Copyright investment in the UK tops £5billion

In figures released today by Imperial College and the Intellectual Property Office we can see that IP investment is larger than previously thought and that over 50% of the total is made up of investments in content destined for film, TV or radio distribution.

The digital revolution has turned this area into a much more volatile space as the ease of copying, distributing and making money from the IP of others has grown quickly & exponentially (a bit like the weird squid in Ridley Scott's excellent movie Prometheus). Google and YouTube are brilliant examples of a land grab in the new digital frontier.

The legal / ethical framework has struggled to keep pace and with the US Govt funding the development and distribution (allegedly) of the Stuxnet virus it seems it is all a bit of a free for all at the moment. The winners going forward are likely to be those who understand the value of and invest in protecting the IP they own.