Why were Popular Georgian Streaming Platforms Shut Down?
As you know, popular Georgian streaming platforms were shut down a few days ago and Georgian viewers were restricted from using free content. The vague inscription - "The site is in the process of reconstruction" raised even more question marks in society, and no one can say for sure whether these platforms will be restored or not, or from now on it will be possible to watch a movie in the Georgian online space only by paying a certain amount.
Entrepreneur was interested in what became the reason for the disconnection of these popular Georgian sites and where to watch movies, about which they spoke to the executive director of the Georgian Anti-Piracy Center, Zuka Bezhashvili.
''Along with the development of the Internet, online pirates developed rapidly in Georgia. These web pages started stealing movies, and advertising them, they opened offices in the center of Tbilisi, positioned themselves as legal businesses, and unfortunately, the society formed a misconception that the movie is free and these sites are legal. It effectively destroyed the industry, made filmmaking uncompetitive, made it uncompetitive to do legal businesses, and plunged the country into a vortex of "piracy".
Years ago, when we started working on this issue, these websites asked for a period of 6 months to give a legal face to the activity, after which 3 years have already passed.
Being within the legal framework means that the advertising revenue generated by these websites should not go into their pockets in full, but a certain percentage should be paid to the producers of the films whose films the user watches. This entire process is taking place with the direct involvement of Hollywood studios: Disney, Sony, Warners, Paramount, and others.
Today we have come to the point where the need to limit access to all international or Georgian "pirated" websites is on the agenda, in which the Communications Commission played an important role, which studied the letters of the rights holders, conducted research, contacted the pirated websites and asked them to provide licenses or remove the material from the website. for which they did not have a license. As I mentioned, this process has been going on for more than two years and we believe that the Commission has given websites too much time to bring their content into compliance with the law. Now, as we can see, all the deadlines and the given time have expired. Those who manage to put legal content on their platform will continue to work, those who want to continue to provide stolen products to the public for free will no longer be able to continue to do so and will have to comply with the law,'' explained Zuka Bezhashvili.
Source: Entrepreneur