Incentivising 'pirates' to pay – An experiment with comic book readers

Internet piracy has been repeatedly shown to displace the authorized consumption of digital content. However, fewer studies tried to identify a viable solution and none – to the authors' best knowledge – tried to convert the 'pirates' into paying consumers. We conducted a three-wave panel survey among comic book readers, asking about their consumption from various sources. After each wave, a random subsample was provided with prizes in the form of digital comic books from a legal provider. We analyze the effects of prizes on further consumption behavior. The first prizing scheme incentivized setting up an account, installing a reader app and familiarizing oneself with the catalog of the dominant digital seller of comics. The second scheme aimed at hooking consumers on particular comic book series. However, we find no consistent evidence of a change in the consumption patterns or the willingness to pay for digital formats. We suggest that for the case of comic books the prices of lower-valued digital copies might determine purchase and discuss the use of similar research design for other creative content.