British ISPs Ordered to Block The Pirate Bay

[EvilNed]

I made no such assumption, hence my comment, "if this has prevented the downloader from otherwise purchasing it." Now of course not every item downloaded prevents a purchase, but would you see it a fair assumption it's more than nil? From personal experience I can easily state it's prevented CD purchases, the hiring of films, and purchasing of films to some degree! Sorry, I'm with shootemindehead. From personal experience I've probably bought more films after watching them and liking them rather than watching something, loving it and then keeping it on my harddrive. I've bought more music post-Napster than pre-Napster (but I still haven't bought much). I think the idea that downloading prevents profit is an easy and comfortable opinion to hold, but it's probably not as true as you think. Again, movie sales going up not down. Along with piracy.

[Sammich]

"Fascism should more appropriately be called Corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power."- Benito Mussolini I remember when movie studios were crying that the VCR would destroy their industry. Then the record companies were crying that cassette tape recorders would destroy their industry. The old farts in the MPAA and RIAA should think of ways of using these technologies to their advantage instead of continually trying to destroy by using "campaign donations" to buy off those in government. Remember, once again, movie and tv ceos were saying youtube would ruin them? Well, gee what from what media are all of the viral marketing campaigns now based? YOUTUBE. You would think that the priority of government would be to protect it's citizens from "terrorists" or other nasties, but grease enough palms in government and police resources can be diverted to protect corporate profits instead. Police Dogs Sniff for Pirated DVDs An alliance of film industry groups that includes the Motion Picture Association of America and the Federation Against Copyright Theft has announced the world's first dogs specially trained to detect CDs and DVDs in bags and packages. The idea is that the dogs may be able to alert police to large stashes of pirated movies.

[shootemindehead]

And many more will not, because they can download them easily at the press of a button and save themselves money! I'm sure there'll be people who'll download and leave it at that. But how many of them would have bought the box set anyway, in the first place. I'd wager very few indeed. So, there's not that much of a hit to the producers pocket either way. People who are into certain material usually want to buy the best copy of that material that they can. In fact, people often repeat buy certain items. In fact, I've lost count of how many times I've actually bought 'Dawn of the Dead' over the years. And if there's a new version with another 20 minutes of extra footage thrown in made available in a few years time...I'll probably get that too, even though I have no doubt that it would be available on the web within a week of the official release. There may also be the idle curious who'll download the avi to have a look, but the vast majority of those people wouldn't even think of forking out the shillings for the legit DVD in any case. -- -------- Post added at 12:32 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:18 AM ---------- An alliance of film industry groups that includes the Motion Picture Association of America and the Federation Against Copyright Theft has announced the world's first dogs specially trained to detect CDs and DVDs in bags and packages. The idea is that the dogs may be able to alert police to large stashes of pirated movies. JEEEESUSSSS CHRIIIST!

[Neil]

I'm sure there'll be people who'll download and leave it at that. But how many of them would have bought the box set anyway, in the first place. I'd wager very few indeed. So, there's not that much of a hit to the producers pocket either way. I suspect it's a high percentage of people who download CDs and films and do not buy the original, that would have otherwise... And I see the percentage growing. Five years ago, people had to download material and then go through the hassle of burning to CD or DVD. Now, it's getting to the stage where you simply drag the CDs, DVDs and bluray copies to your media players and that's it. Downloading is getting easier, the quality better and the ease of playing simpler! I know for example that I can have a CD in FLAC format on my media player within a few minutes, for free... It's actually easier than buying it, and then converting it, and certainly far far quicker! Are you telling me that's not affecting sales? I know I can have a film in reasonably high quality bluray format on my media player within a couple of hours, for free (before it's even released here in the UK)... Are you telling me that's not affecting sales? I suspect the amount of sales usurped by downloading is fairly high and growing all the time! -- -------- Post added at 09:19 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:14 AM ---------- I remember when movie studios were crying that the VCR would destroy their industry. Then the record companies were crying that cassette tape recorders would destroy their industry. Slightly different scenario though isn't it. a) You could of course copy peoples material using VHS and cassettes, but the quality would suffer. b) The copying would typically be to people you knew so not wide spread. Today, a single perfect digital copy of a CD or film can multiply across the world, without losing quality. It's infinitely quicker, and infinitely easier! And only getting quicker and easier still!

[Tricky]

And times are hard at the moment, people being made redundant all over the country, cost of living shooting up, wages not going up with it, people cant afford to be frittering away money on CD's, games, Blu-Rays or even legit downloads when they have a car and house to run, but they still want them so if they can get them for free through torrents or whatever then they will. That is not a mindset that is easy to change or indeed possible. Hell I know plenty of people who earn a lot of money who still refuse to pay for music, games & films if they can get them for free

[MinionZombie]

No prob, Danny, and I agree. I just wasn't sure where we were going and I wanted to explain my position that I don't "agree" with piracy, but there is definitely a difference between downloading a song or a movie and "hey, I'm going to come in your house and take this here TV" I think it's just human nature ultimately - everyone loves a bargain, and piracy is the ultimate bargain. It's easy to do, so many people do it, the harder it becomes, the less people will get into it ... but it doesn't necessarily mean sales will sky rocket again... And times are hard at the moment, people being made redundant all over the country, cost of living shooting up, wages not going up with it, people cant afford to be frittering away money on CD's, games, Blu-Rays or even legit downloads when they have a car and house to run, but they still want them so if they can get them for free through torrents or whatever then they will. That is not a mindset that is easy to change or indeed possible. Hell I know plenty of people who earn a lot of money who still refuse to pay for music, games & films if they can get them for free Indeed - times are hard - but I've found myself instead waiting for bargains and buying stuff legit. There have been some excellent deals and bargains on games/cds/dvds/blu-rays in recent months, but you just have to wait for them and window shop like a mallrat. However it pays off, but I definitely buy a lot less of those aforementioned things these days - no doubt about that whatsoever - I'd even say my budget for such things has easily halved since last year, but because I focus on cheap deals then I can get a bit more bang for my buck - but then again I do have to wait a lot longer for a deal to come along. I've also recently turned to trading in old videogames that I don't use anymore (I've never done that before, I just stock-piled) - and I've been able to take the money from that to buy up some things I've been after for a long old while, which is nice.

[Tricky]

I've also recently turned to trading in old videogames that I don't use anymore (I've never done that before, I just stock-piled) - and I've been able to take the money from that to buy up some things I've been after for a long old while, which is nice. I ought to do that really, I've got a huge stack of PS1 and PS2 games in the bottom of my wardrobe taking up space, I keep telling myself that I'll play them again because they're all classics but the reality is that I barely have time to play the new games I've got, never mind trying to complete FF7 again or Metal Gear Solid. Its my teenage self talking to my adult self I wont get much for them but I really should have a clear out!

[LouCipherr]

Let's consider the simple case of an author who has written a book. It's available in both printed and audio format. Now, consider these days how many people download that book in those formats illegally, instead of purchasing it. It's getting easier all the time! In many ways too, the industry benefits from people downloading material. I'll just leave this here:

[shootemindehead]

I know for example that I can have a CD in FLAC format on my media player within a few minutes, for free... It's actually easier than buying it, and then converting it, and certainly far far quicker! Are you telling me that's not affecting sales? I'd say that the amount of people who actually know what a FLAC is, would be quite small in the grand scheme of things Neil. You and I know what formats are available, but the vast majority of people surfing the web wouldn't even know what an avi or a torrent is. How is it that Apple can makes millions off of iTunes, when nearly everything they have on the music store can be downloaded for nothing? The reason is that the majority of people still buy, if it's marketed correctly to them. The majority of people also wouldn't know where to look for free music. I'll agree that perhaps the music industry has somewhat more of a case to put, than the film industry has. But even then, I'm not willing to accept that piracy is THAT crippling to them. However, I'd make the case that it's the state of the music industry at present that would affect sales to a greater degree. By and large, it's terrible. Mind numbing, here-today-gone-tomorrow manufactured nonsense that people are embarrassed to say they actually bought (or downloaded) within a few years of release. Although, I must admit that "mainstream" has always turned me off. It's that, that will hurt the industry more in the long run. Film, on the other hand, is a different kettle of fish. As people have said, attendances are going up and DVD/blu-ray sell through remains very high as well. I just don't see the writing on the wall that suited mouthpieces want us to see. As I said, the case against piracy (ie, that it's supposedly hurting sales) is WAAAAYYY overstated by vested interests. -- -------- Post added at 02:10 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:58 PM ---------- And times are hard at the moment, people being made redundant all over the country, cost of living shooting up, wages not going up with it, people cant afford to be frittering away money on CD's, games, Blu-Rays or even legit downloads when they have a car and house to run, but they still want them so if they can get them for free through torrents or whatever then they will. That is not a mindset that is easy to change or indeed possible. Hell I know plenty of people who earn a lot of money who still refuse to pay for music, games & films if they can get them for free I'm about to lose my job at the end of the month, so Mr Recession has hit me, square in the face. Will I suddenly go and download the web? No, I don't think so. In fact, I'm not even on any torrent sites. Will I continue to buy films and TV shows that I would like to keep and watch again (I'm a repeat watcher)? Yes, I will. But, I'll be as discerning as ever. Sure, the recession will hit people hard in the pocket, but the question remains the same. Would they have been buying the DVD in the first place. The logical answer in the vast majority of cases, is no. So, there would have been no "sale" to begin with...hence no loss to Warner Bros, Paramount, Universal etc...the poor things. Hollyweird has MUCH more to fear from the likes of Netflix, than it does from people torrenting on the interweb.

[MinionZombie]

Lou - I see your Gaiman, and raise you a Buxton...

[LouCipherr]

How is it that Apple can makes millions off of iTunes, when nearly everything they have on the music store can be downloaded for nothing? The reason is that the majority of people still buy, if it's marketed correctly to them. The majority of people also wouldn't know where to look for free music. Again, I have to agree 100%. The REAL issue with "piracy" in my extremely humble opinion is "availability at a reasonable price" - for example, for the longest time, I couldn't find the old John Belushi movie "Neighbors" on DVD. It was, however, run on cable recently and someone recorded it and has made it available as a HQ AVI file. Yes, I downloaded it and converted it to DVD so I have the movie in my collection - why not? It was apparent Sony wasn't interested in selling it to the public, so I found a way to get it myself (perhaps "necessity is the mother of invention" would be an appropriate correlation here and for piracy in general). Would I have downloaded that had the movie been available? No. There ZERO reason why this movie shouldn't be available to me for purchase at a reasonable price (that is a key part of this). Hell, do one of those "burn the disc on demand" archive deals if you feel you won't be able to sell enough copies to make it worthwhile to do the proper remastering, packaging, etc. That being said, Amazon made the DVD of Neighbors available for the first time ever last year. Remember, this is a movie from 1981 that didn't exactly do "stellar" business. So, Amazon makes it available through Sony's Archive DVD-R releases (ie: you want a movie? Sony will burn a copy of it for you, but it's not like they remastered it for DVD, so it's not a "great" quality copy either) - The problem is, it was $19.99 for the DVD. That's not a blu-ray, that's a non-remastered-VHS-master-recorded-directly-to-a-dvdr-disc-in-all-it's-crap-quality. Did I buy it yet? HELL NO. Why? Well, I don't see why I should be paying Sony $20 for a sub-par quality, standard def DVD-r of the movie. That's bullshit. I can buy high-def blu-ray recent releases and even older movies for HALF that price. Now, had Sony put that DVD up for, say, $9.99? $11.99 (this is a DVD-r disc, mind you, so I feel those are 'reasonable' prices for a burned dvd-r movie from the 'archives')? I would've jumped on it in a heartbeat. It's all about availability to the consumer at a reasonable price. If they would crowbar that logic into their thick skulls and every day thinking, i think all of these movie and music companies would be in a lot better shape than they are. Lou - I see your Gaiman, and raise you a Buxton... Dammit MZ, I'm at work today and my computer has no speakers - I will check it out later tonight!

[Sammich]

Slightly different scenario though isn't it. a) You could of course copy peoples material using VHS and cassettes, but the quality would suffer. b) The copying would typically be to people you knew so not wide spread. Today, a single perfect digital copy of a CD or film can multiply across the world, without losing quality. It's infinitely quicker, and infinitely easier! And only getting quicker and easier still! No it isn't slightly different. The quality of the duplicate never the issue back then, nor is it today. The movie and recording industry views as a threat ANY technology that allows for the POSSIBLE copying of their products and then goes on to lobby lawmakers to ban, regulate or heavily tax such technologies. Here are other examples. Some legislation passed, others did not. The relevant fact is once again, governments are becoming the strong arm for private corporate interests that buy off legislators to do their bidding. Public tax payer resources are being diverted to support a private industry, while veterans sit homeless on the streets and are being denied mental and medical services. Recording Industry Lobbying Group Pushes Congress To Tax Radio Stations More "MusicFIRST, a recording industry lobbying group that already has some controversy surrounding it due to contributions from groups not allowed to be involved in lobbying, is continuing to push forward with its campaign to claim that radio is a kind of piracy and demanding legislation that forces radio stations to pay extra to play music." When 70% Of The Cost Of Blank CDs Goes Straight To The Recording Industry "It's well known that Canada has a "private copying levy" on blank CDs. This tax was pushed by the entertainment industry as compensation for the fact that many people will use blank CDs to record music. It's somewhat up in the air whether or not this means that private copying is completely legal in Canada (the recording industry still insists no, many people insist yes)." Music Tax Details From Source: "Pay Us Not To Sue You" "We learned yesterday that Warner Music, the third largest music label, is gunning for a $5/month music tax on U.S. residents. So the plan essentially comes down to telling ISPs that they can avoid any copyright infringement liability if they pay the fee on behalf of customers. And while the government wouldn’t be directly involved, the willingness of law enforcement agencies and the judicial system to enforce civil and criminal copyright infringement laws is the stick by which Griffin will convince ISPs to jump on board. It’s government endorsed extortion, nothing more and nothing less." Forget the iPod Tax - Canadian Copyright Collective Demanding Memory Card Tax "During the most recent election campaign, there was no shortage of debate over the so-called iPod Tax, a proposed levy on iPods and similar devices to compensate for copies of sound recordings. While the prospect of an iPod tax in Canada died with the Conservative majority, the existing private copying system remains unchanged. Canadians currently pay levies on blank CDs (and cassettes) and now the Canadian Private Copying Collective, which collects the private copying revenues, would like to establish a new levy on blank memory cards used in a wide range of devices such as smartphones and digital cameras. As Howard Knopf notes, the CPCC has just filed for the following levy: 50¢ for each electronic memory card with 1 gigabyte of memory or less, $1.00 for each electronic memory card with more than one gigabyte of memory but less than 8 gigabytes of memory, and $3.00 for each electronic memory card with 8 gigabytes of memory or more" The DAT Tax "In 1992 congress passed legislation ( The Audio Home Recording Act of 1992 ) that amends the Copyright Act of 1976 to do the following: imposes a "royalty" tax on DAT recorders (section 1004(a)) imposes a "royalty" tax on blank DAT media (section 1004(b)) establishes a complicated procedure for distributing the collected "royalty" tax to artists, performers, writers, and publishers (sections 1006 and 1007) requires DAT recorders to use the Serial Copy Management System (SCMS), which prevents digital dubbing beyond one generation (section 1002(a)) prohibits manufacture and sale of devices whose primary purpose is to circumvent SCMS (section 1002(c))" Dutch plans for iPod tax could kill MP3 industry "A Netherlands proposed tax on MP3 players could devastate sales of hard disk players, and set up international waves over copyright legislation. The tax is being proposed by the Stichting Thuiskopie foundation, and is set to become law in the Netherlands in a few short months unless the European Commission finds a reason to intervene. It is unlikely that will happen, as it has failed to come up with a policy for levy taxation so far. The idea of all levy based legislation is that some form of copyright collections agency collects tax by imposing a surcharge at the point of sale for any storage devices that could possibly be used to store pirated works. This certainly extends to the iPod which has up to 60 GB of storage, and which can store MP3 files." Everyone is already familiar with the recently failed SOPA and PIPA, but now another even more far reaching one is in the works: CISPA. If you are already being forced to pay a government mandated tax that goes to the recording industry as compensation for POSSIBLE piracy, how many more levels of this type of legislation will be enough for them? In some countries people are already paying TWICE for copyright, once for the media in the form of a compensatory "piracy" tax and then again when the actual movie/music is bought. If this continues, the MPAA/RIAA will probably get some government to pass a law stating that their claim of ownership extends to any and all media (past, present and future) the moment that a movie/music is placed upon it.

[LouCipherr]

Gotta love how these shitheads tax people on things like blank CD's, DAT tapes, and it looks like soon enough, flash memory cards - all because they assume they will be used for piracy - when in fact, most of them are not. I don't know about you guys, but I've never personally traded music on flash card or a DAT. All these examples Sammich gave us are prime examples of these industries not having a blessed clue as to what's going on around them. They still want to operate like it's 1975. So, how's that workin' out for you guys?

[EvilNed]

Hear, Hear! Lou and Sammich, voices of reason. What really rustles my jimmies is that people make assumptions regarding piracy. You can read it all through this thread. People assume that the big media companies are losing millions of dollars. People assume this. I don't know about you, but if somebody wanted to censor something because they assumed it was bad for you, then I'd tell them to Also, I'll leave you with this, for all you people who think this is somehow "OK".

[Sammich]

As Gerald Celente has said, the government at all levels, especially the court system in the U.S. has become so saturated with corporate influence (i.e. BRIBES) that it has gone from "justice" to "just us" as in laws only apply to "just us" peasants. The MPAA/RIAA are only one part of the multi-national corporate takeovers of America and other countries. The latest Supreme Court ruling that corporations are people shows how high this infiltration has become. I have absolutely nothing against capitalism and am all for it. Under capitalism one rises or falls based upon one's own successes or failures. Profits are kept private and the same private entity is responsible to deal with losses. Under the emerging system of corporatism (fascism) one rises or falls based upon how much influence can be gained in government with the objective of creating a state enforced monopoly. In this system profits are kept private and losses are recouped by forced payment from tax payers. TARP is a huge unprecedented example of this. Austerity measures are another. It is fast becoming time for nations to begin declaring odious debt for all of the crooked dealings that have been taking place for decades.