New York joins the MPAA
p2pnet.net news:- New York City has been recruited as a corporate enforcement agency by Hollywood’s MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America).
“Flanked by producer Jane Rosenthal and MPAA’s Mike Robinson,” says Variety, NYC mayor Michael Bloomberg yesterday signed legislation that’ll turn anyone who camcords a movie into a criminal.
The new law upgrades so-called film piracy, “from a violation with a $250 fine to a misdemeanor that carries up to six months in jail and penalties of up to $5,000,” says Associated Press.
The announcement was timed to coincide with ‘anti-piracy’ advertisements described as public service announcements.
The so-called PSAs, “feature film clips from movies like the animated hit ‘Happy Feet’ as they might look in illegally recorded copies, emphasizing the poor quality and urging New Yorkers not to buy pirated DVDs on the street,” says the story.
“The campaign uses ratings-style icons such as ‘RO’ for Ripped-Off, ‘PS’ for Poor Sound, ‘SP’ for Stupid Purchase, ‘OV’ for Obstructed View and ‘F’ for Fake,” says Variety.
The MPAA fakes will be on display at bus stops, shown in theatres and aired on local stations, it says, adding:
“Often taped with camcorders in movie theaters, the MPAA estimates that in 2006, New York City theaters were the origin of 43% of camcorder-source pirated DVDs tracked in the United States, and 20% of pirated movies seized globally.”
Hollywood would dearly love to see Montreal and other Canadian cities take the same step.
The MPAA is demanding that Canada change its copyright laws to suit Time Warner, Viacom, Fox, Sony, NBC Universal and Disney, “before a new administration takes over,” p2pnet posted recently, and, “one that may not be as cooperative as George W. Bush’s”.
Because, says Hollywood in an attack spearheaded by Dianne Feinstein and John Cornyn, we’re IT whejn it comes to illicit underground movie production.
Sony, one of the Big Six movies studios that’s on the ram,page, makes wonderful little camcorders such as the world’s smallest and lightest high definition consumer camcorder with full HD resolution based on HDV 1080i, as it stated when the camera was released.
And yet, “Strangely Sony, which also makes eminently affordable CD and DVD burners, hasn’t yet been named by other members of the movie cartel for aiding and abetting pirates,” p2pnet noted in a write-up on the camera.
Stay tuned for news of the first camcording New York teenager to be thrown into jail at Hollywood’s behest.
Also See:
Variety – Mayor signs piracy fine, May 1, 2007
Associated Press – Film Piracy Now a Misdemeanor in NYC, May 1, 2007
change its copyright laws – Hollywood muscles Canada, March 6, 2007
p2pnet – New Sony ‘pirate’ camcorder, May 18, 2005
If your Net access is blocked by governBryan Adams slams Net radio hikement restrictions, try Psiphon from the Citizen Lab at thIs the endSurvey: How Did Copyright Infringement Become Equated with Robbery? (of the Net) nigh?zze University of Toronto’s Munk Centre for International Studies. Go here for the official download, here for the p2pnet download, and here for details. And if you’re Chinese and you’re looking for a way to access independent Internet news sources, try Freegate, the DIT program written to help Chinese citizens circumvent web site blocking outside of China. Download it here.
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Tired of being treated like a criminal? They depend on you, not the other way around. Don’t buy their ‘product’. Do bug your local politicians. Use emails, snail-mail, phone calls, faxes, IM, stop them in the street, blog. And if you’re into organizing, organize petitions, organize demonstrations and then turn up on your local political rep’s doorstep, making sure you’ve contacted your local tv/radio station/newspaper in advance. Don’t just complain. Do something!
May 2nd, 2007 at 6:41 pm
“”The campaign uses ratings-style icons such as ‘RO’ for Ripped-Off, ‘PS’ for Poor Sound, ‘SP’ for Stupid Purchase, ‘OV’ for Obstructed View and ‘F’ for Fake,” says Variety.”
Here’s some REAL rating systems:
ICT:
Image constraint tag. Your high-def player and high def TV are reduced to standard def junk.
HDCP:
High bandwidth digital copy protection. Thanks to bugs in the firmware, even though your equipment is HDCP compatible it still doesn’t work.
UOP:
User operation prohibition. Annoying ads you can’t skip. Makes you want to boycott the product.
AACS:
Advanced Access Content System. First you must update your software, maybe some firmware, reboot several times, then you can watch the movie after 30 minutes of ads.
RPC:
Region codes. You paid for it like a good little consumer. They got your money. But you STILL aren’t allowed to watch it unless you break the law.
CSS:
Content scrambling system. Won’t let you transfer movies you legally paid for onto players you legally paid for unless you break the law by decrypting YOUR movie and putting it on your PMP.
VCR:
One of the many wonderful technologies they tried to kill. If they had killed this they would have missed out on BILLIONS of dollars in profit. They accepted defeat and used this technology to make undeserved amounts of money.
P2P:
See VCR
May 3rd, 2007 at 7:16 am
A very direct way to kill tourism.
Don’t they realize that NYC is host to millions of tourists, many that come with a camcorder and come from places where entering a theater with one is not illegal.
Don’t they realize that if you are a tourist and you incovenience them too much the tourists will be driven away?
What is next, forbid photo cameras everywhere because they can be used to photograph copyrighted works, which are found everywhere?
Besides if criminals wanted to copy movies at a theater all they need to do is to pay a theater manager that is dishonest or doesn’t make enough to feed the family (NYC is too expensive for most salaried workers) and the copying will then be done with tripod mounted professional cameras, not cheap handheld camcorders in the hands of video novices. Remeber NYC is a mafia town and anyone, judges, police, brokers, you name are in the take.
I agree that comercial piracy of movies and music recordings is a problem, but this solution is a very unworkable solution.
Perhaps $5.00 legit videos will drive away the pirates. Pirates simply could not compete with a resonably priced, returnable if defective, products.
Also, why not prohibit most sidewalk sellers, of which there are millions in the USA? This is where most stolen merchandise and piracy products are sold.
Rafael Venegas
gvenegas.com
May 3rd, 2007 at 12:19 pm
“What is next, forbid photo cameras everywhere because they can be used to photograph copyrighted works, which are found everywhere?”
Stuff like that is kinda happening now. When my family visited Nickelodeon studios years ago (disappointing) they showed us where they recorded some game show. They wouldn’t let us use video cameras because of copyright (the lady working there actually said so). All we could have gotten was a 30 second to 2 minute clip of a game show with no sound.
And what happens if you try to take a video camera into an overpriced concert?
May 5th, 2007 at 2:56 pm
What you expect from a fat slob of a bitch senator from san fransicko who claims to represent the people as a democrap but lives in a $16000000 house in Pacific heights California paid for by the fat cunt funneling taxpayer money for military construction projects into her husband’s contruction company by INFLUENCE PEDDLING.
Mike Savage crowns her all of the time on his radio The Savage Nation and he is correct whenhe says LIBERALISM IS A MENTAL DISORDER.
May 5th, 2007 at 3:06 pm
What you expect from a fat slob of a bitch senator from san fransicko who claims to represent the people as a democrap but lives in a $16000000 house in Pacific heights California paid for by the fat cunt funneling taxpayer money for military construction projects into her husband’s contruction company by INFLUENCE PEDDLING.
Mike Savage crowns her all of the time on his radio The Savage Nation and he is correct whenhe says LIBERALISM IS A MENTAL DISORDER.