File sharing: the death of creativity

Singapore - The Intellectual Property Office of Singapore (IPOS) has launched a RocketX-created campaign aimed at educating young consumers on the difference between ‘file sharing' and illegal downloading.

"The focus of our public awareness campaign is on the issue of online piracy, in particular illegal file sharing.  This is due to the increasing popularity of illegal file sharing among Singaporeans today and hence, the need to educate young people on what constitutes illegal downloading and to increase the understanding that the concept of file sharing is in fact stealing if the content does not belong to you," Liew Woon Yin, director-general for IPOS said.

The campaign launched 26 April to coincide with World IP Day and will run for six months in various formats including print, online, TVCs and in the cinema as well. The print ad shows a blank space with the copy saying, "We were going to show you some movies. But they were stolen".

"We're trying to educate as well as change behaviour but we want the change to be brought about by a respect for intellectual property, not out of a fear of recrimination, therefore the campaign shows the effects of piracy (death of creativity) and reminds the audience that 'It's not file sharing, it's stealing'", Marc Nicholson, CEO for RocketX said.

"Young people today are so accustomed to file sharing that they view it as a right - it's practically a political movement and yet they recognise that respect for IP is important. The ultimate objective is to stop illegal file sharing but given the pervasiveness of P2P file sharing and the popularity of sites like Bit Torrent, we recognise things are not going to change overnight," he said.

The ads are targeted at digital savvy users aged between 14 and 35, and media placement was handled by Carat.

In other news, RocketX has been awarded all Cisco recruitment advertising business with a branding campaign for Auxiliary Police Officers (APO) due out middle of May.

The objective of the campaign is centred on four points, which are to drive awareness of the APO position available at Cisco, trigger interest in having a career as an APO, educate the benefits and privileges Cisco offers, and finally, drive potential candidates to act. The campaign will run in print and across MRT in-train panels.