(Almost) Free Movies On-Line... Sorta

Snaller writes "See the latest movies on the net? Its possible - apparently the law in Taiwan says that for a movie to be protected by copyright law one has to apply for such protection within a month after the opening in the theaters. This rarely happens and as a consequence movie88 has opened a virtual movieplex: See any of their films for 1 dollar. The movie is streamed in a format that doesn't allow you to save it on the harddrive, but for that 1 dollar you can view it anytime and as much as you like for 3 days. The selection includes movies like "Shrek", "Legally Blonde","American Pie 2","Gone with the wind", James Bond and Batman." Yeah this'll last. Right. But it really demonstrates what TV will be like in the future when you have access to thousands of movies. And the buck a film rate strikes me as awesome. I'd watch a lot more movies if they were only a buck.

Comments

Re:US Law vs. Taiwanese Law

[tlk nnr]

I wonder how much sway MPAA has in Taiwan. Certainly in the US this little "problem" would be fixed quickly...

Better mark Taiwan up on the Axis of Evil list too..

That's due to being too friendly with China:
According to the Bern convention, you don't need to register for copyright protection.
But Taiwan was thrown out of the UN and most international bodies, in order to please China.
And thus Taiwan couldn't take part in the negotiations, didn't modify it's national laws.
Nice sideeffect.