By Charles Randall

3 February 2013

The topic of "on-line piracy" cropped up at the ICC Board meeting in Dubai last week when there was unanimous agreement to continue combating illegal and unauthorised streaming of Sky Sports cricket broadcasts on the internet.

For a large number of ordinary cricket lovers in Britain -- possibly a huge number -- the phenomenon of peer to peer broadcasting has given wider access to live cricket, especially the Ashes series. As is well known, viewers watching Sky broadcasts on television are forced to pay about £500 a year due to bundling with other unwanted channels in any subscription deal. Cricket people have to pay for live Premier League football, which they don't need every week, and for so-called entertainment, which they might not want. There is mandatory  'added value', so in this way many folk have been disenfranchised financially.

The ECB have to judge a delicate balance between strong income streams and keeping cricket in the public eye. About a year ago they sold live cricket exclusively to Sky for £260 million in a deal running to 2017. There is the argument that excluding terrestrial television weakens public interest, as with rugby union in the early professional days, but this debate will not be explored here. There is no blame on Sky, who produce good quality broadcasting and set their strategy to maximise revenue. The ECB have to give thought to difficult decisions.

The point to be made is that on-line streaming should keep everyone happy. I would be willing to predict that if pirating were to be stamped out, very very few person would then decide to pay £500 a year just to watch the Ashes. Peer to peer broadcasting produces an array of opportunities to watch satellite broadcasts of cricket and other sports such as football free of charge. The quality is much lower than proper television, but just about good enough.

Giles Clarke, the ECB chairman, made a comment a year ago that was either incisively diplomatic or a little ludicrous."These pirate broadcasters," he said, "are the biggest danger to cricket because they take money out of the game without commercial benefit to the sport."

The truth is that if peer to peer broadcasts disappeared, the ECB would not gain a single penny more from Sky, though fewer people would enjoy watching cricket. So it could be infered that Mr Clarke was simply saying the right thing. He knows there are worse "dangers" from the ECB and ICC point of view, such as playing schedules and fixing.

There seems little doubt that peer to peer streaming, with adverts, infringes copyright, but does it really matter?

The ICC put out these comments after the Dubai meeting: "The board unanimously agreed to continue to combat the legal, financial and practical issues facing member boards and the ICC in relation to ‘online piracy’ (illegal and unauthorised streaming of broadcast footage over the internet) and other intellectual property rights infringements in the form of ‘digital ambush marketing’ (online trade mark or other intellectual property infringement, unauthorised mobile applications/SMS activations etc). An updated strategy will be further developed in time for future ICC chief executives’ committee and ICC board meetings."

At Test matches in some parts of the world, spectators used to perch precariously in trees outside a ground for a glimpse of the action. Perhaps they still do if they can't afford a ticket or if the ground is full. But apart from the timber value, does anyone gain by cutting down the trees?