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It works for TV because the TV networks actually paid for the rights to do so. VidAngel just decided, hey let's rip some Blu-rays and stream them. After all, we paid for the Blu-rays, so it's all legal, right? It doesn't work that way. A more relevant example of how this sort of thing can/does work without breaking the law is ClearPlay.
The filtering itself is specifically permitted because of a 2005 law (nicknamed the Family Movie Act). That prevents the content creators from having any legal recourse against individuals or companies who use or provide content filtering services, BUT, the service needs to be run in such a way that it would be legal with or without the filtering. (i.e. they have to buy the streaming rights if they want to stream). Either VidAngel has complete and utter idiots for lawyers, or they knew all along they were breaking the law but wanted to drum up lots of support and get all activist-ey about it, rake in some cash, and "stick it to the man." That's a really, really dumb business model.

Perhaps current laws should be changed, but if so, work toward that goal first rather than flagrantly violating the law, getting smacked down, and then hoping the public will bail you out and push lawmakers to ram through changes if you get them all outraged about those evil media companies" taking away their right to filter..."

Apparently Clearplay already does this.

From an AC elsewhere on the thread, apparently a company called Clearplay has done this. They sell a Bluray player and a plugin for chrome that works with Amazon streaming service.

They don't seem to have the granular controls that this other service was touting, but they have the tech in place such that they could enhance their service.

So maybe this is like the early fights with Napster et. al. The early movers won't make it, but the concept will eventually be implemented because the demand is there.

I live in Utah (raised in Hawaii) and have been LDS my entire life. I never used VidAngel because I thought this lawsuit was coming. I see a better legal argument for ClearPlay; they send you a patch file to apply to their proprietary player. You need the physical disc to watch the edited version. This has allowed ClearPlay to exist since the 1990s.

Their legal argument is better than I expected it to be. However, there are two big problems with their argument:

As another commenter pointed out, they claim to sell the video for $20, then immediately buy it back for $19, they also stream it the customer (bandwidth costs) and edit it (server farm / cpu costs). It's quite obvious they're charging $1 to stream it to you, the "sell it for $20 and buy it back for $19" is a gimmick, it's bullshit. Nobody is buying movies from them, they're paying $1 to stream it.

It is a way to try skirt copyright / broadcast rights on a technicality. Customers do think of it as $1 to stream the movie, and VidAngel highlights this net cost to customers. I have not searched, but I doubt there's a way for customers to keep the filtered (or even unfiltered) movie (eg. buy the moie for $20 w/o sellingit back). This inability to refuse to sell it back may be legally significant.

That's a lot of outrage over ... I'm not exactly sure why you're outraged.

Let's look at the only point you made:

it is not worth their time to put out "edited" versions of popular movies for you.

That's probably true. So what's wrong with allowing a third-party to do something like offering a special player and filters like ClearPlay? Do you also find that objectionable?

If so, I'm curious as to why. It doesn't affect you in any way, so I'm guessing you have some moral reason that you feel you must impose on others.

When you sell a copy, you don't have rights to control that copy. Copyright gives rights holders specific limited rights over broadcasting, performance, and making copies, etc.

It doesn't give the rights holder carte blanche to tell people what they can and can't do. If I buy a book, the rights holder can't tell me where I read it. They can't tell me I'm not allowed to use a highlighter on it. They can't tell me I'm not allowed to burn it.

Yes, you can do whatever you want to your copy except modify and sell it. "And" is the important word you seem to have missed. It clearly says in copyright law you cannot modify your copy and sell it without the copyright holder's approval. See USC 117(b). As for what modification, a highlighter is not modification.

I'm not talking about OEMs. I'm talking about mom and pops building whitebox PCs. They don't have an OEM agreement, and they don't need one. They buy stuff at wholesale, assemble it, and resell it. Its not illegal.

What part of modification and redistribution isn't clear. I don't see anywhere in your example where modification occurred. And please read about what "modification" is because it seems to me you don't understand it.

Nope. I can buy a CD, and remix it to my hearts content. the right's holder can't say squat.

Learn what the term derivative work means.

Furthermore, even the redistribution isn't under their sole control. Its under our joint control. I can't release copies without their permission, but they can't distribute it either without mine.

Now, personally, I think I should be allowed to sell the remix album provided each unit of the remix album is bundled with an original CD contain the songs remixed. As the rights holder of the original song cannot possibly claim they were damaged if they are compensated in full for the original for EVERY SINGLE copy of the derivatave work.

So basically you're saying you don't respect copyright law as long you infringe in small amounts. Isn't that saying how can a store be upset if you steal a $1 candy bar from them. How can you possibly be damaging to them? Other than it wasn't your candy bar, there's nothing wrong with it.

But that's beside the point, making an "insallation" copy is allowed by copyright. You don't need a license for that. And calling the nominal "changes" required to get OSX to work on a vanilla PC an infringing derivative work is an abuse of copyright law.

Hello? There is a difference by modifying a computer to run Tetris and modifying Tetris to run on a computer. If you can't distinguish between the two, then there isn't any hope for you as you clearly don't respect someone else's work.

Glad you brought up cleanflicks, because that's actually an interesting case on a number of points.

The main area it failed in my opinion was by making a copy of the DVD, that was edited. Unlike the installation copy of software which is protected by copyright provisions that allow you to make a copy for installation purposes, the edited DVD was not protected in the same way.

Again there is difference between modifying a computer to run software and modifying software to run on a computer. If you modified Tetris like replacing the system libraries, you've crossed a line when you sold it.

The interesting solution to cleanflicks is "clearplay" where an unedited original is provided, and then a "template" is applied by a custom DVD player that mutes and skips past the "unwanted" content.

http://www.clearplay.com/

And the clearpay solution fits the Apple situation quite appropriately. The original unedited OSX disc is provided, and the installation copy (which doesnt need permission from the rights holders) is modif

You mean besides losing the right to control works which the law says is theirs?

When you sell a copy, you don't have rights to control that copy. Copyright gives rights holders specific limited rights over broadcasting, performance, and making copies, etc.

It doesn't give the rights holder carte blanche to tell people what they can and can't do. If I buy a book, the rights holder can't tell me where I read it. They can't tell me I'm not allowed to use a highlighter on it. They can't tell me I'm not allowed to burn it.

You do know that OEMs are covered in their modifications because their OEM licenses explicitly detail what they can do right?

I'm not talking about OEMs. I'm talking about mom and pops building whitebox PCs. They don't have an OEM agreement, and they don't need one. They buy stuff at wholesale, assemble it, and resell it. Its not illegal.

Besides the fact derivative works are under the sole control of copyright holder?

Nope. I can buy a CD, and remix it to my hearts content. the right's holder can't say squat.

Furthermore, even the redistribution isn't under their sole control. Its under our joint control. I can't release copies without their permission, but they can't distribute it either without mine.

Now, personally, I think I should be allowed to sell the remix album provided each unit of the remix album is bundled with an original CD contain the songs remixed. As the rights holder of the original song cannot possibly claim they were damaged if they are compensated in full for the original for EVERY SINGLE copy of the derivatave work. Franky, I'd like to see that one end up in court... because its against the letter of the law, but not against the spirit of the law, and I'm very curious what damages the rights holder would argue they suffered.

But that's beside the point, making an "insallation" copy is allowed by copyright. You don't need a license for that. And calling the nominal "changes" required to get OSX to work on a vanilla PC an infringing derivative work is an abuse of copyright law.

Next up Wired magazine will sue the post office for folding a magazine in half to get it into my mailbox. The original magazine is flat they'll argue... by folding it in half to make it fit, you made it into an unauthorized derivative work and then you distributed it.... and we at wired magazine have been materially harmed to the order of millions of dollars.

So if you decided to sell your car, it's okay for your friends to take your car without your permission and sell it, right?

If I decided to sell the car. They bought the car. Then yes, at that point, they can do whatever they want with it.

See CleanFlicks.

Glad you brought up cleanflicks, because that's actually an interesting case on a number of points.

The main area it failed in my opinion was by making a copy of the DVD, that was edited. Unlike the installation copy of software which is protected by copyright provisions that allow you to make a copy for installation purposes, the edited DVD was not protected in the same way.

The interesting solution to cleanflicks is "clearplay" where an unedited original is provided, and then a "template" is applied by a custom DVD player that mutes and skips past the "unwanted" content.

http://www.clearplay.com/

And the clearpay solution fits the Apple situation quite appropriately. The original unedited OSX disc is provided, and the installation copy (which doesnt need permission from the rights holders) is modified to work the way the end user wants it to.

What if Pystar had simply sold an empty PC, a copy of OSX, and a customized installer that did the system prep, installed the unedited OSX, and then updated it with the requisite patches all on the customers premises?

Would that be entirely fine then? I think it would have been.

So, from there, to shutting them down, because they did it at their office instead of at your house? That seems like an abuse of the law, not a just application of it.

I agree with you on the FSF in terms of them being a good organization. I contribute for over a decade to the EFF and am friendly with Kathy Hargraves who used to be an officer with FSF. I wasn't being too critical of their editorial, I was indicating that on matters of fact regarding how Apple works they are simply incorrect, oversimplifying too much. Statements like, "iPhone completely blocks free software. Developers must pay a tax to Apple, who becomes the sole authority over what can and can't be on everyone's phones" is simply not true.

The problem is when you combine aggressive rhetoric with factual error that really creates a severe credibility gap.

In terms of legislation in the US and its pro corporate anti-consumer bent. I'm pretty appalled. Copyright extensions is my #1 hobby horse but the telecommunications act of 1996 was a shattering moment in terms of faith in the government. I'm no fan of the vagary of the DMCA. So again nothing to argue there.

As far as things getting worse. During my lifetime, (born '69) thing in terms of censorship have collapsed. Services like http://www.clearplay.com/ , are very useful since they are setting precedents about the right to edit your own version of content, i.e. that everyone who owns a copy of a work has the "right to patch the copyrighted content" of that work and a limited right to redistribute. So I disagree with the general theory that things are getting worse, I think they are getting better. But yes there is movement in both directions. For example in the 1980s most employees that had a desktop system had dumb terminals, and far less freedom on their desktop than they do on a Windows machine without admin rights. The mass casette tape usage changed music freedom. The VCR and movie rental has done wonders for free video. Large hard drives have created a new world of movie freedoms.

As far as Apple and the capability for abuse. I agree, PCs used to be very low security. Security is going way up. In all fairness though the demand for security is being caused by criminals not corporations. Spammers, virus people, credit card thieves are the ones creating this problem. Then you add on corporate IT desks that want to lock down employee systems, and media producers that want to avoid rampant piracy. But ultimately it was spam that killed open protocols like SMTP relay and Usenet not corporate greed. And I also remember reading about Stallman's The right to read where he was talking about the dangers in 1997, and I think he's a great guy for pointing out the potential for abuse.

I see the technology companies as, on balance, doing their best to navigate a very tricky situation of individual freedom, protecting copyright and creating manageability. And I know in taking that rather optimistic perspective I'm being a bit pollyanish relative to the FSF. And there are two main reasons I don't make much heavier use of Kindle:

a) The price is way too high for most books
b) I see books as a long term buy and DRM schemes rarely last a decade.

Nope, they are still at it! I think they have a law which specifically protects this kind of service.

The ones that closed were actually making copies of the discs and editing them, whereas clearplay does it on-player.

ClearPlay sells players that filters out violence/sex/whatever parents don't want their kids to see and GoodMoviesOnline (and others) take copies of movies and returns back a copy that's PG.

The ClearPlay DVD player automagically censors movies for families. There is some kind of subscription service that tells your player what scenes to skip. Hidely-ho, neighborino! ClearPlay got their asses sued by Hollywood, but they seem to have prevailed, and they are still in business.

http://www.clearplay.com/Press.aspx?pid=19

At the core, the ClearPlay case seems an awful lot like blocking web ads. Media is provided to you, and you decline to view part of it by using an automated third-party service.

(I wonder if ReplayTV would have won their auto-ad-skipping lawsuit if they hadn't settled?)

In your comment about the "cut list" I think you must be referring to the 'cleaned DVDs' topic of a few days ago, and I think you're misunderstanding that ruling.

What was prohibited in that case was the reproduction that Clean Flicks was doing in order to produce the edited versions. They were taking a movie, editing it, and then selling the edited version -- yes, they were selling each edited version packaged along with an unedited version, but they were reproducing the film just the same. That's where they ran into copyright problems.

Other companies who took a different tactic towards the problem, and avoided the reproduction step (by delivering to the customer an EDL that would cause the player to fast forward through various 'offensive' parts) were allowed under the ruling.

There's a pretty good analysis of the verdict on FindLaw, which isn't too long and is worth reading. In particular: "The defendants also argued that they were protected by the so-called "first sale" doctrine ... [they] failed to win on this affirmative defense, because they were not just dealing in the hard copy, but rather making copies of it." (Emphasis mine.)

If you're willing to spend some more time reading things actually written by folks who have law degrees, I recommend this substantial article from the Georgetown Law Journal, which was written in 2004 and examines the viability under copyright law of several video-censoring technologies, including old-school razorblade tape splicing, CleanFlicks-type digital editing, and EDL-based 'skip over' systems.

Although CleanFlicks no longer offers the edited copies of DVDs, another company, ClearPlay, still offers an EDL-based product (which IMO is a much more elegant solution to the problem anyway, since it lets you pick what types of smut you personally dislike), as can be seen on their website.

This type of on-the-fly editing is legal, and was clarifed as such by President Bush's passing of the "Family Movie Act of 2005," which specifically allows you to make changes to an authorized copy of a motion picture, as long as you don't create a fixed copy of the edited version. The best part of the law? It's not limited purely to obscenity edits; according to one Forbes article, it could be used just as easily to protect a fan's removal of the more obnoxious parts of Star Wars Episode 1 as it could the removal of Kate Winslet's nudity from Titanic. (Sadly, apparently the technology can't replace Jar Jar Binks with a naked Kate Winslet. Yet.)

So the next time you think that G.W. hasn't done anything for you, it seems that he may have let some good slip through after all.

I agree with the ruling in principle, and I understand the rationale behind it. My question to Monday morning /. legal representatives is, does this ruling pertain to the Clearplay player as well? AFAICT, the distinction between the two is that Cleanflix physically strips the "naughty bits" from the DVD, whereas the Clearplay player simply uses a downloaded filter to automagically fast forward through unwanted scenes.

Actually, an even better possiblity would be the folowing example. Consider a hypothetical standalone DVD utilizing the Clearplay concept. Imagine having a DVD that included all those nasty scenes, but only played them when specifically called for (akin to a director's cut DVD with the "watch with deleted scenes" option). Even better, what if the data on the DVD was left intact, but a third party menu was bootstrapped onto it? You could then choose to watch the censored movie (as programmed by a third party menu system) or simply escape to the original content of the DVD.

I'm no lawyer, but the line here seems to be drawn based upon the location of the original, unedited source material. If you have the physical DVD, the Clearplay system is legit because it falls under the same concepts that govern fast forwarding a VHS. Basically anything you do in private (without redistribution) is ok as far as the law is concerned. Cleanflix is no good because it redistributes an unauthorized, edited version of a copyrighted work. I wonder, would the ruling have been the same if the Cleanflix DVDs also included the original, unedited material?

Exactly, fair-use is how http://www.clearplay.com/ gets around it. You are just paying someone else to tell you how to "slice it up". (it's done by downloading the appriate filter to the special clearplay dvd player, which then skips the filtered parts). The orginal dvd is left intact.

A good alternative for those who don't want their young children to see "bad" stuff is clearplay. We've had it for a while, here is how it works.
1. Buy a normal DVD with all the "naughty bits"
2. Get the filter from the clearplay website for that DVD
3. Transfer the filter via USB or CD to the clearplay DVD player
4. Watch your DVD - the filter tells the DVD player where to skip the naughty bits - no editing, just timecodes to be skipped.

I thought it'd be jumpy but it really isn't. Most of the time I can't even figure out what has been skipped. Plus you can set the level of each "naughty bit" - violence, profanity and sex - from low to high. Pretty neat stuff I'd say.

At any rate, the way to go about this would be to design a special DVD player which wouldn't play normal movies unless they also had some kind of storage media inserted into them containing cryptographically signed data on which parts to skip over. That way, you could sell the original movie filled with nudity and kids wouldn't be able to play it unless they also inserted the media that instructed the player how to skip over that nudity.

Does this affect the ClearPlay DVD player, or just companies that manufacture DVDs? It seems to me that the player should be in the clear since the alterations happen at the persons home on their own copy and since they must select for them to happen. So there is no distribution of the derivitive work.

why not have a player that can be scripted, so that when a DVD is played the script will skip past the "naughty bits".

Like this?
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/04/09/12 18216
http://www.clearplay.com/

The idea of a DVD player that filters on the fly is explicitly allowed under the Familiy Movie Act of 2004. The law was enacted to support ClearPlay, which implements such a system. They trick is to make sure that no fixed copy is made of the redacted version (to comply with US copyright law), and that the filtering information is distributed independently of the movie (to satisfy the DVD Copy Control Association).

Oh, yeah, http://www.clearplay.com/

If that is what you want, then by all means, buy a ClearPlay DVD Player and play your standard DVDs in it. It will automatically skip "the dirty bits" and there's no nefarious copyright infringment going on.

This piece of legislation has a particularly interesting act in it called the Family Movie Act. The legislation allows companies to market filters and equipment to skip over parts of a DVD. The idea is that people who don't care to see the more raunchy side of Hollywood can skip the profanity and sex. (Yes, I don't want the profanity and sex in the movies that I watch. I've heard all of the jokes, so let the rants begin.)

This part of the legislation was promoted by ClearPlay, a company that distributes filters and DVD players that can utilize the filters.

Not only do I like the ability to skip the raunchy stuff, but I like the fact that this promotes the idea that people can have control over the content that they pay to license. Hollywood considers the filters to be an "edit" of the original movie, but since the original DVD isn't altered, I don't see any difference between this and manually skipping content. It empowers the user and I like that. The implications are broader than just "Family Friendly Movies."

Oh, grow up. I'm not talking drugs or guns; these are fucking movies on DVD, which is a format crippled enough as it is.

We've had movie ratings for years, why do we need stuff like ClearPlay (which, by the way, they're integrating directly into players)? You mean to tell me that you want your kid to watch R+ rated movies... but without the "naughty"? Please.

However, under the proposed law, skipping any commercials or promotional announcements would be prohibited.

This is wrong. The proposed law does not prohibit skipping commercials.

What this portion of the law is about are products like ClearPlay, which is a DVD player that "sanitizes" movies by eliminating the naughty bits. Some object to this as censorship, others endorse it as personal control of content.

Movie producers have claimed that ClearPlay violates their copyrights on movies. This new bill incorporates an earlier proposal that would basically make it clear that the system does not violate copyright. It explicitly says that these kinds of filtering systems are legal.

However, the exemption from copyright does not apply to systems that eliminate commercials. That is the clause which is causing so much controversy. It leaves open the possibility that filtering commercials might be said to violate the copyright held by the original producers of the content.

Here is where the big mistake is made in interpreting this. The new law does not change the legal status of filtering commercials. It might be legal, or it might not. Generally, it is untested. What the new law FAILS to do is to explicitly state that it is legal.

I hope that readers are intelligent enough to distinguish between a law that criminalizes skipping commercials, versus a law that fails to legalize them. The truth is that this law does not change the legality of the action.

Unfortunately the Wired author either was not intelligent enough to make this distinction, or chose to present an inflammatory and false interpretation in order to increase his readership and make more money for his employer.

Make waaaaaaaaaaaaay for the Karma Whore!

1) The list of movies from Clearplay.
Nope, "Shaving Ryan's Privates" didn't make the cut (but, Band of Brothers did). You can sort them by MPAA rating, which yields this: no NC-17, no G ratings. Some (but not that many) R ratings. Basically, it looks like it's about toning down PG and PG-13 movies for kids. For god's sake, maxwell - won't you think of the kids?!?

2) From the lawyers mouth - hear the lawyers discuss the case in front of a law class at Berkley. Every time they almost get interesting their lawyerly nature comes through, but hey - THEY REALLY BE LAWYERS!! (no joke, I seriously considered preparing an edit script). btw: favorite quote - "In the entertainment industry, it's not about the money. It's about ALL the money."

3) Bowdlerizing for Columbine?: Why American directors have no moral rights to their movies. (that's the subtitle, not a troll)

4) There Shouldn't Be a Remote Control on How We Watch DVDs, a Commentary by Ernest Miller of the Yale Law School.

I was just getting a little tired of seeing section 106 pasted again and again again.. sometimes in text, sometimes marked up in bold, sometimes in italic...

Now, maxwell, that mp3 file is 1:29:10 long - no more posting till you've heard the whole thing, mmkay?

Take a look at what it does to Freaky Friday. It adds extreme violence. Maybe Clearplay is worth downloading after all.

Except the creators of the movie, who find their work has been bowdlerised without their permission.

This player only works on a specific list of movies which have been pre censored by Clearpay (the company RCA licensed the censorship technology from) and every single movie on the list is rated G,PG,PG-13 or R (no NC-17 or unrated pictures). So as far as I'm concerned the "artists" already gave up their moral rights when they censored their films for the MPAA ratings board.

To me this seems like a very good idea because it allows people to control what they (and their children) see without forcing their moral values on anyone else.

Since the movie is controlled by a database telling the player when to skip forward or mute, there's no ability for you to change which things the player blocks out. Maybe in the future you'll be able to tell it things like 'show me everything except nudity' or something, but for now no.

In order to check if the movie is available or not, you simply have to visit the company's website that produces the database. ClearPlay

Our censoring overlords think there's sex and nudity in Apollo 13! I must have missed that....

It's not different because you can turn this feature on or off depending on whether or not you want to watch those scenes. Personally, I think it's a good alternative and having a choice is good. The Matrix Reloaded is a good example of a movie where the gratuitous sex scene completely detracted from the flow and purpose of the movie. That scene could easily be deleted with no value lost.

I was curious about this same thing, so I looked up the model on the RCA web site. Apparently the player has some non-volatile memory, which is preloaded with the ClearPlay definitions for about 100 popular DVDs.

If you want to play a disk that is not on the list, you can download the definitions file (assuming they have created it) for it from ClearPlay, copy it onto a CD-R or CD-RW, and load it into the memory of the player.

You can read the exact procedures, and see what options the player offers you, starting on page 24 of the Instruction Book for RCA DRC232N (Warning: it's a .PDF, 1733 KB).

I was curious about this same thing, so I looked up the model on the RCA web site. Apparently the player has some non-volatile memory, which is preloaded with the ClearPlay definitions for about 100 popular DVDs.

If you want to play a disk that is not on the list, you can download the definitions file (assuming they have created it) for it from ClearPlay, copy it onto a CD-R or CD-RW, and load it into the memory of the player.

You can read the exact procedures, and see what options the player offers you, starting on page 24 of the Instruction Book for RCA DRC232N (Warning: it's a .PDF, 1733 KB).

Go to the clearplay website and check out their list of censored films.
I was shocked to see the following"About a Boy"
Moderate "Blood and Gore"???
Did I sleep through the "killer-death-zombie" scene or something?

What I'm saying is it gives people a false sense of control. They are relying on ClearPlay to tell them what the bad parts are, instead of deciding, for themselves, exactly what parts are bad. I have no problem with someone wanting to use this. Just be realistic on who is actually in control.

And what they cut out is apparently pretty extensive. Blood & gore in Harry Potter?

ClearPlay is the service that scans the movies and determines what will be cut out. The player (I think) phones home and checks on each DVD.

Their current list of movies and what they cuy out is here.

For instance:
Alien - 1979
Blood & Gore
Before:Extreme
After: Minor
Profanity
Before: Moderate
After: None
Sex & Nudity
Before:Moderate
After: None
Violence
Before Heavy
After: Moderate

The blood and gore in Alien was a crucial part of the horror movie. Take those out, and it's much less of a horror experience.

But you have little or no control over this either. You're relying on the good and kind folks at ClearPlay to decide what parts you should not see and hear.
Does their worldview = yours?

The censoring only works on movies that it already knows about. A human has setup what is to be censored. It uses the Clearplay software.

No, it would be like taking crayolas to a reproduction of a Rembrandt. The original art isn't defiled in any way.

I think you're refering to ClearPlay This is exactly how it works, though they also control the audio as well and can mute the player at appropriate times too.

Ya know, the technology exists for putting 'tags' in the dvd itself so with extra firmware the dvd player could be configured to show a film that is rated R as PG or even G by skipping the tagged portions of the film. (Hey maybe I should patent that Idea! You are all my witnesses, I though of it first!).

Judging by their past experiences. Perhaps it would be in Wal-Mart's interest to strike up a deal with Clearplay or any of the other companies who get to decided what we should and should not see.

Mike

Some may remember the Slashdot story about CleanFlicks getting sued by the the Director's Guild of America. It turns out that they are suing 15 other companies in addition to CleanFlicks, including MovieMask, ClearPlay, and Family Shield Technologies, which all offer real-time editing of DVD content during playback.

What happens when Open Source projects start offering this kind of functionality? Will the lead maintainers or distributors of these projects be sued also? If commercial entities are getting sued for offering certain (seemingly benign) features in their systems, will that discourage Open Source developers from contributing to projects for fear of legal retaliation? Some companies may have the legal firepower to defend themselves, but some kid in college certainly won't have the resources to protect himself from a malicious lawsuit along these lines.

and simply purchase ClearPlay. Then they can control how the "editing" occurs. They could then charge the Movie Studios an "editing" fee for creating a cleaner movie. Everybody wins. But chances are that this won't happen.

It's unfortunate, since my guess is that there is a pretty big market for a DVD player like this.

Like this . As I understand it is some kind of service that does exactly that. Not sure, I'm not into censorship at all... I just googled a bit.

Before anyone objects to your assertion that Clean Flicks is engaged in "fair use", they should check out how Clean Flicks runs its operation: About Edited Movies. I agree with you, it's fair use.

If Clean Flicks' editing procedure isn't fair use, then a TIVO's ad-skipping feature is also not fair use. The broadcasters have released their video stream, and any automated editing of that video stream by the TIVO is not too dissimilar to what Clean Flicks is doing: Clean Flicks is simply inserting another mechanical method in place of what the TIVO does in one's home.

It is also worth checking out this Boston Globe article, which provides background on a number of Clean Flicks' competitors---some of which work solely through the distribution of edit lists that you use on your PC or through a controller to a standard DVD player: ClearPlay and Family Shield Technologies.

To reiterate, their current business model is fair use.

Yes yes yes, I agree. But I don't think the 'artistic rights' is the strongest argument.

The strongest argument, IMO, is that by redistributing the edited materials, you're redistributing the copyrighted works of another. You can't remove some scenes and still distribute it as the original movie with the original movie name. And, you obviously can't use it because you don't have rights to the remaining footage.

However, once the movie is in the hands of the end user, then fair use comes into play. I can do whatever I want with what I've bought so long as I'm not redistributing (to anyone off the street) and definetly not making a buck off of it.

Any edits by the end user is clearly 'fair use'. The companies that are doing DVD overlays (MovieShield and ClearPlay) no question have a green light.

Adam