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EFF Supporting Home DVD Editing
cheesedog writes "The Electronic Frontier Foundation has filed a brief in federal court in support of companies that offer software to edit violence or sex from a user's DVD. The full story can be found in this article from the Salt Lake Tribune."
As long as I can still view all the sex and violence I want, then I'm fine with it. Personal censorship is a right.
, so what's the problem?
"Consumers are being empowered to use technology to customize the way they view something in the privacy of their own home, and this makes Hollywood nervous," said Jason Schultz, the EFF attorney
I don't see why empowering the customer in this way would be bad for Hollywood. The customer wins, but I don't see the flipside loss.
Is it that Hollywood would want to sell their own software to do this? Is it lost opportunity cost?
Esteem isn't a zero sum game
Because it lets people self-censor, rather than a giant company doing it for all of us. This lets people who don't mind (or even enjoy) violence and sex to see more of it, and those who do mind can watch the same stuff, sans sex and violence. Anything to increase the granularity of censorship is great in my book.
The EFF is fighting for a way for us not to be forcefed the crap that the movie studios are forcing on us. We win the rights to edit out the sex and violence, and we also win the right to actually control the media we purchase.
I do wish the EFF had more (some) power sometimes though...
--D
To the contrary, this is very important.
Personally, I have no problem checking out Kate Winslett naked in "Titantic" - it was probably the only good part of the movie for me.
But if somebody else wants to buy the movie and edit it to remove those parts, that should be their right as owners of their own property.
This case goes to the issue of what do you own. Do you own the DVD and the movie contents inside, to modify as you please? If that is the case, if you purchase a full version of the movie, the artist/producer/copyright holders all get their money, are you not allowed to then take it to some other third party to edit out scenes you don't like? Or if you are a third party dealer, can you buy the movie, edit it, and sell the edited versions with the same profit going back to the original copyright holders (for example, you include the original DVD, and for an extra $5 - $10 dollars you can get the PG version as a separate disk that says "Edited by John's Prude Company".
What if you want to make dance remixes of a song? Can you buy the CD, take it into a professional DJ, and have him give you a CD with the music you bought with the various other remixed music inside?
So while the issue is rather silly - (Oh, No! A Utah Mormon might see a breast or hear the F-Word! Runnnn!), the central idea of ownership is far from it.
Of course, (as Dennis Miller was oft to say), I could be wrong.
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
This makes sense to me. This is not forced censorship in anyway. This is self censorship for those who wish to have it. While I would never use this product I can see where families wanting to not have to explain sex and violence because the kid is in shock, but rather when it seems the time is right. Let kids stay kids, and quit always thinking they need to be exposed to things to "learn". A good parent will teach a child a base for everything they need to learn. Be honest with your kids, but you be the parent, not the MPAA.
Ignore the "p2p is theft" trolls, they're just uninformed
One thing I CAN imagine is The Matrix: Reloaded without that gratuitous sex/orgy scene in the middle. What was the point? What did it show that was important to the plot? Is Keanu's butt-crack really that important to his role as The One?
how is it censorship if *I* as a user edit outs parts that *I* don't want to see. In truth I think there is to much sex and violence on TV and the movies. If I read a book and there is a bit I don't want to read I can skip to the next section. editing what I want to see is not Censorship, its user choice.
Its only censorship if someone else tells me I can't watch the sex scene. if i don't want to watch it that my afair.
Erlang Developer and podcaster
Perhaps this is because they'd rather force feed our brains with crap some of us don't like viewing with small children in the room, or even just because some of us (??) find it objectional
Drastically changed and sold in mass... THAT would be illegal. It's no different if I bought a DVD and wanted some of the violence or sex "skipped" by a third party. This is all Trilogy Studios in Sandy, ClearPlay in Salt Lake City and CleanFlicks of Salt Lake City are doing.
I don't see much wrong, if anything at all if I wanted to skip or edit something I owned - so if I can buy this product from a third party where certian items are "skipped" then I'm more inclined to purchace there.
Same here. I dont know how to feel about this. I am strongly in favor of the director deciding what the viewers see. After all its their movie. Movies are a work of art, and only the director should have the final say of what goes in and what doesnt. (ofcourse, this doesnt apply to crappy movies that dont even need a decent director anyways)
On the other hand, I dont see any reason to stop people from removing parts of a movie that they dont like. Self censorship is best.
But I dont know how I would feel if people started distributing edited DVDs. That becomes gray area for me. Maybe it is good at times (the phantom edit comes to mind). But I am sure that I would not like to see an edited movie before I have seen an unedited virgin print first.
Don't Panic
...are DVDs with built-in parental control via the disc's menus. In order to watch the unedited movie you have to enter a code from the DVD packaging, otherwise you get a sanitized version, free of any "offending content" via seamless branching.
This will nip the "What about the CHILDREN!?!?!" and religious fundamentalist justifications for editing/manipulating content, since parents can just toss/hide the adults-only code for the DVD so that junior is stuck with the G version.
It will also serve to get the right-wing Republicans backing their activist constitutents doing the editing to stop being interested in fair use issues and back with the rest of the Republicans in legislatively enshrining MPAA corporate objectives.
They'll still offer the non-code-based DVDs to the rest of us, so that filmies and others won't whine to loudly about this inconvenience.
"Everybody" wins -- Mormon kiddies don't see titties, filmies get "normal" DVDs, the MPAA gets Orrin Hatch off his back AND can get back to kicking home editors in the ass.
Actually, I think it's really important. I mean, look at it this way:
The EFF has a tough time defending stuff like deCSS because the first thought of many is pirating. However, software to edit out violence and sex would ALSO need to have this knowledge. I think they're using it to gain some leverage in the battle of "what are the positives of having the CSS out there."
This also would help cement the idea of DVDs as belonging to the consumer. The consumer can do what they choose to they're own property (within reason). This is a point that EFF is trying to make on other fronts, but has trouble since, right now, it's linked directly to piracy.
This gives them something to fight for that maybe more people will see as a positive example of "fair use", etc.
This would be like going to a museum and taking crayola's to a Rembrandt.
No, it would be like taking crayolas to a reproduction of a Rembrandt. The original art isn't defiled in any way.
'I ain't a liar, baby, and I ain't proud I just want what I'm not allowed.' -- Violent Femmes, 36-24-36
"I know that most DVDs have chapter stops. It is my opinion that a film is not like a book - it should not be broken up. It is a continuum and should be seen as such. Thank you for understanding" - David Lynch on why his DVDs have no chapter stops.
I think I would agree with this philosophy. If you dont like parts of a movie, try to live with it.
Don't Panic
The big difference is that this is being done by the end user. If I am a parent who wants to block language from my kids but want them to watch an otherwise funny movie like shrek I should be able to do that. (not saying that I would but ..) This is differnt than blockbuster only supplying editted dvd's
Utah, and Utah County (the location of Clean Flicks) have a majority LDS community. The LDS faith has been instructed by it's leadership to avoid seeing rated "R" films. This is a moral decision made by the LDS leadership as a guideline for it's followers.
The down-side to this is that there are a number of good films that should not be viewed by LDS followers. "Schindler's List" is a great example of this. It was rated "R" for violence and mature themes. However, it is a powerfull film made to tell an important story. BYU, the LDS church owned university in Utah County, could not show this film to it's history students, due to it's graphical nature and it's violation of the honor code that the BYU students agree to. Given the import of that particular film, I would love to hear that an edited version could be made available for those who want to see it, without violating the guidelines their faith lays out for them. Given the particular moral outlook of the prominent faith in Utah, I think it is great that a good film can be made to conform to the expectations of the largest demographic in the community.
I live in Utah, but am not a follower of the LDS faith. Many of my friends are, and they will either not go to any "R" rated movie, or they tend to get a guilty feeling if they do. A few have made the decision to judge which films they will see (i.e. avoid films with the "R" rating for sexual scenes or foul language, but not for violence). The ability to make a decision that will not violate their beliefes is a good one. I support Clean Flicks, even though I would not use their service.
The MPAA and the film industry need to come to the realization that their current view on the "Ownership" of the film medium needs to be changed. Then Clean Flicks and other companies might not need to face stupid lawsuits or worse, legislation.
it is better to light a flame thrower than curse the darkness. -Terry Pratchett Men at Arms
No, you have it wrong. The EFF isn't standing for public censorship. Rather, they're saying individuals should be allowed to cut out things they don't want their children to see. I agree that if it was a broad-based public censorship, then it would be bad. But basically all their advocating here is a fair use right for individuals (or families) to do what they want with something they bought. That is totally something I can understand.
For example, my mom still hasn't seen all of Saving Private Ryan because she couldn't get through the first five minutes, which is just the beginninng of a very realistic portrayal of the storming of Normandy beach. If I were to cut out some of the most disgusting scenes for her, then she would probably watch it and enjoy it. I don't see why this should be wrong.
She also doesn't like swearing, and if a movie has a lot of F--- this and F--- that, she's very likely to be turned off by it even though she says she likes the plot. She should be allowed to do that if she wants.
It's all about user's choice. The censorship is self-censorship, and therefore totally permissible (and supportable) IMHO.
"The evil of the world is made possible by nothing but the sanction you give it." -- Ayn Rand
This technology is really just the tip of the iceberg.
d iots filtering. Oh, and backlinks, using a partial XLink implementation.
;-)
This is a limited form of annotation and augmentation. For my final year project at uni, I created a web annotation project using a modified KHTML, KIO, and Konqueror.
The idea was that any entity could publish annotations of any uri addressable resource, and any portion of that resource via content specific identifiers - eg XPath for xml, substring matches for text, svg shapes for images, etc etc.
These annotations, which could also carry an rdf payload, were signed, and a web of trust created. The annotations were shared via a p2p network modeled on fast track, implemented in python.
Then whenever a location was visited, your client would perform a search for that uri, evaluate the trustworthyness of the annotations, and then display the ones it thought were useful. Moderation, in the slashdot sense was just a special form of annotation.
These annotations would be passed to the active component, and then, if it knew how, rendered appropriately. It also allowed eg. collaborative porn/ad/change-your-useragent-to-msie-for-these-i
It was a fairly neat project, and I got good marks for it, but I've never got round to polishing it up and releasing it - not sure if the KHTML would like all my changes anyway!
I had created a limited form of the Semantic Web, and when I do release it, I want to model the whole system just using rdf.
The other area I wanted to expand it to was collaborative tv ad filtering. Labeling TV show broadcasts with a unique urn, eg
urn:/BBC/Black Adder/03x04/Broadcast/UKGold/2003-04-14T2200 , and then use the same trust model to cut out ads, and add subtitles, commentarys, even hyperlinks and backlinks. Also geographic urns annotation presents some very exciting possibilty such as collaborative mapping and reviews, eg restaurants.
Well , now thats off my chest I just need to win the lottery, pay off my student loans, quit this mind numbing banking job and implement it...
Okay, Hatch is a loud advocate of the DMCA and stupid ideas like his Hack the trader idea.
But Hatch is from Utah. And Hatch is mormon.
I would imagine that the best way to convince hatch of the stupidity of his ideas is for his mormon constuants to know that his laws are making it illegal for DVDs to be edited to remove sex.
Wonder how fast the chairman of the judiciary committee would change his mind. Anyone in Utah?
I don't see any justifiable arguement against people doing this. If I want to buy an expensive painting and draw on it or use it for TP, that's my business I own it. If I want to rip a DVD, edit out swearing, heck add my own scenes, in my home for my own use, then that's my *right* if I bought and paid for the DVD. I own it. I'm not one to go on about rights all the time, but this seems pretty damned cut and dry to me. Obviously distributing the modified DVD or copying is against the law and reasonable, other than that TS for the MPAA.
And I would've thought for DVD that it would be a great move for movie companies to include an edited track and cut of the movie on a DVD anyways - they're going to have to do it for TV, so why not get that out of the way, plus increase the sales of the DVD?
I wonder how the /. community would have reacted on a story saying "there's this company that
wants to make software that can be used to censor DVD content".
Or better yet- "M$ will put a feature in their next MediaPlayer release that will give the ability to auto-detect certain DVD titles and skip certain scenes".
I just wonder how many of us would be on the side of Microsoft if it came to that...
Just because the Good Guys are pursuing this one, I feel that many here are swayed in favor. I for one feel that censoring a (possibly artistic) work amounts to intellectual rape, in extreme cases, which for me outweighs the right of a buyer to mutilate his property.
On the other hand I do applaud the EFF for taking this stand, regardless of the eyebrows it will raise.
It's sad that the entertainment industry is so out of touch that they take a case like this to court, and the EFF has to waste resources submitting friend of the court documents because the legal system is so screwed up that some judge might actually agree with them.
Of course consumers have the right to view DVDs and skip any part of it for any reason, too much sex, not enough sex, too boring, Jar Jar Binks, etc.
Next they'll tell us we aren't allowed to skip commercials or go to the kitchen while they're on, oh wait, didn't they attack TIVO on those grounds?
By reading this sig, you agree to the terms of my sig license.
You don't really think the EFF is championing censorship, do you?
The EFF promotes freedom to use technology. After filing a lawsuit to defend the right of a Replay TV owner to use a technology that does automatic fast forward over commercials, how could the EFF not defend a technology that does automatic fast forward over naked breasts? The copyright holder doesn't want you to FF over either of them of course, but should the law declare a difference here?
Defending free technology means you sometimes have to defend it being used for things you wouldn't like.
I live in Utah and detest Orrin Hatch for his lack of balance or understanding on fair use issues.
I bet this is one issue (the only one I am aware of) that he is actually on the correct side of, due to his Mormon constituency. Too bad he cannot see the more general desirability for this sort of fair use denied by DMCA and his other nonsense.
Is this the same crowd that believes that once they buy a music CD they can do whatever they want with it? Are these the same people who believe they should be able to tweak someone else's software so it fits theirs needs?
I cannot understand why any of you give a rat's arse what someone else does with their purchased copy of a movie. This has nothing at all to do with offending the artists and everything to do with freedom. It is truely amazing seeing all the hypocrites whine.
"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible, make violent revolution inevitable" - JFK
just a reminder, the folks over at eff.org can always use your support. TMH
I really like how this is an EFF case where they are on the knee jerk conservative side of things. They're not supporting some drug crazed anarchists here, but ultra wholesome Mormons. That can only help.
Last I checked, the **AA and the book publishers' organizations hated public libraries, used book stores, and used CDs. They've argued that libraries should pay royalties, that selling used books and CDs should be illegal, etc. So don't be surprised at this stance.
-Looking for a job as a materials chemist or multivariat
I have no problem with home-editting equipment that lets a person edit a movie that they have purchased in their own home (although I find the idea repulsive in general). But editting movies and reselling them is definitely a bad idea IMO. Yes, they can label the movie as being editted, but there isn't a way to know what was editted, so there they are basically selling a copy of the movie that is butchered, and no one knows what was butchered. If something in the movie doesn't make sense, is it because of the editting, or because of the movie? People then make assumptions about the movie and director/producer/actors/whoever based on a product they didn't create. It would be like taking LoTR and rewriting select parts of the book. I then sell that book (with a note saying parts were "editted") and people refuse to by any other Tolkien books because that one made no sense (because of my rewrites). I am changing the artists vision.
"Information wants to be expensive" - Stewart Brand, the same guy who said "Information wants to be free"
"That screen is your contract not to pirate the movie or use it in non-personal ways...."
Uhm, no. It is not a contract - it's just the FBI warning. It's already illegal to distribute copies if you are not the copyright holder. Whether you sign or don't sign something is irrelevant.
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
Congratulations to the EFF and the majority of Slashdot viewers for sticking to your principles. It seems too often lately that I hear people argue a particular point with some moral justification, only to later hear them abandon the moral justification when it supports some other point that the arguer is against.
:).
To spell it out: the moral is that "You've bought it, you can do what you want with it." (Within reason, of course.)
I personally may not edit movies, but I fully support the rights of others to do so, once they've bought it. Besides, we all know how some movies get a sex scene "tacked on" just to titillate the dating audience. In these cases, the people editing movies are probably improving the movie by doing so.
Anyway, I am even more appreciative of the EFF (although not really surprised, they're good guys) and more impressed with Slashdotters in general (what is the world coming to?
What I meant (you would have understood if you read the whole thing) was that it is okay for people to see what they like. Fast forward all you want, Skip over the ads, etc. But why would you want to edit a DVD other than for re-distributing it? I would still be okay with people editing DVDs for removing material that they dont want to see each time they see the movie. But what I am _strongly_ against is when someone else watches the re-edited movie without having seen the original, and with no knowledge that this is a re-edited movie. That should be a strict no-no.
Don't Panic
You seem to be missing the point completely. There are people in this world who do not EVER want to see the material that would be edited out of the films. To expect someone to view content that they would deem objectionable as a precondition to viewing the edited version is preposterous. What started this was an offer from a video store to cut and splice a purchased copy of Titanic for anyone that requested it to remove the one nude scene. What was discovered, and then challenged in court by our all-knowing morality police at the **AA, was that there is a market for a service that would offer PG versions of PG-13 and R rated movies. The edits are similar to what the movie industry already provides to the airlines for in-flight movies. It was never about the resale of altered content to the open market as original work. It was simply a service offered to the legal owner of a rightfully purchased piece of merchandise.
Changing someone else's art should be illegal????
If it's digital, you're not changing their art. You're changing your copy of their art. Contrast this to a painting - with a painting, there is only one copy, you change it, it's changed for everyone.
With a DVD, you change your copy, and SO WHAT??? WHO CARES? My copy is unaffected. Yet you would lock someone up for that? Or harass them ala the RIAA?
Furthermore, when you create a work of art, it is not some edict from God, to remain unchanged and unquestioned for time immemorial. It's a statement, an emotion, and other artists are going to react to it - perhaps by sampling, interpretation, or parody. Art is not above social commentary.
p.s. Steven Spielberg is a total friggin wanker mistaking himself for an artist.
Don't give me that 'auteur' bullshit about the director. That totally ignores the input of the scriptwriter, actors, cinematographers, and editors. Unless the director is doing all of that on his own, it's a collaborative effort.
But, you are right: there is no reason I shouldn't be able to skip over bits I don't care for. Have I harmed Kubrick for skipping over that 'travelling through the monolith' bit in 2001? Well, fuck him if I am. It's boring as shit, and it's my DVD and my DVD player.
These people aren't distributing edited DVD's exactly. If memory serves (too lazy to double check) you send your copy, purchased from WalMart or wherever. They send you an edited copy. If the person who paid the store (and through a circuitous path, the studio and director) doesn't want to watch it, so what?
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
Give me a fucking break. The companies involved in the lawsuit aren't even selling modified DVDs. They are selling software that lets a user modify the playback of the DVD to avoid the undesirable portions.
The MPAA is basically arguing that my movie-watching sequence should be like the "therapy" in "A Clockwork Orange" -- I must see it exactly as the director intended, so I must have my eyelids forcibly held open so I can't possibly miss a single second.
And they think this will actually help their bottom line? The lunacy!
Moderator hint: a comment is neither "Flamebait" nor "Troll" if it is true.
Read the article again. Here, I'll even help you out.
The companies in question are Trilogy Studios in Sandy and ClearPlay in Salt Lake City. They make software to edit DVD streams. They do not sell content, and they do not modify the DVD themselves.
As the article also says, CleanFlicks was the company editing and selling software. EFF is not submitting the amicus brief on their behalf. The brief only covers the other two companies.
Now, presumably you could use such software to edit a video stream and then burn the result and sell it. That would be illegal. But this is very similar to the case with morpheus and kazaa -- they are tools that can be used to infringe copyrights, but they have significant non-infringing uses, just like this DVD editing software.
"The evil of the world is made possible by nothing but the sanction you give it." -- Ayn Rand