Legal Niches

Report: $41.5 billion Lost to Handheld Game Piracy Worldwide

By james_fudge

According to a study conducted by Tokyo University's Baba Lab for the Computer Entertainment Suppliers Association (CESA) video game piracy for portable consoles (Nintendo DS and PSP) cost the gaming industry at least ¥3.816 trillion ($41.5 billion) worldwide between 2004 and 2009. Piracy in Japan alone accounted for ¥954 billion ($10.4 billion) of that amount, according to the study.

Using 114 piracy sites, researchers checked the download counts for the top 20 Japanese handheld games over a five year period - 2004 to 2009. After tabulating those figures, researchers multiplied that amount by four - under the assumption that the Japanese market makes up 25 percent of the market - to come up with a worldwide figure. The study did not take into account other methods of trading files like peer-to-peer sharing.. Read More

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Full post as published by GamePolitics.com on June 07, 2010 (boomark / email).