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Most Movies On P2P From Insiders?
An anonymous reader writes "AT&T Labs has determined that a significant majority of movies on P2P networks are the result of leaks from movie industry insiders (New York Times, free reg req'd). They not only point to the obvious cases (movies online before theatrical release, like The Hulk or Star Wars AOTC), but also examine other cases. The researchers examined 285 movies from P2P networks and used the quality of the file to determine whether it was some guy with a video camera or not. Choice quote: 'Our conclusion is that the distributors really need to take a hard look at their own internal processes and look at how they can stop the insider leaks of their movies before taking measures that might hamstring consumers' technologies and rights.'"
Maybe this was done on purpose to bring movie piracy into the spotlight (which as mostly been dominated by music piracy)?
A major chanel for movies on P2P are copies sent to academy members by the studios.
Either don't pass them out, put a tighter reign on them, or don't complain when they get on p2p before the dvd release.
How many of us are suprised by this? Just run a search for new albums that haven't even been released yet, and bam, all of the songs will almost always be there. I don't think the companies want allll the songs to be there, as teasers, before release date. Movies, software, even hardware gets leaked. What to do, what to do.. oh i know.. more legislation, and invest in stupid monitoring and/or crippling systems. Err.. wait.. we tried that already.
pm
** "It's not my job to stand between the people talking to me, and the ones listening to me." -- Pego the Jerk
Or from the we know what you're up to dept.
Choice quote: 'Our conclusion is that the distributors really need to take a hard look at their own internal processes and look at how they can stop the insider leaks of their movies before taking measures that might hamstring consumers' technologies and rights.'"
They care about hamstringing consumers' rights and tech? If the result of "leaked" movies is more control for the industry, I would be suprised if they're not giving employees who "leak" films big fat bonuses.
Let's see. Get a few extra $million at the box office or leak a film and take another giant step towards total media domination. You know what they'll choose. It's not like they shy away from spending $millions lobbying to get similar results.
"When it rains, it pours." --Morton's Salt
'and the economic effect is "basically nil -- there's no evidence whatsoever that people are not going to the theater or not buying DVD's or not renting videotapes because of this activity."'
I think this cannot be stressed enough. Yes, people are downloading your movies. No, you aren't losing money. I love owning DVDs, but I also download like mad. My monthly DVD budget doesn't change based on the number of movies I download, but the movies I buy sure does. I can list off a large number of DVDs I've purchased after downloading them first.
"The market alone cannot provide sufficient constraints on corporation's penchant to cause harm." -- Joel Bakan
So many articles on movie/game sharing seem to think that p2p networks are where these start off. They're sadly mistaken. Any article that doesn't dig deep enough to talk about irc or release groups or anything actually related to the scene does not deserve my interest. The copies of movies on kazaa and other p2p nets are taken from the original groups, downsampled and put on kazaa. If they think that p2p applications are to blame then the mpaa needs to contract a real research team.
Yes, but having that "duh" come from AT&T Labs means a lot more in court than having it come from your or me. It doesn't hurt to point out that a chunk of so-called "piracy" is due to the studios' own irresponsibility.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Insider releases will always be an issue as long as people outside the profit circle (shipping companies, lower echelion MPAA employees, etc) have pre-release access to the disks/tapes that the movie is on. Either they need to build encryption into the projectors/disks or they need to make the people handling the movie pre-release some how more connected to the profit stream the movie generates.
I don't know how much money it takes to replace the pride and joy an insider gets from seeing the movie out on the net before the 1st screening, but i bet it's less than the amount the MPAA would writeup as a 'loss' if they caught the person involved in the distribution.
Can anyone think of a movie in recent times (past 2 or 3 years) that *wasn't* available on the net before the 1st screening?
/* * pope1 */
Um... ok, if you really want to call some dude working at a video store an "industry insider".
"We obviously need a new moderation category: (-1, Woo-fucking-hoo)" --Mr. AC
Quite the opposite. They are terrified that people will discover what shite some movies are and not go. I've read several articles in recent months that pretty much state that Hollywood relies on the first weekend bump to make back production costs, even on crapola movies. The article I read (in the WSJ) mentioned that kids text-ing their friends via cellphone to stay away from bad movies (e.g. the Hulk) was putting a real crimp in their plans.
Bravo for those kids with cellphones, I say!
Yeah, It's not like they ever print stories of interest to /. readers so why should we try to support them in even a meager way.
Personally I think that this often done delibertly to test how popular the film will be. Throw it out on the net and see what comes up to grab it.
Slashdot, home of supporters of free software, free music, and free speech.Except for Moderators that disagree with you.
Come on, that's an off-the-wall conspiracy theory....
The real problem is the old saying of of "Information wants to be free." Major movie releases are mega-hyped events where the content is something that is kept out of public view until the designated day, hour, minute of a moment, but within the process has to pass through the hands of thousands of people. It takes only one person to make an unauthorized copy at that level to get it onto the P2P networks.
I don't buy the "I want to stick it to the man!" argument. Some people are just too cheap to drop $15 - $25 on a DVD.
If you think that's too expensive, don't buy it. Affordability (or lack thereof) is not justification for downloading it illegally.
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
Go to the Movies : $9.50 each person
:)
Buy the DVD : $14.95 - $19.95
Download and burn DVD : ~$200 for burner and $1.5 per disk.
Figure for a family to go see a movie ~$38.50 + concessions...It's way cheaper to buy the DVD. However, when DVD's are > $20 each - it makes more sense to copy them...
The point is, lower the prices on this stuff (movies and music) and people will pay for it. A large portion of the piracy is due to price gouging, IMHO.
Oh, and put out more movies worth seeing!
Don't subscribe to NYTimes?
Yeah, It's not like they ever print stories of interest to /. readers so why should we try to support them in even a meager way.
What's stupidest about this is that not only is there free (as in beer) registration, but several nice slashdotters have set up logins over the years that everyone on slashdot could use (they published the login name and password). The coolest thing is no one ever changed the passwords on these accounts.
If you really want to karma whore, you could always create a new user and publish its name and password. Honestly, i do not know why submitters do not just link to the archive version of the nytimes story, whcih never requires a login to see.
Every time a nytimes story is used on /. I see the same 100 goddamn posts. Whining about registration, suggesting registration, suggesting archive urls, giving usernames to use to login... it's all a binch of malarky. Everyone who reads slashdot knows the deal with nytimes. Why they don't link the archive version to at least preempt the whining is beyond me.
The movie industry doesn't have to worry so much as the music industry for several reasons, mainly because they know not to gouge their customers.
Let's compare the two.
1) Movies come out in theaters for about 8 to 12 dollars, sometimes cheaper. This is as close to a live concert as your going to get. A live concert tickets for a major band is easily $30 dollars. Not to mention having to wait in a really long line, and deal with all the kids. Go to a movie on a Tuesday, sneak in a coke in your pockets or girlfriends purse and your cool.
2) Once out on DVD you get all kinds of extras, and a really high quaility piece of art. CDs are cds, they don't make them with surround sound or anything special. No video of live concerts or anything. And you usually have to pay 18 bucks for them, even when they have been out for 10 years! You can get all those marginally good movies for $10 bucks in those bins.
3) Movies can cast 10s of millions, while CDs could be made for near nothing. Yet they continue to sell for about the same and they just trust the user to want a collection.
I think the music industry could learn a thing or two. I don't really think we need multi-million a show tours. I don't want a million lights and gimics. I just want to see a live band for a decent price. I wish I liked phish, cause then I could get it. Why must I pay $100 bucks for a Radiohead concert. What ever happened to the arena concert?
Ever heard of previews?
Savvy people know the previews are FOS. In fact, generally the better a movie looks in preview the more likely that it is going to truly, deeply suck. Many movies give up the best three scenes in the whole movie in the preview. Then you go watch the movie and find that everything else in the movie sucks.
Its probably better for everyone to have people p2p the movie and watch it small screen. I usulaly don't watch p2p movies, and am more inclined to buy a dvd than rent or watch a movie in the theatre (now that many dvd's are $5, why put up with the hassle of renting?). I will watch a movie in the theatre if it has aspects which will show better on a gigantic screen (case in point: LOTR with its massive battle scenes). Otherwise, it is not worth the money to watch it once when I can buy the dvd and watch it over and over with commentary.
Regardless of the situation, I do not think p2p will make me not buy a movie I would have anyway. I frequently buy dvd's of movies I have watched at friend's houses or borrowed previously. P2P is essentially the same deal. Besides, watching movies on the computer sucks ass. A good viewing environment for movies is ultimately very important to me.
The opposite is far more likely, AT&T is a major provider of connectivity threatened by potential legal responsibily for facilitating file trading. They have significant self-interest in making these statements (true or no), moreso than any university, and the MPAA no doubt realizes it.
What I want to know is with all the P2P talk, how come you never here anything about newsgroups?
I personally find them much more inviting. Plus you know someone isn't going to log off and, as in my case, I top out my bandwidth.
As if insider leaks are anything new...
Our conclusion is that the distributors really need to take a hard look at their own internal processes and look at how they can stop the insider leaks of their movies before taking measures that might hamstring consumers' technologies and rights.
Who cares about insider leaks? If 100,000 copies of a movie are distributed for free ahead of release, the distributors will be 10 times more concerned about the fact that they're not getting paid than the fact that the movie was leaked ahead of it's release. Whether a movie is leaked, bootleged, or copied from legit media, the distributors are screwed if 100,000 people get their hands on it for free.
What would really require the distributors to "take a hard look at their own internal processes" would be if someone discovered a loaded Kazaa node on one of their networks.
The problem is that the film industry has lost sight of what they "sell". At the simpliest level, they are selling: a story projected on a huge screen, sound better than you have at home, and a decent seating environment. No foreseeable technology is going to allow the general public to have the "big screen" experience at home in the near future. Therefore, the movie industry has something of unique value.
The problem is that as that by expanding into the home market, they gave up a lot of their uniqueness. When the cost of creating a copy of a movie for home use was high, they could make money because they could do it cheaply. However, as the cost to distribute lower quality formats falls, the "value" the studios offer to home users pluments.
Now, I'm certainly not denying the studio's invested a lot of capital and "own" the movie, but think of it like this: I go see a famous comedian in a club, and remember/write down all his jokes. I can go tell those jokes to my friends, or type them up and email them across the internet. Chances are, even though they are still funny, they are much better when you see the actual comedian perform them.
There is a reason film and music companies are called "media" companies. The idea is that they provide the "medium" which conveys content to end-users. Medium used to be expensive, now it's cheap. Their business model is broken, they spend tons on content and are trying to profit of the medium.
Good point. It's very similar to how the RIAA is secretly sharing kiddie porn on all the p2p networks so they can make a case to congress that all p2p should be shut down to save the precious children from horrible emotional abuse (ignoring the fact that the RIAA is suing 12 year old children at the same time, because one can comprehend only so much hypocrisy).
Do I really believe the RIAA is putting kiddie porn on p2p networks? Well, I've never, EVER actually come across kiddie porn on any p2p's, but then again I've never looked for it. Considering how highly illegal it is (much moreso than sharing a song... kiddie porn is right up there with crashing jetliners into buildings), I have a hard time believing anyone would be so stupid as to voluntarily share kiddie porn on a public network... unless it greatly benefitted his business model. So, I firmly believe IF there is actually kiddie porn on KaZaA, etc, that the RIAA is 100% responsible for it being there. They got the children naked, they took the pictures, they stuck them online, and they are bringing it to the government's attention. That way there is evidence to justify the Children's Peer to Peer Protection Act of 2003 (banning p2p software). Who is producing all the lobbying material (videos, booklets, etc) advocating shutting down p2p networks because of kiddie porn? The RIAA. And idiots like Orin Hatch (who, as a musician is currently getting $10+k in royalties per year, and should recuse himself from such debates due to the conflict of interest) have already taken up the RIAA's cause.
So, the bottom line is that "every time you download a song, the RIAA sexually molests a child" is not too far from the truth.
Machiavellian? Maybe so, but the fact that they're willing to sue 12 year old kids to sustain their worldwide monopoly doesn't make it much of a stretch to presume that they'd stick kiddie porn online if it meant possibly getting rid of all file sharing once and for all.
Stupid people make stupid things profitable.
but hey, they did it to Mitnick - filesharers are equally computer criminals
That's like saying since blacks are a minority in the US, they should be put into gas chambers because Germans did it to Jews. I'm not a "Free Kevin" fanatic, but Mitnick's been punished far more severly than justified because the FBI wanted to set an example and the legal system couldn't cope with the buzzwords. Using him as an example of what should happen to people who commit computer crimes is perverse.
In my opinion, computer primes should be prosecuted based on their "real-world" equivalents. Having someone download MP3s off of you should be considered giving 10 or 100 illegal song copies out ($600 max), not the $150,000 the RIAA persues. Mitnick was punished too severly because the judicial system got too hung up on the threat of computer technologies and the potential for harm, rather than looking at the trespassing charges for what they really were.
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For people who scoff at conspiracy theories, remember that if only takes one boss to "joke" about such an idea, one employee to do it on his own time, and year-end bonuses to reward the employee without actually establishing a link between the illegal action and the boss or the company.
The boss has plausible deniability. Even if the conversation was recorder he only said "Damn Company X and their fleet of trucks", he didn't tell the employee to pour sugar in their tanks. It was all a terrible misunderstanding, that terrible lawbreaking employee did it of their own initiative.
Maybe some RIAA mid-manager in charge of P2P stuff commented on how much easier it would be to shut down KaZaa if it started to deliver kiddy porn when you searched for a song...
As noted elsewhere in this thread, the popular movies aren't the problem. People downloading good movies (and this is not usually completely quick or easy--you have to want it) are generally also the people paying money to see it in the theatre, telling all their friends to watch it, buying the DVD or renting it multiple times.
It's the crap movies that are the liability. If they get out early, only a few people need to see it and start telling all their friends that it's crap they should avoid. Then the studio is SCREWED.
It's also bad for mediocre movies. I admit I've done this with some anime. Watched a rip, thought it was okay--but not good enough to, like, actually watch again or, heaven forbid, buy.