SINGAPORE – Singapore’s screen community celebrated World Intellectual Property (IP) Day today with the launch of a new consumer awareness campaign encouraging audiences to access their favourite shows from legal sources and to say no to piracy.

 

The short animation, created by award-winning Singaporean animation company Robot Playground, invites audiences into the lifecycle of the film and television industry, illustrating the vital role played by paying customers to the health and sustainability of the creative community.

 

While there are a wide range of legal online video options available to audiences in Singapore, including HOOQ, Netflix, Starhub Go, Singtel TV on demand, Toggle, Viu, Amazon Prime Video, Mubi, Catchplay, Pooq and Guidedoc.tv, and with cinema complexes offering the latest movie releases are within easy reach of most Singaporeans, online piracy remains at significant levels. In fact, according to publicly available Custom analysis of Alexa data, local visits at pirate sites are 1.14 times higher than those at legitimate sites. The data shows that the top five piracy websites we accessed more than 7 million times accessed by Singaporeans in March 2018.

 

In recent times, Singapore has seen a significant proliferation of piracy boxes and apps being made available for sale to consumers, who may not be aware that much of the content made accessible to them is provided without the authority of the rights owners. Both the Intellectual Property Office of Singapore and the Infocomm Media Development Authority have urged viewers to access legitimate content, and content providers to offer competitive prices.

 

The campaign was launched at a World IP Day celebration event held at Golden Village Suntec City, and will be featured on video screens at the foyers of Cathay Cineplexes, Golden Village Cinemas and Shaw Theatres. The campaign video will also be shown on selected Starhub TV channels and on the Centre for Content Promotion website.

 

The day’s activities also featured a panel discussion entitled “Powering Change: Women in Creativity and Innovation”, moderated by Nikki Loke from Viddsee, and featuring Annabelle Kwok, CEO of NeuralBay, and filmmakers Christine Seow and Ang Geck Geck.

 

The panellists discussed their inspirations and how they nurture creativity, as well as the challenges they face pursuing careers in the creative industry.

 

Guests were also treated to a special screening of Marvel Studios’ Black Panther, thanks to Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures.