. Every time someone steals our content, the company does not receive income that would go to the production of new high-quality content”. And the final reason is country and its citizens development, “We believe, the more developed the country is, the less piracy is in it, and we try to instill the habit of using only legal services in Ukraine,” he said.

Alexey Shuldeshov, General Producer of Star Media TV channels notes that the fight against piracy means an increase of revenue and minimization of losses, “As our practice has shown, under the effective anti-piracy programs implementation the income from content can grow up to 30-60%. And with the right speed and response, you can further increase monetization of certain titles. However, even though the industry has stepped far forward in the fight against piracy, now it looks like sealing leaks in a floating boat. Therefore, we have a more difficult and responsible task — users training. Our experience shows that it’s important not to punish, but to explain and offer alternatives to all industry players, including advertisers,” he said.

This event is a meeting venue for business owners, lawyers of Ukrainian and International rights holders and all those, who are concerned with the intellectual property rights protection. In this conference the participants work on the practical solutions provided, conduct constructive dialogue and make the joint decisions on further actions.

Organizer — “Clear Sky Initiative” Public Union, created in order to foster the licensed video content marketplace and confront intellectual property rights violations. 

We invite you to join the conference at KMW on September 17 from 14 to 18.00 in London conference hall, Hyatt Regency Kyiv, at the III conference for rights holders “Fighting Piracy in Ukraine: 5 “what fors” and results of fight against content theft”.