How to Solve a Problem Like Greenhills

Government and big businesses need to think differently to find a way out of persistent problems. Let's think backwards and sidewards -- a technique that Edward de Bono called Lateral Thinking.

What if instead of spending lots of money on policemen and NBI to raid vendors of fake software and DVD movies, businesses instead collected money from the vendors?

Instead of going after pirates after the fact, copyright owners could simply ask the pirates to pay a one-time license to copy any amount. It does not matter any more how many they produce and sell.

What about the vendors at Greenhills and Metrowalk? Authorities would require receipts per disc sold. And copyright owners can charge a small percentage of the receipt sales. Let's look at the numbers.

• Cost of one DVD: P50
• Let's say we sell it instead at P75.
• P25 goes to the copyright owner.
• How many DVDs are sold in Greenhills and Metrowalk alone? If you've visited those places, you'll see how brisk business is.
• Let's just say they sell 100 pieces per day. And let's say that in a month they sell 2,000 pieces (assuming 20 days of sales).
• That's easily P150,000.00 a month. That's P50,000 per month to copyright owners.

Note that I've only assumed a very small share for copyright owners. It could be more, if their greediness prevails (the market force will balance out eventually -- fake vendors would rather go underground instead, I think).

This is to some extent what Steve Jobs and EMI have agreed to do. iTunes will now begin to sell copyright-free music. This I think is an elegant and simple solution to the problem.

It's the same principle that happened with the FX jeepneys in Metro Manila. Public transportation is so bad in our city that FX jeepneys caught on. After trying to ban them and stop them, authorities later figured they could just earn from them.