MPAA School Propaganda Program Examined

Anonymous Coward copies-and-pastes: "'As part of its campaign to thwart online music and movie piracy, Hollywood is now reaching into school classrooms with a program that denounces file-sharing and offers prizes for students and teachers who spread the word about Internet theft. The Motion Picture Association of America paid $100,000 to deliver its anti-piracy message to 900,000 students nationwide in grades 5-9 over the next two years, according to Junior Achievement Inc., which is implementing the program using volunteer teachers from the business sector." Only $100,000 to advertise to 900,000 students? What a deal! We mentioned this earlier.

Comments

Only a step from

[Kierthos]

offering money to kids who turn other kids in...

"Rat on your friends, redeem valuable prizes!"

Kierthos

Re:Only a step from

[LittleGuy]

offering money to kids who turn other kids in...

"Rat on your friends, redeem valuable prizes!"

I'm saving my boxtops for the Elia Kazan Commemorative Lifetime Achievement Action Figure, With Kung-Fu Grip.

Re:Only a step from

[EinarH]

And they want to scare of the parents as well. A part of the program is a take home and fill-out-together letter to the parents.

I wrote a long comment about this and the program last time this was mentioned.
There are some links to the pdf files in the program there.

The Starving Artist is a discussion based game where students are divided in group and shall produce a CD but then they are ripped off by "file swapping". "how does this makes you feel?"

Share the following statements with the students to summarize the lesson with the class. These statements help summarize the lesson and connect the concepts to the students personally.
- To legally own it, legally buy it.
- If you haven't paid for it, you've stolen it.
- Copying a movie or CD for a friend is illegal.
- If you wouldn't take a movie or CD from the shelves of a store without paying for it, then why do it online?

I must say that $100,000 is dirt cheap for a program like this.

Re:Only a step from

[mike77]

And they want to scare of the parents as well. A part of the program is a take home and fill-out-together letter to the parents.

I personally am not a parent, but if I were, I believe I would be pulling my child out of these classes. When did schools become a lobbying forum for corporations? Was it when Coke and Pepsi started battling over who gets the lucrative lunchroom contract? (gotta get the kids hooked early and turn them into "consumers", it's their patriotic american duty) I doubt it will happen, because most people are sheep, but I would really like to see some outrage by the parents. What gives the *AA's the moral ground to stand on and come into the schools, and tell our nations children what is right and wrong. Last time I looked they represented money driven/hungry companies, and I cannot even think of a company anymore to which I can point and say, look, now there's a stand up company who's always done the right thing, and I'm proud to support them.

Parnets, make some noise, and don't sit by while your children are being "educated" by the united corporations of America.

Re:Only a step from

[brianosaurus]

They "forgot" to do the other part of that RPG:

Have the students divide into groups and produce CDs. Same game so far. But now have them try to get a deal with the RIAA. Have them find out that they don't get squat for all their hard earned work. Maybe they're CD will make it to a few shelves, but they won't see a cent, since all of the RIAA promotional budget goes to "sure things" like Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake's R&B career, and Metallica.

Then tell them that they can't distribute their music online since the RIAA now owns the copyrights to their songs. So they can't get any exposure. Next, tell them that their sales didn't recoup the advance they got from the studios to record the album, so they actually owe money back.

Then ask them how they feel about it.

Just like DARE

[AlgoRhythm]

And we all know how much THAT works.

At least taxpayers aren't paying for it.

Bad idea

[Anonymous Coward]

Anytime you tell a kid that something's bad, their first instinct is to go investigate it. After listening to the **AA's lectures, they'll immediately go home and log on the net to see what this "Kazaa" thing is.

remember

[Anonymous Coward]

remember when Ronald Reagon first started that war on drugs that even rewarded children for snitching on their parents...

even if you had a little pot in the home it was like you were an axe murderer...

now children, if your mommy and daddy have kazaa on their computer you be sure to tell us so we can sue the hell out of them and\or put them behind bars where they belong...

overly simplistic

[toasted_calamari]

From the article:
"If you haven't paid for it, you've stolen it."

I honestly hope that this program has a more complex take on IP than this. I can easily think of many, many things on line that can be obtained for free, legally. (the entire contents of sourceforge comes to mind.) IP law is phenomenally complicated and cannot be boiled down to simple slogans and sound bytes.

Re:overly simplistic

[Daniel Dvorkin]

The suits who run the studios are so disconnected* from the techies in the render farms that such issues never enter their brains.** And to big-corp-think, of course, free software -- free anything -- is an abomination and unclean anyway. Understanding this, IMO, is key to understanding everything from the [MP|RI]AA's reaction to piracy, to Microsoft's reaction to Linux. In their perfect world, you pay for everything; more specifically, you pay them for everything. The idea that anyone might be able to get useful stuff for free wakes them up in screaming nightmares. This is not rational cost-benefit analysis. This is a clash of worldviews as fundamental as Galileo's with the Church.

--

* I'm not claiming any special insider knowledge of how Hollywood studios work. This is my guess based on my experience of how big corporations work in general.

** If they have brains. Or hearts. Or courage. All of which are highly debatable.

Re:overly simplistic

[JediTrainer]

The riaa should learn from this lesson, too. If you try to charge someone more for a product because you assume they're going to do something illegal, people will find a way to get around the higher price. Proactive high prices don't fly in a capitalist society where everyone is waiting for the sale price, and unwilling to believe bullshit about "these are for data, those are for music" when they're identical except for the price.

That reminds me about something else. Some years ago, a contact lens manufacturer was successfully sued because they sold the same lens as both a permanent and and disposable lens. The labelling was different, and the price (something like $1 for the 'disposable' and $100 for the 'permanent'). The quality of the lens was the same.

I thought it had been made illegal to sell the same product deceptively this way and try to charge a higher price because of this ruling.

start while they are young

[Zanek]

This reminds me of one of my favorite books, 'A Brave New World'.
Program the kids while they are young and by the time they are adolescents they may think copying music (not stealing :-)
is as bad as physically stealing from a store. I wonder if someday some kid will be
like "Copying music is worst than stealing cars"

Re:start while they are young

[kfg]

Saw a congresscritter on the tube the other day (can't remember her name) foaming at the mouth, saying that downloading a song from the internet was stealing, just as if they had stolen a CD from a store, and should be prosecuted as such.

Ummmmmmmmmm, no. One is a civil copyright violation, roughly analogous to skipping out on a one dollar phone bill and basically the same as photocopying a chapter from a library book, and the other is larceny, the same as stealing a library book.

With great legal minds like that writing our laws is it any wonder we are where we are?

KFG

Excellent business plan.

[watzinaneihm]

I am going to stop my email-marketing business and going to pay a million to the government to let me teach students why a large penis is important in their life.And if they dont want that, ill teach them how to meet naked teens desperate to talk to them. And if they want alternatives, ill teach 'em how to put a wireless camera to good use.
If RIAA plan is legit, so is mine.

Re:Excellent business plan.

[dr_dank]

I am going to stop my email-marketing business and going to pay a million to the government to let me teach students why a large penis is important in their life.

R. Kelly, is that you?

You're forgetting...

[StringBlade]

They already know more about Kazaa, filesharing, and the Internet than most adults.

Salem File Sharing Trials

[bcolflesh]

My name is Goody Walters and I accuse little Billy Smith of file sharing! Burn him!

er its a school not a billboard

[pacman on prozac]

Why should any business or company be allowed to advertise in school, regardless of what their message is.

Besides what are they teaching the kids, that it doesn't matter if you make a load of worthless crap aslong as you have lawyers to back you up? yea great.

Re:er its a school not a billboard

[vwjeff]

My senior year in high school showed me the relationship between schools and companies.

Our school district was hurting for money like most school districts were. The high school principal offered exclusive selling rights to Coca-Cola and Pepsi. We had a survey in school on which we would prefer. Something like 78% wanted Pepsi. Pepsi offered the district $50,000 for exclusive rights for one year. Coke offered $55,000. The district went with Coke.

Many things at our school such as scoreboards were donated by Pepsi. They of course had the Pepsi logo. When they were donated there was a contract that stated the logos must say on otherwise ownership will go back to Pepsi.

Coke made many threats to sue the district if the logos were not removed. They finally had to remove the logos which resulted in Pepsi removing the signs.

My point here is that the district didn't gain anything. They had to buy new scoreboards and other equipment Pepsi originally "donated." From this real life experience I learned that schools are no place for ANYONE to advertise.

Brainwashing ?

[MoonFog]

Andrew Irgens-Moller, 14, buried his head into a backpack on his desk and rolled his eyes as the guest teacher warned of computer viruses and hackers that could take control of a user's desktop via file-sharing programs. He objected that antivirus software could scan downloaded files and only sophisticated hackers could pull off the remote desktop computer takeover.
Then the teacher cut him off.

These are brainwashing tactics... It is downright scary that these "guest teachers" are even allowed to spread such FUD. If they want to move young kids away from filesharing, try at least to feed them with false information.
"Your computer can be taken over at the minute you install Kazaa"

Re:Brainwashing ?

[Kircle]

More telling I think is the quote that followed:

Bret Balonick, a tax accountant on loan from PricewaterhouseCoopers to teach the anti-piracy class, was arguing that some downloaders have been affected by malicious activity. Besides, he said, it's illegal to upload and download unauthorized content online.

"If it's illegal in America, host it in Uzbekistan," snapped the 14-year-old.

The quote you mentioned does make it look like brainwashing, but the quote I mentioned here makes the kid look bad. Almost like saying, "move your money to a swiss bank account."

most insigtful comment in the article

[rokka]

"If it's illegal in America, host it in Uzbekistan," snapped the 14-year-old.

Contrast this

[cubicledrone]

With the average volunteer who might want to help kids in the local school districts learn to read or to operate a computer. Schools would require such a person to navigate a bureaucratic maze for weeks.

But for $100,000, they'll gladly put the taxpayer-funded curriculum on hold for the day and allow a live advertisement for the latest feature film to kids who can't read or construct a complete sentence. Incredible.

Interesting! New rights for us!

[Eric_Cartman_South_P]

Quoted from the article...

"If you haven't paid for it, you've stolen it."

Conversely, that means if I paid for it, I OWN it. Not a license of it, not some right to it, but OWN it. Now I can copy, broadcast, whatever. If the RIAA is going to boil things down, so will I. Time to give all those mp3's I OWN to my friends.

One good thing about it...

[Dave21212]

If they passed out pamphlets to the students, at least they won't be able to read them.

"Why Can't Johnny Read ?"
--- Because the teachers spend more time trying to brainwash and subdue the little brats than actually teaching them perhaps ?

Lovely...
Do any lawyers think there might be a case for equal time/access ? Send Linus or RMS around to teach kids for a while...

Uh huh....

[MoeMoe]

"The Motion Picture Association of America paid $100,000 to deliver its anti-piracy message to 900,000 students nationwide in grades 5-9 over the next two years"

And this is going to make an impact... how? Most kids at that age are smart enough to know when they are being jacked, even if they didn't, they would only be under the spell until the "prizes" ran out. If the MPAA went to 1st graders, prizes would probably reel them in without question. The problem with that is 1st graders, assuming they are computer literate, do not go downloading massive quantities of MP3s or DivX encoded movies.

<paranoid_rant>
Now if you ask me, the real goal for the MPAA in doing this is to trick the children into admitting they have downloaded a movie or two before and then threaten to sue their parents for everything they've got... To avoid litigation, the parents can agree to have the child stop using the computer altogether, and give him a calculator to play with instead.
</paranoid_rant>

This Is Worse Than You Think

[SirChive]

This is really bad. Not so much because the MPAA is going to schools to deliver it's particular propaganda. But because ANY group from private industry can buy access to school kids.

What's next? Representatives from the Brokerage industry going to grade schools to preach the virtues of buying stock? Fast food evangelists marching freely through classrooms brainwashing kids to eat only Happy Meals.

The MPAA is evil. But no more evil than any other industry group that will push it's own profits at the expense of all else. We are truely losing our integrity as a society if we let any of them into our schools.

So much for volunteering...

[Shoten]

I participated in JA when I was in high school, all those years ago; I was actually about to approach them locally and start participating as a volunteer. Frickin' forget THAT now. What are they thinking, acting as a forum where organizations can pay to disseminate information for their agendas?

Conspiracy theory meets business plan

[Stiletto]

1. Buy laws to make sure public school system is desperate for cash.

2. Dangle a little money in front of said schools in return for implementing "New Education Marketing Campaign"

3. PROFIT!!!

It's All About the Hearts and Minds

[BlackBolt]

Big media propaganda like this may work in a small sector of society, but it seems consumers are slightly unsatisfied with how the big media companies are handling things. And when the people aren't happy, economics dictates that they do what they have to do to get happy, in this case, pirate. I watch Survivor, all those pirate dudes love it there. Piracy is your friend. Now, I'm not condoning piracy, but the fact is, the corporations and the customers both have a responsibility to defend their respective positions, and to prevent the other power group from stealing too much control and upsetting the fragile and beautiful balance we call crapitalism. The system only works if both sides are doing their jobs, and that is:

Customers: Shop wisely. You are voting with your dollars. If you accept draconian DRM, you will NEVER get your freedom back. You must protect your individual rights by choosing the best product and not buying based solely on emotionally exciting advertising hype or getting pushed around by impotent corporate shortcuts to profitability.

Corporations: Adapt to the changing environment as you have always done. Listen to the customers and do everything possible to keep these informed consumers on your side. Search for innovative ways to improve your product, streamline your processes, and still make a REASONABLE amount of money. Stay alive to serve the customers tomorrow.

Here's a quick rundown of some of the main gripes consumers have with big media products today:

Things Wrong with Movies: Overpriced movies to match the overpriced snacks, Ben Affleck and J-Lo, crappy plots (which also may fall under the Ben Affleck category), $20+ million dollar salaries for actors which leads to increased ticket prices, irritating and useless copy-protection on DVDs, etc.

Things Wrong with Music: Overpriced CDs, Britney Spears, not enough money given to the artists, Britney Spears, generic one-hit wonder boy bands pushed like a cheap drug, Britney Spears, general refusal to adapt to the internet (thank Apple for what innovation there is there), etc.

Things Wrong with Satellite: Well, nothing.... We're just stealing that because we can.

I wish I was still in school...

[tipsymonkey]

I know exactly what I would wear that day

Let's play Starving Artist

[BigRedFish]

The Starving Artist is a discussion based game where students are divided in group and shall produce a CD but then they are ripped off

Whee! Hey kids, let's play Starving Artist! It's FUN!

Students are divided into groups, in which each group 'produces' a CD. When finished, they submit their CD to local radio stations hoping it will be played, and try to get them sold in record stores, only to find out that the radio only plays material presented by a members of a certain association, and the shelf-space at the store is contractually obligated to hold only that association's material. The best they can get is the one small indie store on the bad side of town will put some copies in a cardboard box up near the register with 'indie bands' written on it in magic marker. How does this make them feel?

Then the students shop their CD to association-affiliated record labels. After repeated rejections, the students finally learn that if they want their CD heard, they have to accept a contract that pays them, at most, 4.5 cents per $18 CD sold. How does this make them feel?

Students then put up a website and let people download MP3s of their CD for free, with an online store selling 'real' packaged CDs, along with T-Shirts, posters, keychains, and other such merchandise, with all profits going directly to the students. Students calculate how many 4.5-cent CDs they'd have to sell to make the same as the $6 profit from a single CD sale on their own site, even selling at half the association's price. How does THIS make them feel?

Then they learn that the association is rigging consumer devices such that their independent CDs can't play unless they pay fifteen grand to the association for a 'key.' And they can only buy the key if they agree to the 4.5-cent contract and let the association have all the merch sales. Students calculate how much an extra $1.60 per-CD royalty tax eats into their bottom lines, the cost of lost T-Shirt sales, and how many 4.5-cent CDs it would take to pay off the $15,000 for a key. How does this make them feel?

End of lesson discussion: Why are artists starving?

OPTIONAL: If time permits, the teacher may role-play a visiting guest teacher who tries to tell them that they're criminals for daring to want to produce or enjoy music without paying the association. Hilarity ensues.