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Oscar Screener Ban to be Revoked for Academy Members
bigjocker writes "Yahoo is reporting that the ban to distribute screeners copies will be revoked. The bad news is that only members of the Academy will receive them." It's still unclear how this will affect events such as the Golden Globe awards. According to the article, several critics' organisations have yet to decide their reaction. I'm guessing that at the least, Academy members are pleased to know they won't have to find a theatre to screen award nominees.
The bad news is that only members of the Academy will receive them."
Don't feel so bad, I know this academy member who always makes a few copies for his friends...
My next sig will be ready soon, but friends can beat the rush!
shouldn't that read "academy members will be pleazed to know that they too wont have to get on Kazaa to see the movies?"
Imagine how hard it would be to judge moving dramas with the welfare mother 2 rows behind them, yelling "callete! callete!" at her 11 screaming kids. Not to mention the fat redneck guy in the row in front of you, taking up 2 seats (exposed butt-crack nested on the unmoveable arm rest). How could anyone enjoy a movie like that?
Actually, this experience seems familiar...
Free disks of Kazaa Ultimate Edition were sent to each Academy member's house by a group of anonymous benevolent cowards.
this is about. or why I posted this response. I dont think i really care what this is about either, i'm just not sure why this was posted at all. This is probably the first time I can remember having absolutely no clue what story on slashdot is about.
TallGreen CMS hosting
What about critics who aren't members of the academy? Having a small, closed group of people be the only ones with access to screeners isn't much of a solution.
Now we all know the real reason was cause they where pissed off indies where winning on a regular basis cause major motion pictures have sucked balls in recent years, but to have the blame put on us cause we where the easiest target and couldn't fight back against the MPAA (the people who decided this) it became us as the bad guys who where the cause of indie movies not being able to be allowed to send out DVD's to the voters
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
I know this has been mentioned before but ill repeat it because I believe it to be true. No one will never, repeat NEVER, stop piracy. The solution is to make the movies (or any product for that matter) actually worth paying for. Most movies have gone up in price (as have the actors pricetags) and down in quality. People are tired of it. Even if youre going to keep making crappy movies, at least show some other cool stuff in the theaters (maybe a behind the scenes type of thing for 30 mins after the movie ends?) Anyway, if you have a good product, people will pay for it
What they are going to say when movies are leaked now? It will happen.
The movie industry will have to fess up that some of the most respected people in their industry are in fact IP theives. Just like they want to paint everyone else to be. It'll be fun to watch.
The accademy should (quietly) distribute watermarked copies - with individual watermarks - to the members - and then take action against the responsible member(s) if the material ends up on the black market.
It's the height of hypocracy to swat at unauthorized copiers among the customer base in such a way as to create massive colateral damage among non-violators while simultaneously giving the industry insiders immunity.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Actually I don't think ANY critics are members of the Academy since the Academy is for the creative and technical people who make the movies but I could be wrong.
This just in - who gives a fuck?
I'll tell you who does : the legions of people who download those screeners on P2P. They are the true big losers of this decision.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
We also have a backup plan whereby we stakeout academy members' houses with laptops+DVDROMS and "borrow" their DVDs for a couple mins when they arrive in the mail. We're working on getting the postal workers on the payroll next to make this easier.
l33tboyz always delivers the screeners. Arrrr!
Ahh! So it's you who calls those premium rate voting lines and votes for Don't Know.
Let's see 9 bucks to get into the movie theater and 15 to 17 minutes of commercials that I just got suckered into paying to see.
I do not feel bad for these very greedy people.
Academy members are pleased to know they won't have to find a theatre to screen award nominees.
They can always see my friend Rob who runs his business out of a Ryder van on 4th and D. He's planning on having an Academy member special.
...Oscar Screener Ban Plan Scrapped. I think it has to do with Oscar Meyer hot dog scraps being banned at awards festivals.
At least the MPAA is taking a more consumer-friendly approach to it's piracy problem. No matter what they do, I applaud them for not caving in to the level of the RIAA by sending supoenas to their consumer base.
It has to do with the availability of release-quality pirated (copied, whatever) material.
Erm, the availability of that material to VERY VERY BAD people whom we should NEVER associate with. Of course.
Seriously?
Really, how is this bad news for anyone who isn't trying to steal content? I'm a strong advocate of being able to backup and/or copy things that I have a legal right to. I'm also a strong opponent of "tools" like the DMCA that use corporate fear to try to over-legislate or get rid of technology because it *could be* used to break the law.
But restricting screeners to academy members is only "bad news" if you were hoping that someone in the wider distribution list was going to copy the movies and distribute.
Espousing piracy significantly weakens an anti-MPAA stance. In fact, it plays right into the pro-MPAA argument saying "the only reason people want the ability to copy is so they can pirate."
If you're against the MPAA's position on heavy-handed anti-technology legislation, I'm with you. If you're only in it because you want to steal some stuff... coun't me out.
OK, fess up, how many people here have movies that occationally have the subtitle "for your consideration" pop up on them? I know my first copy of The Two Towers did. Granted I bought it as soon as it came out and I will buy the extended edition as well, so I have trouble feeling like an evil pirate (arrrr).
:)
The point is, where do you think these movies are getting leaked from?
Finkployd
Yeah, if you want to find an issue for your soapbox, try those freaking patterns of brown dots in movies now. Absolute ass. It's not like the pirate DVD's don't come from China where the people printing them from the studios just do an extra run at night. It's not like the horrible p2p hype-releases don't come from inside the studio.
Screeners getting DVD's (or not) who cares? They're shitting on public right now.
We need a new videogame where instead of jacking cars the players hunt down and mercilessly excecute heads of major ass-clown corporations. Then, using the address found with their driver's licence go on to slaughter their families, on principle. After a mission they can high-five, top-ten, and drink mountain dew while playing a bonus snow board stage where Tony Hawk's wife is dancing in a bikini.
But that's alright, you're no nerd. A nerd is typically good with "technology". A nerd would be able to figure out that he can edit his freaking preferences so that movie, music, or entertainment news DON'T SHOW UP AT HIS HOMEPAGE.
I'll tell you who does : the legions of people who download those screeners on P2P. They are the true big losers of this decision.
No. The big losers are the ones who don't grok the post. The decision repeals the ban of home copies. This means the P2P folk once again have access to these films.
So, other than saying that P2P pirates are losers in the first place, you've got it backwards.
Kevin Fox
The reason they banned the DVD's was they said tech geeks where pirating the movies too much when they sent the DVD's out, so likewise to prevent it they wouldnt let anyone (major studios, or indie) release them out to the voters, making the voters go to the local movie theaters to see them.
The truth was they where putting the blame on us cause we where an easy target, the real reason they banned them was the only way most indie movies got screened and voted on WAS caused they released them on DVD to the voters. The majors pissed they have lost so many oscars to the indies decided what would be the best way to tip the scales and saw the fact that most theaters dont play indies or play them for a very limited time that it was a easy way to get more major films screened and voted on than minor ones.
SOOOOO all of the big wigs wispered in the ears of the MPAA to get the ban put in place, and the MPAA not caring about the 100 or so indie companies under their wings put the sweaping ban in place much to the horror to all of the critics/indies/directors/and actors who had both not a clue it was going to happen and no say when it did happen.
Well in protest a huge number of smaller awards shows decided to take the year off, along with the Golden Globes which shocked the MPAA into realizing it made a horrable mistake since not only was the excuse of it was the piraters fault not taken seriously but everyone was now gunning to take the MPAA down including its own members who outnumbered the small majority of major studio members who where in control.
and thus why we should care, cause while no one took them to be serious, we the Tech geeks where to blam with yet another of lifes problems that really isnt a problem.
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
Last year's Oscars had 52 nominated films. You can remove nineteen of those for the two short film categories (five films each), the foreign-language film category (five more films), the documentary feature category (five films), and the documentary short subject category (four films), leaving 33 films for the other categories. (Not to diminish the importance of these categories, but we have to start somewhere.) Most Academy voters will probably already have seen at least half of those 33 films before the nominations are even announced. So having to see another 17 films between the nomination announcement and the end of voting? What a tragedy! To be forced to go watch a bunch of Oscar-nominated films, in order to vote in a big popularity contest. :)
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
Roger Ebert wrote a column about this when the decision to ban screeners was announced. I tend to agree with most of his points, and can't wait to see what he says about this latest turn of events. We should all be happy, and not because this likely means more pirated pre-release copies of movies. No, it means there'll be some degree of fairness and equal exposure in oscar selection.
As if the major studios don't control hollywood enough, a ban on DVD distribution would have killed most independant studios chances of even being considered for an oscar.
Movies with limited distribution, and fewer available numbers of prints would've been shut out in favor of those which can afford advertising, and set up screenings at enough locations that a significant portion of the academy could view them.
This move at least allows some degree of fairness. All movies have the chance of being viewed by all screeners, regardless of who distributes or produces them. It's still not perfect, but it's much better this way.
Bring racketeering charges agianst the MPAA. Only way to stop them for good.
-Seriv
seeing those dots every FUCKING TWO MINUTES ON THE SCREEN WHEN I JUST SPENT 20 FUCKING DOLLARS OF MY HARD EARNED MONEY FROM FIXING COMPUTERS THAT SOME SHITHEAD PRE -K'ER FUCKING STUCK GUM IN WHEN I COULD HAVE WAITED 6 MONTHS AND BOUGHT A MUCH NICER UNMOLESTED DVD.
k done ranting
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,12732,00.htm l
There was a teacher at my college that was a member of the academy, and every Oscar season he would show all the nominees back to back in the school's screening room. He'd start showing them at 7 or so and we would not be done until like, 4 or later.
Man, I miss college.
It's still unclear how this will affect events such as the Golden Globe awards.
:)
It's also still unclear how this will affect events such as downloading your favorite movie.
They're are idiots. The acadamy has nearly lost all shred of appearing to once have been able to pretend it had credibility.
It's shocking and more than a little pathetic that the movie awards show with any dignity is the MTV movie awards.
Now I'm sure Mystic River, which is a better than fair, but no where near great, movie will recieve plenty of gushing adulation. Which it doesn't deserve. Ohh the slightly melodramatic, "for your Oscar consideration," look ma' it's artsy, overacting, it's full of stars!
If those ass-clowns overlook the grandfather and especially little girl from Whalerider, they might as well let Howard Stern and Kevin Smith Fans fight each other in a battle-royal where the last "man" standing picks the winners. Naturally, they'll still have Whoopi and Billy Crystal introduce stars to introduce the winners. But this time they'll have She/He and Billy strangling little kittens and puppies with their bare hands (occasionally drowning them in water) to make it funnier. And it will be 11 hours long (although it may run over).
Tell me why they are not already watermarked.
It would not be so hard to watermark a seperate serialnumber into each copy sent out - there is a very limited number of screeners right? under 1000?
it cannot be that hard to do.
Then you bust the screeners who screw you.
Done.
comment directly in my journal
When I first read about those on /. I thought "this will be another subtle little thing that I will never notice" I'm just not one of those people who picks up on all the little nuances of media quality - be it audio or visual.
I was so wrong.
At kill bill - there were times, like when they popped up on the blue background of a fight scene that was all about visuals, that I nearly screamed. I was so annoyed and distracted I could not stay on track with the movie. And we are talking about a basic martial arts/action film. Not something real cerebral. If this is how films will be from now on - I am not going to the theater any more.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
How does this stuff applies to nerds? I don't see how it matters. All news outlets, online or dead tree ones, are already saturated with hollywood related junk.
Man, I'd buy that game in a heartbeat--especailly if it came with a cupons for MountianDew, and 10% off a SPAS-12.
well to each his own then, cant make you care, but if more serious steps are taken against us in the future by these assholes just know the entire geek community has the rights to say I told you so now.
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
Every movie I have seen since that abomination The Medallion, where I thought they were some sort of random ass editing mark, has had them.
I have to say that leaked screeners sell movies. Before i could download movies, i never bought one. Downloading a movie si the only way i decide what movies are worth spending $20 on.
can anyone say "embedded serial numbers"
I was listening to a morning show in LA when Quentin Tarantino was on, and I thought he made an interesting point. He basically said that it hasn't been all that long that people have been receiving dvd screeners. When they asked for a copy of Pulp Fiction he was greatly insulted. He said something to the effect of "Are you kidding me? IT'S STILL IN THE F-ING THEATRES. I don't want him sitting at home doing laundry and having his kids asking him to drive them to their friends house while John Trovolta's blowing some guys head off."
Please note that's a very rough translation from memory.
Take Care
A1miras
Critics who are not members of the academy do not vote, why would they need screeners?
Q.
If you've seen much of Milla Jovavich, her problem isn't her acting, which can be pretty spectuacular considering the projects she chooses, it's the projects she chooses.
She appears to give the director exactly what they ask for, no matter how bad the idea is.
not members of the academy
==
don't vote
==
don't need screeners
Suddenly, CowboyNeal is concerned with movie awards? The last I read, this was News for Nerds. Stuff that matters.
Unless CowboyNeal is concerned with being unable to pir8 the latest screener DVD in the future, I don't see how this matters nerd-wise.
Sure, there's awards to worry about. I guess. It's just an industry. I mean, we spend our lives toiling over corporate networks and don't get other IT people holding ceremonies and kissing our pimpled butts over a job well done. So, I am not too terribly concerned about film 'artists' getting their deserts either. It's life, live it for the fun, not little golden globes.
Sure sure, someone will miss out after a good indy flick is released. I'm a nerd, I don't care. If I was an Oprah-watching soccer mom, this just might be an issue. This sort of thing belongs in Vanity Fair or possibly a Wired! article. As a consumer and nerd, I stand very little to lose either way. The same movies will be released on DVD and I'll eventually find them on Netflix.
Can we get back to science, anti-microsoft hate speech, Linux zealotry (you terrorists!), and linking to three year old Wired articles sometime soon?? I'm really tired of the "OMG, they want to stop piracy of unreleased movies!! The horrors!!". Then we wonder why people don't see much of a difference between an open source supporter and a warez/movie thief.
Great job keeping the lines grey!
yes and they appeared on the screen smack in the middle of flat-color surfaces, so they are fucking obvious and distracting
of course i didn't miss any of the "plot" because of these dots
Ebert might be. He's a screen writer of breast fetish movies. And came up with the catchy title "Bra of God" for another. Classy guy. Funny, now that he appears to have a mini-stroke his movie reviews seem similar to Siskel's....
Closed family trees recycle DNA, and it eventually shows (i.e. Prince Charles).
Sick 'em boys!
This is a test. This is a test of the emergency sig system. This has been only a test.
Why not have academy members votes be weighted based upon which movie they have seen? If, for example, Finding Nemo recieved 40% of the vote of the 1,000 members registered as having seen it, it still could lose against the 50% vote given by the 150 members who saw "Whale Rider."
Such a scheme sounds more fair, if it isn't possible to see a movie in the intended format.
The ______ Agenda
TRUE Story: I was eating in a restaurant in Stamford, CT a year or so ago, and all of a sudden I realized at the table next to me was sitting none other than Gene Wilder. He was complaining that though they started to send out award nominees on DVD, he still didn't have a DVD player! Nice guy, by the way.
Academy members are pleased to know they won't have to find a theatre to screen award nominees
And even worse pay for the movie! God help, this should not happen!
NoSuchGuy
[real Bad Karma]
Grundgesetz * 23. Mai 1949 - 30. November 2007 - http://www.vorratsdatenspeicherung.de/
This was *long* before HBO and company built media empires reselling cable feeds to franchisees across the country. We lived up in the hills above LA (La Crescenta) where an antenna was not good enough, but cable TV delivered a sharp feed of the local channels plus the big broadcast networks. Sammon's customer base consisted of a few hill-dwellers like us, plus the swankier Santa Monica/Wilshire/Hollywood area,
Anyway, at some point in the late 60's or early 70's, Sammons created their own little premium movie channel called the Z Channel. It was a steal even in those days: two main new features a week, plus all movies all the times. (Plenty of good foreign films, too.) No commercials, of course.
What does this have to do with Oscar Screeners?
Well, the amazing thing is that they had so many members of the Academy as their customers that it made sense to screen the academy award nominees over the Z Channel! There would be one week or two (probably in January, AFAIR) when there would be nonstop marathons of nominated films, back to back, 24/7.
The world of movies and cable have changed so much since then (see current story) even I find it hard to believe that this happened. But I saw it myself.
I can't speak for the other Sammon's customers in my neighborhood, but we bought an early-generation VCR just to be able to record these oscar nominees. Our first VCR was about $1500 and probably weighed 30lbs.
The Academy Awards are far from the only game in town. Although maybe that will be less true if the ban changes to how the article describes it. (Monopoly, anyone?)
I think i've got problems. Every time i saw that title i thought '...Gates?'
Browse at -1, because trolls are often the most creative part of
Both of them have director boyfriends that cast them in their movies.
.
Milla is the biggest whore
If they got director boyfriends and start to pop in their films then that is whoring.
They've got them groovy self-destruct tapes (or was that Mission Impossible only? Well, at worst CONTROL had that groovy self-destructing agent jammed in the wastecan/flowerpot/mailbox). Its funny when you think about it.... any ban by the MPAA on distribution of screeners to insiders (in general) affects only said insiders. The "scene" shrugs it off. Maybe the MPAA will ban the distribution of workprints as well (Ha! Boy, and one would think that THOSE would be easy enough to track back to the source...).
Given that some of the best films are indy and never given the chance in the first place, the question begs, "Who cares?"
Why, on heaven's green earth, would I give a toss what the "Academy" thinks? Let's see, a major Hollywood release wins several awards. Could we be anymore predictable?
It's nothing more than a slick way to kiss-ass and score points amongst the Hollywood elite. Art be damned.
(Much better, thanks!)
You're reading the acrony wrong...
http://www.mpaa.org
Coming soon to a flea market near you...
DVDs of movies which have "REVIEW COPY" watermarks zooming around the screen.
Why is this bad news? Who should receive them? Why do you care about the movie industry's ritual pat-on-the-back?
I though the only interesting aspect of this ongoing story was that the proliferation of fast internet access was forcing the industry to restrict screeners. Nothing really good or bad in that. And no, I don't care if some less mainstream film wins an Emmy or Grammy or whatever. The only outcome I'd find "good" is if the industry stops being profitable, so cultural energy flows into less centralized channels.
Not only does it not come with dots, but there isn't much of a plot you can aspire to miss.
More pr0n for the people!
If I become an Academy member, can I get some for free? Or do I have to log on to Kazaa again?
I think your thinking of something different, name an academy member that is a working schlub?
The MPAA, in an effort to reduce theft on the high seas and kidnapping, (yes, in addition to "piracy", they are now referring to "illegally abducted films"),
Wow. I'm just waiting to see what happens as this process continues to its logical conclusion.
Some new words the MPAA introduces into English between now and 2103
Rape - When people take single screen captures of sex scenes or scenes with actresses in skimpy outfits or really even just any scene from a movie that they liked, and post it in a "pictures page" on geocities
Pedophilia - When clips, recordings, or scripts for a a film that hasn't been released yet are leaked to the internet, or (more often) leaked to Harry Knowles
Genocide - Replaces outmoded term "piracy" in 2067 as a common verb for using p2p services. This is to reflect that by using a p2p service, you are personally destroying the way of life of the entire movie industry. The MPAA comes to the conclusion that this is the right word to use after the crossover film that serves as Gigli part 8 and Tomb Raider part 23 makes less than $500,000 gross, and clearly people downloading films from p2p networks are to blame
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
I really don't understand how this is even newsworthy to anyone who doesn't have a wooden leg, a patch over one eye, and a parrot on his shoulder squawking "Free Kevin!" morning, noon, and night.
I have no reason to give a rat's ass whether the movie industry sends out screeners or not. I'm neither a filmmaker nor am I someone who reviews films for award consideration. I'm not alone in this. Virtually NO ONE here falls into those two catagories, which leaves the third group with a reason to care, pirates. Is slashdot going to change its motto to "News for thieves. Stuff that will get you 5-to-10?"
The fact that this is somehow news here is really sickening. Its almost like reading a story about how burglars are unhappy because homeowners have been arming themselves with even bigger shotguns and are being pickier about who they allow into their home.
Sounds to me like we need some more chlorine in Slashdot's gene pool.
Hans
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
I, personally, think it is bad for independent films. ;)) and improve their return on investment.
When this ban was just announced, independents started to moan because their films are not widely available in local cinemas. Now keep in mind, that in most cases it is the big studios that distribute those indie movies. Studio affiliations allow them to share some glory (they're the one, who found "diamond in a rough" which receives an Oscar for... ), earn big bucks (indie film costs pennies compared to supermegablockbuster from W. Brothers
What would be the easiest way for them to keep the Oscars coming and money flowing? Push those movies into more cinemas in more cities. Yes, the latest alternative movie would probably still not be available on every screen in every cinema in your city, but it might be available in one or two arthouse cinemas (which generally is enough for limited audience films), and, potentially, growing to dozens of cinemas if it happens to be a hit.
Now we're back to "release in 5 cinemas in the US, send 5,700 tapes/dvds to Academy members" scenario (with winner getting a bit more attention, and loosers never seeing the eye of the public in not-so-cosmopolitan cities).
Hyperom.com
since academy members have an interest in keeping piracy at bay
I disagree. It's entertaining to watch the MPAA thrash around and damage itself trying to cope with changing technology. Even if you don't pirate movies, you can still appreciate the humor in seeing the MPAA come up with a new "strategy" every few days, each one more harmful to the studios than the last. If they tried to about-face any faster, Jack Valenti would get whiplash.
0 1 - just my two bits
What the matrix needed was more acting power. Someone like Depp. Of course serious actors tend not like to star in video games.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Normally I don't point out language errors, usually they aren't that important...however I find myself "uncomfortable" with the idea that a "ban" can be "revoked."
After all, it was the initial screening abilities that were revoked in the first place...can revoke be used to mean "reverse" in this instance?
(Revoke implies to me that some ability associated with another person is being annuled. Here, the ban was not placed by the other party, but by the same party who will be reversing it.)
You all want to know the truth about what happens with the acadamy awards?
The big studios all spend huge amounts of money sending all the members fancy packs of all the films they want to get awards.
This incudes special box sets and stuff like that.
As soon as they arrive all the big name films suddly all disapear to the homes of friends who "BORROW" them never to be seen again.
The only ones left are the art house or indie moveis. Which end up living ontop of the dvd player until there is nothing interesting on TV then they might get watched.
I know ive seen it happen every year
I recently watched Kill Bill in the theater and much to my dismay, there were several instances of the CAP CODE splashed on the screen in white sections of the film, making them blindingly obvious to everyone.
I asked my wife if she saw any blotches in the movie without being specific to see if it was just me, but she described just the same thing I saw. One instance had a clearly defined open sided square just as O-Ren's aides opened the paper door at the House Of Blue Leaves.
Ostensibly this is to track cam jobs of the movie on the internet. In reality, all it did was annoy me (a PAYING customer) to such a point that I have decided that the next time I see a movie with these CRAP CODES in them, I am going to demand a refund from the theater. I'll point out exactly where the code is so I can prove I saw it. After that it's no more movies at the theater for me.
Screw 'em - if they think they need to ruin paying customers' enjoyment of a movie to supposedly stop cam jobs (which they won't dent one iota), then I will refuse to be legal myself and actively start pirating and encourage others to do likewise. Treat your customers like criminals and they will act like criminals.
Quizo69
Visceral Psyche Films
Woah, you like totally Melvyn'd me there, dude!
When I am king, you will be first against the wall.
How can I become a member of the academy. I wanna vote and make sure something like Titanic never wins again.
-- Karma Karma Karma Karma, Karma Chameleon - Boy George
Can somebody explain what the big deal here is? Aren't the movies reviewed AFTER they come out? If so, how is this a non-negligable risk of piracy at any stretch of the imagination, when Joe Viewer can pick up a DVD, rip it, and then return it, or mill them off in Asia? How are these "screeners" contributing to piracy? Is Tom Hanks running some operation out of his garage or something?
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
Either way, as long as there are DVDs, and patience...MPAA's KUNG FU is still one step behind
We nerds are the destruction of all society!
Rejoice in your power! It's all just numbers, but they don't know that! It is the downfall of Rome! Watch it burn! Please. Spare me the dramatics from the Senators and the people that pay them to make things happen like Jack Valenti.
Honestly, I have never seen such a society fearful of the neighborhood geek (the onese that make fun of you most are grateful to have around when their computer goes belly up during fantasy football trade time).
We are the nerds, but I have never thought that the ones that would get pushed off the monkey bars in gradeschool, or stuffed in lockers would be practically branded as Al-Qaida. Honestly, this is all too interesting to not laugh at. Amazing. If Ben Franklin was born today he would have been burning away on his keyboard right now, doing something that would, "contribute to criminal activity."
The rest of society is strangely gripped with fear so much of us losers in their basements that they are passing law after law trying to control the very ideas and thoughts of people, and make that this country is founded on a criminal offense. It is a great time to be a geek. Lots of power, lots of responsibility. Many say this is all bad. I think they have no idea what they are talking about. We are just the first Phoenix rising from the ashes to make a new, society that will be coming from the old. This is not a new process. This happens in every civilization about every hundred years. I for one am happy to be here to see it.
Something good will definitely come out of this. Certainly, I see that a lot of bad corporate practices, bad politicians, and bad people will get in a whole lot of hot water over the ideas that these bills and laws bring about.
And no, they cannot take away all of the freedoms of the world, because if they do, payback will be a real bitch. Being a leader is walking a tightrope, if you screw up, you'll get adjusted even faster than you thought you would. Look at Bush. The man is practically scrambling. SCRAMBLING. This geeks are evil thing will be adjusted soon enough when they realize that society has always had people like us around, and they have always been heretics... at least to the status quo Pat Robertson's and power broker Bill Gates's of their time.
NEVER, EVER, EVER underestimate the masses. This will work itself out. Trust me. You are not a slave, and no, they cannot shoot you and make this all go away like they used to. This is just a transitory time. As usual, it pays in the end to be a free thinker and use your brain. So don't freak so much. Things are going to be better soon enough.
In protest of the screener ban, they would have cancelled an award show?
I say keep the ban then!
I can't tell you how much I HATE those &#$( award shows.
Joan Rivers and others gawking over what horrendously tacky and expensive outfits the stars are wearing beforehand. Why do we care? The stuff is loaned to them, it's a form of product placement on part of the designers.
Then comes the preaching on the evils of P2P at the start of the show.
And before each award is presented, we get the awful, awful, awful, inane scripted banter on part of the presenters.
And then comes Justin Timberlake, Christina Agulera, and Brittney Spears. One or more of them seems to be present at every stinkin awards show, even if it's the Country Music Awards.
And then one act or movie always seems to take all the awards. Some acts like U2 and Tom Hanks always win no matter what the competition, or the merit of their particular thing (I like U2, but "Stuck in a moment you can't get out of?" Puh leeze)
And then they can't ever seem to end on time.
And sometimes it seems like there's an award show on every other day!
So if the screener ban causes these shows to be cancelled, I say "Bring it on!".
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Still not caring here.
The large corporations in the United States are controlling your government, your laws, your freedoms and your culture??!?!!
Makes me sure glad I am a Canadian. Swearing on regular cable, no RIAA, no MPAA, no lawsuits for customers, and corporate 'contributions' to political parties limited to a thousand bucks.
Land of the free my ass!!
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