p2pnet - rss feed: Movie sanitizers sanitized
p2p news / p2pnet: “ClearPlay’s unauthorized censorship is mostly ignorant ideological desecration, rather like the Nazi book burnings and similar censorship from 65 years ago. It pays little attention to context or art and makes few distinctions based on anything sensible. If you dislike much of what Hollywood produces (as I do), there are better ways to make that known.
“In this matter as in others, the USA is becoming both the bully and the laughingstock of the free world, behaving more like the countries it ruthlessly wants to eliminate.”
That’s what Dr P. Rapoport posted back in 2004 in a Reader’s Write to a story on ClearPlay which hacked, literally, the likes of American Splendor, Big Fish, Cat in the Hat, The Haunted Mansion, The Last Samurai, Looney Tunes: Back in Action, Master And Commander, The School of Rock, Timeline and Win A Date With Tad Hamilton.
Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, and Norman Jewison were among Hollywood producers who later complained about ClearPlay and other companies which offered these clean cut – literally – movies.
Now US district court judge Richard P. Matsch has ordered Video II, Glen Dickman, J.W.D. Management Corporation, Trilogy Studios Inc., CleanFlicks, MyCleanFlicks, Family Shield Technologies, LLC, ClearPlay Inc., Clean Cut Cinemas, Family Safe Media, EditMyMovies, Family Flix, USALLC. and Play It Clean Video, to, “hand over their entire inventory of scrubbed flicks to the five major Hollywood studios and stop ‘producing, manufacturing, creating’ and renting the cleaned-up material within five days or face possible court action, including the likelihood of massive penalties,” says E Online.
Digg this.
Also See:
ClearPlay - Profanity nudity violence = $, May 12, 2004
E Online - Judge Scrubs Movie Sanitizers, July 10, 2006
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July 11th, 2006 at 10:18 pm
Careful what you wish for. The content cartels are only too happy to take these same overreaching American copylaws, which stop the resale of homosexuality-scrubbed, minority-scrubbed, or even politically-scrubbed content, turn them around, and wield them against anime music videos, iFilm fan splices, and independent music remixes.
Here, the movie sanitizers truthfully represented their products as unauthorized edits to customers. They paid full price to the studios for every single DVD before sanitizing them, profiting only from a modest markup of US$5 or so. They legitimately made films of major cultural importance (partially) accessible to those who, for religious or other personal reasons, would never have experienced (or paid money for) them. I may detest their final product, but I can’t deny that this was a win-win for both the studios and for (fringe) consumers.
All told, this injunction is just another slide down the slippery slope toward the zero fair use, zero first sale world the content cartels crave, where consumers never truly own anything, but simply license content to be experienced for the limited times and methods the cartels allow.
July 12th, 2006 at 12:54 am
I remember not long ago that the cartels were pushing to close p2p applications because they were responsible for the exposure of porn and sex to minors. Yet here we see another example of just what is important to them.
Take your pick, go to a rental place such as Blockbuster, buy movies from other stores, watch music vids on tv; almost any of those are subject to expose you to what you don’t wish your youngsters to see.
Yes, I understand there are ratings on movies. I also understand that unrated versions are sold. Don’t get me wrong here, I am not in favor of censorship in this manner with someone else deciding what I should or should not be able to see. The main reason for that is religious puritans almost always manage to gain access to some of this. Besides another point that only the cartel media gets suggestions as to what to remove to change the ratings. If you are an independent maker you would receive that advice.
Regardless of whatever is presented, I reserve the right to determine what will be played in my home and I resent in the strongest terms any board or group that attempts to supplant my choices with what they think I should do or chose.
July 12th, 2006 at 2:04 am
Censorship is OK as long as it is not FORCED censorship. Those who filter spam want censorship, otherwise, they would not complain about spam, attack spammers, or install filtering software. The sanitizing companies were performing a service for PAYING CUSTOMERS. I do not wish to view smut, and so rarely do I buy, rent, or see cartel produced movies. I might have used such services if they were available in my area. What Hollywood wants to do is FORCE SMUT onto the viewers.
It’s not filesharers that is reducing movie studio profits, it is the crap produced by the studios. They long ago lost me as a customer.
July 12th, 2006 at 5:38 pm
Get the facts straight - ClearPlay does not hack anything, they are protected by legislation, & the judge did not order them to do anything. ClearPlay makes software that allows users to avert profanity, nudity, etc by skipping the scenes or muting them, unlike CleanFlicks, which actually makes new “clean” versions of the DVD. The Family Movie Act, past last year by Congress, protects ClearPlay by name. ClearPlay simply allows parents to protect their children from potentially inappropriate scenes, just as AOL allows parents to use parental controls on the innocent. It’s a good to society.
July 12th, 2006 at 8:45 pm
Well you don’t have that quite right. ClearPlay was NOT included in Judge Matsch’s decision. In fact, he threw out all charges against ClearPlay back in August 2005, after the passage of the Family Movie Act.
Now regarding “better ways to make … known” that I don’t like what Hollywood produces, that is probably true. But maybe I’m not trying to make a political statement with ClearPlay, but just want to enjoy my movies more.
If you don’t like the idea of anchovies on your caesar salad, boycott them. But if it’s just anchovies you don’t like, as the waitress and she’ll probably just leave them off. Or, if you’d like, just take them off when served.
July 12th, 2006 at 8:49 pm
You don’t have that quite right. ClearPlay was NOT included in Judge Matsch’s decision. In fact, he threw out all charges against ClearPlay back in August 2005, after the passage of the Family Movie Act. ClearPlay is perfectly legal and doing business.
Desecrating movies? I guess that depends on your perspective. There are a lot of versions of most movies being made, for theatrical, DVD releases, TV, airlines, countless foreign markets, etc. In some cases, editorial decisions are made by producers and investors rather than directors. Marketing guys after focus group. Those who think there is a holy and sacred version of the movie that all others must worship are simply uninformed.
Now regarding “better ways to make … known” that I don’t like what Hollywood produces, that is probably true. But maybe I’m not trying to make a political statement with ClearPlay, but just want to enjoy my movies more.
If you don’t like the idea of anchovies on your caesar salad, boycott them. But if it’s just anchovies you don’t like, ask the waitress and she’ll probably just leave them off. Or, if you’d like, just take them off when served.