A few major Russian media companies – Gazprom Media, National Media Group and The First Channel – have taken off their online broadcastings from main page of Russian search engine Yandex’s due to piracy accusations. Media companies not alone in their concerns. Not so long time ago right holders in entertainment content have accused Yandex of piracy.
Now media companies, right holders of audio-visual content, undertake effective measures. They also accuse Yandex of piracy and believe it facilitates search for illegal content in internet and don’t erase links to pirate web-sites from search. Certainly Yandex denies all accusation and claims it strictly comply Russian laws and develops legal services and facilitates legal video market.
Major Russian right holders are ready to put their broadcastings back on the main Yandex page, but only if Yandex cleans all pirate links out of search. Right holders believe it is the only way to make Yandex fight piracy and erase illegal content. Yandex placed right holders’ channels on its services only as experiment. Now there are only Yandex’s channels on Yandex page – comedies and cartoons.
Why right holders have taken off their broadcasting? The revenues, they received from Yandex, were “scanty” in comparison with “ losses counting up to hundreds of millions of Roubles” caused by illegal dissemination of broadcasters’ content, stated representative from National Media Group. Besides, major right holders develop their own online video platforms and they don’t want to lose their revenues thanks to competing services and indexing of illegal resources.
Yandex claims “there was no any mention on piracy in all official letters”. Yandex believes it provides all relevant monetization opportunities for right holders. Leaving Yandex’s platform by Russian major media companies is illogical, believes CEO of Russian association of electronic communication. He believes fight with piracy it is not policy of prohibitions, it is creation of available and quality platforms for distribution of legal content and it is logical to develop such platforms together with online leading companies like Yandex.