Macrovision Study Reveals Widespread Gaming Piracy
Surveys of 6,000 Xbox and PlayStation 2 Gamers Show 21% Play Pirated Games, but 3 out of 4 Would Have Paid for Them
SANTA CLARA, Calif. March 14, 2005-Macrovision® Corporation (Nasdaq: MVSN), the world's leading supplier of content and software value management solutions, today announced the results of a gaming piracy study that shows significant losses experienced by the gaming industry due to software piracy.
The surveys of 6,000 Microsoft Xbox and Sony PlayStation 2 users show that 21% of gamers play pirated games, but 73% would have bought the game within one month if a free version had not been readily available. This high level of piracy on console systems, which are generally considered to be secure closed systems, is surprising.
The study also shows that 43% of all gamers who play pirated games download over 15 pirated titles a year. Over 74% of downloaded pirated games come from Internet websites or peer-to-peer networks, while 21% of the games are copied from friends. Of those who play pirated games, 64% have installed mod chips on their consoles.
"The prevalence of high-speed Internet, and the availability of pirated games on websites and peer-to-peer networks, have made downloading pirated games relatively easy and widespread," said Steve Weinstein, executive vice president and general manager of Macrovision's Entertainment Technologies Group. "Game piracy will increase rapidly over the coming months and years as gamers hone their downloading methods and behaviors. As the market leader in game content protection, Macrovision commissioned this study to help the industry better understand the primary sources of ongoing revenue displacement."
The Macrovision report is based on surveys conducted in February 2005 of approximately 6,000 console game players. The survey participants were randomly selected from a pool of visitors to various game-related websites.
About Macrovision
Macrovision develops and markets content and software value management solutions for the video, music and software industries. Macrovision's technologies are embedded in over 9 billion DVD, VHS and CD units representing over $130 billion of protected entertainment content. In the software market, Macrovision's software value management solutions are licensed to software developers.
They include the FLEXnetTM universal licensing platform and the InstallShield® suite of software installation, repackaging and update solutions, which are deployed on more than 500 million desktops worldwide. Over 50,000 software publishers and virtually all of the Fortune 1000 companies use Macrovision's technologies to maximize the value of their software. Macrovision is headquartered in Santa Clara, California and has offices worldwide. More information about Macrovision can be found at www.macrovision.com.
® 2005 Macrovision Corporation. Macrovision, SafeDisc, InstallShield, and FLEXnet are registered trademarks or trademarks of Macrovision Corporation. All other brands and product names and trademarks are the registered property of their respective companies.
This press release may contain "forward-looking" statements as that term is defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. A number of factors could cause Macrovision's actual results to differ from anticipated results expressed in such forward-looking statements. Such factors are addressed in Macrovision's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2003 and its latest Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the period ended September 30, 2004, which are on file with the Securities and Exchange Commission (available at www.sec.gov). Macrovision assumes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements.