The Motion Picture Association of America wants to ban DVD Technology as well! We have to stop them!
Posted on 07/14/2003 11:30:02 AM PDT by ConservativeMan55
I honestly believe that the threat of lawsuits against individual downloaders was and is bogus. I have not seen one shred of evidence to the contrary. I've downloaded tons of songs beginning back with Napster. It never hurt the recording industry one ounce. What hurts them is when there is no interest. Luckily for them, Napster and Kazza kept the interest alive.
When Napster first came out everyone loved it and there was no talk of lawsuits. The recording industry was booming. Sales were up and I remember news pundits and other talking heads say that the reason sales of CD's were up was because of Napster. Napster had spawned a new interest in music and was keeping it alive.
How many of you downloaded every song off a CD, and then burned it onto another CD? Like many others I would download one song, listen to it, and if it was good enough, I would go out and buy the CD. I never found each song on a new CD, and downloaded each one. Now I have no way of listening or knowing anything about a new CD so my interest has waned considerably, and I won't be at the Music Store anytime soon.
Now the RIAA has successfully destroyed Napster and I might add about half of their profits. They are now going after Kazza. This won't be easy to do because Kazza is worldwide. Instead of going after Kazza, they are attempting to scare the downloaders into dropping Kazza in a scheme Jethro and the Beast would be proud of. If only those downloaders were elderly then the liberals could take away the ability to download and blame it on the Conservatives.
The RIAA should wake up and not do what Martha Stewart did. Martha attempted to make 200 thousand dollars illegally and ended up losing millions. This is what happens to the CEO's that are crooked. They work hard much like Martha did, and end up with more money than they know what to do with. Then once they get to the top, some decide they don't want to work for it anymore and become deceitful.
That brings them down as soon as they make that first choice. Now the RIAA is talking about how terrible their sales are, and they are blaming it on Kazza and other file sharing programs. Maybe they should take a look at when their sales started to tank. Its right when they started threatining their consumers with lawsuits!
Back to my question. Has anyone been sued yet? Any Senators sons or daughters been thrown in jail over this? Anybody been dragged into court? I didn't think so.
The Motion Picture Association of America wants to ban DVD Technology as well! We have to stop them!
I've read Kerry Segrave's Payola in the Music Industry: A History, 1880-1991. It is excellent and covers every bit of the technology in the idustry from sheet music and vaudevile to organ grinders to recorded music, to radio, to recorded music on radio... The industry has always dictated to the courts what the first ammendment means.
The copies I see on bookfinder.com are eighty dollars up to the hundreds; I bought mine from a library sale for a couple of bucks. I wouldn't say that it is worth spending $250 but I do heartily recommend it.
There is also William Knoedelseder's STIFFED:A TRUE STORY OF MCA,THE MUSIC BUSINESS,AND THE MAFIA which I hear is a good book (deals with the 1970s and 1980s, the book came out in 1993).
I also hear that Clinton Heylin's Bootleg: The Secret History of the Other Recording Industry is a good read (I'd rather pick this one up than Stiffed).
I'm sure that there is much more good reading here:
The BOMP Bookshelf - Inside the Record Industry
"Note: these are primarily expose´s about the rotten secrets the music industry would rather you not know about. For books about how to break into or make it in the music industry, click here."
They got that same tax levied into blank CD's ... now I just carry a portable 20GB hard drive that process mp3's and playlists .....
Pi$$ on RIAA
Hollywood's response has been to release some DVDs with RCE (DVD Talk page on RCE); their name for a scheme that checks if a machine is "region free" (verboten in their eyes). Since I can manually set my DVD player to any region this is nothing more that a nusience (but something that would persuade me to boycott buying the American release since I would need to keep toggling my settings to play it). I have not seen any other countries embracing RCE or setting up barriers to the sale of region free players.
Some foreign DVD manufacturers offer different suplemental features or release their discs prior to the US discs. It's a global marketplace. People can buy import CDs, they should be able to buy import DVDs too.
Warner Home Video:
WHV will start a program to enhance the capabilities of the regional code specification for DVD beginning in October. This program is a response to the unauthorized practice of altering DVD video hardware players so that they bypass the region code requirements for DVD. This is happening on a more frequent basis in many territories, and retailers are openly marketing these non-complying players with names such as "region free" and "multi zone".The Technology – The enhancement is an additional imbedded code (RCE – Regional Code Enhancement) on the DVD disc that makes the current regional coding more robust.
How It Works – In simple language, the RCE allows the disc to detect if a hardware player is region specific (as required by the CSS licensing agreement), or if it has been manufactured or altered in the market to be "region free". If the player is "region free" the RCE will not allow the disc to play the program material. It will instead display a message on the television advising the consumer that the machine is not authorized to play this disc.
The actual wording will be as follows:
THIS DVD PLAYER MAY HAVE BEEN ALTERED AND IS UNABLE TO PLAY THIS DISCTHERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH THIS DISC DVD PLAYERS AND DISCS ARE DESIGNED TO WORK IN CERTAIN REGIONS
THIS DISC IS NOT COMPATIBLE WITH THIS PLAYER PLEASE CONTACT YOUR LOCAL RETAILER OR PLAYER MANUFACTURER FOR ADDITIONAL INFORMATION WE APOLOGIZE FOR ANY INCONVENIENCE
WHV will start applying the RCE to discs scheduled for release in the U.S. market beginning in late October. At this time, the RCE will only be applied to Region 1 versions of titles. At least one other studio (Columbia TriStar) will also be releasing discs with the RCE during the 4th quarter.
The program has two objectives. (1) Discourage the export of region 1 discs to other regions and (2) discourage the sale of DVD video hardware that has been modified to “region free”.
WHV Sales personnel should immediately begin to communicate this program to key retailers in their respective territories.
It is especially important to focus on retailers selling product online, and any account, which may be exporting products outside Region 1. With the online retailers, we must discuss the need to properly notify consumers outside the region 1 territories that the disc may not play in their player before the disc is purchased. The customer dissatisfaction and returns risk is significant if this is not done. At this time there is no plan to send out a press release on this program. This document should be used to review the program with all U.S. accounts.
And this from Columbia:
October 3, 2000 Dear Customer: Columbia TriStar Home Video will be implementing a program to enhance the capabilities of the regional code specifications for DVD product beginning in October 2000. The Regional Code Enhancement affirms Columbia’s commitment to support regional coding, which was designed to respect and adhere to each country’s respective laws and policies governing ratings, censorship, release windows and rights for home video product. The enhancement will allow the Region 1 DVD disc to check the region code of the player ensuring that the player is a non-modified region 1 specific player. If the player has been modified to be region free, the Region 1 disc will display the following message:"This disc is intended for play on non-modified Region 1 players only. There is nothing wrong with the disc. To assure playback you should purchase or rent a disc designed specifically for your region."
Please be assured that the Regional Code Enhancement technology will not affect the consistent high quality standard, set by Columbia TriStar Home Video, for audio and video on its DVD titles. We thank you for your support and understanding in our efforts to reaffirm our commitment to regional coding as both a theatrical and video organization.
Fox reportedly had this graphic on their UK Simpsons site:
In addition, Supreme Court justices must be required to define an MP3 or AVI. I wouldn't be surprised if at least four justices think that an MP3 is a type of assault weapon.
Frankly, I'm more concerned about border security than pimple-faced 15-year-olds downloading an *exclusive*, not-yet-released Britney Spears track off the internet.
The US saw a third consecutive year of decline, with album sales down 10% in units, mainly due to falling sales from major album releases affected by sales substitution from internet sources.
Japan has continued to suffer from internet piracy and CD burning. An estimated 236 million CD-Rs were burned in 2002, while legitimate CD sales were 229 million. Overall the Japanese market fell 9%, but has the biggest national market share for music video sales, valued at $US 407.5 million.
Several Western European markets performed relatively well in the context of the global decline. France, the world's fourth largest market, continued to defy the global trend with 4% growth in unit sales. This is largely attributable to the continued growth in sales of French repertoire. Norway, Italy and Portugal also saw more or less flat markets.
The German market stands out as worst affected by mass CD burning. Sales fell by 9%, Germany's fifth consecutive year of decline. Spain has now fallen behind other Western European countries in per capita sales, with a fall of 16% in value. Spain has seen a sharp increase in physical CD-R piracy: in 2002 some 24 million pirate units were sold, in other words two out of every five records.
The UK market in 2002 came to the end of its five-year growth run. While the number of albums sold remained stable at 226 million, downward pressure on prices meant the value of album sales fell by 3% and illegal downloading was just one of the factors contributing to the continued decline in single sales. However 2002 was a strong in the UK for domestic artists, who accounted for half of the top 40 selling albums.
Music sales across Asia fell by 10%, largely because of continuing economic difficulties and both physical and internet piracy. The exception was Singapore, which experienced a growth in both regional and international repertoire.
In Latin America, Brazil partly recovered from last year's severe decline (up 4%) due mostly to stock liquidations. Mexico remains the biggest Latin American market and 10th in the world despite a second consecutive year of decline, with sales down 19%. Piracy continues to plague the market with 50% of the population buying pirate music products. The Argentinean market continues to suffer from severe economic and political instability and has fallen steeply by 23%.
Source: IFPI
The frame rates are different (I think one is 25 frames [per second while the other is 30 frames per second). Even France is using PAL for DVD.
My region free DVD player is fully capable of playing NTSC and PAL discs (I have both). Some Region 1 DVD players can still play region 0 PAL dvds.
Region coding is an artificial thing. It is a bit on the disc that says "only for this area". Importation of the discs or players is not illegal. Hollywood's solution would be for you to buy a separate player for each of the 10 regions.
Consider if/when this becomes the case with DVD (as we go to DVD-audio it could be implemented). Great reissue companies like Bear Family and Ace would be unplayable in America.
The industry may push for this as Europe may not respect the last go-round of copyright extension. They never signed onto the "renewal". Some "fear" that Europe will consider rock and roll to be lapsing into the public domain. You can see why some US firms would like to prohibit it's availablity in America.
As a consumer you would be breaking no law. It is just about the will of the studios.
About 1/3 of my DVD collection is imports. Some titles have been issued later in the US, many haven't. Some have made it over here but are dubbed, edited, or have no supplements. As a consumer, I use the internet to find the version of the disc that I want.
The US disc for Snatch has RCE. I won't buy it now that I know that. I think that the UK and Australian editions may have more "stuff". It's not a high priority purchase of mine (I do like the Lock Stock & Two Smoking Barrels tv show I bought though).
You can get an NTSC/PAL capable VCR but they are costly ($400-1000). I don't think that you can just put PAL tape in an NTSC VCR and "digitally correct" it on output. Some videoprojectors automatically detect a PAL or NTSC signal and convert accordingly. Any know if a PAL tape can be played in an NTSC vcr this way? What about correcting it inside a computer (digitally convert it to NTSC in the computer and then output the signal to an NTSC VCR)? There are companies that are legally permitted to "convert" a tape from PAL to NTSC for you (you own the original tape, you are not bootlegging it, just having it transferred to a format you can view).
CDs are typically $9-20 for single disc releases. 30 minute albums are no cheaper than 70 minute ones.
The industry is following the low DVD pricepoint to help the market to grow (many more people are buying home video now). The industry "could" lower the pricepoint for CDs to encourage sales too but instead they are pushing it upwards (to $18, which is where it had been in Europe; Japan is even higher at $25-30).
The industry was caught price gouging but plea bargained an out of court settlement so they didn't have to admit anything. States got paid, consumers got screwed and prices still went up.
I agree. Who is doing this for profit?
No, it's not the same as stealing a tank of gas, at least as far as the laws says. Nevertheless, copyright infringement is sure illegal!
IMO lawsuits won't even put a dent in filesharing. The technology moves too fast.
If the RIAA wants to minimize filesharing (they'll never end it, nor do they want to IMO), then they'll adjust their distribution methods to more closely accommodate the existing technology and will continue to adapt to it.
JMHO
If we were talking about a bicycle, yes. But we're talking about copyrighted material. It is, under copyright law, illegal to distribute copies of music. It's not "theft", it's "copyright infringement". Theft is for taking something of value without paying. Copyright infringement is eliminating potential value of something.
BINGO!
I reckon they have always used laws to eliminate competition, so they figure it's easier to legislate a continued monopoly than be smart, innovate, and assertive.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.