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MPAA Sued Over DVD Screener Ban

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the we-want-awards-too dept.

bigjnsa500 writes "Fourteen small movie houses are suing the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) trying to stop the ban on DVD 'screeners'. 'It will chill the financing of independent films by limiting the awards they can receive', say the plaintiffs, who include Talking Wall Pictures, Sandcastle 5 Productions and Salty Features. They feel they are being treated differently because several 'specialty' indy film shops are still allowed to send out 'numbered, encoded videocassettes' to Oscar voters. This ban was issued by MPAA President Jack Valenti initially to stop the illegal distribution of DVD screeners on the Internet."

7 of 265 comments (clear)

  1. This is dumb. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    They should be able to send out whatever they want or not send it out. I'm so tired of things being settled in court when the answer is simple common sense, if they want to combat some imagined slight through no screeners then fine if the Oscars want to refuse to award any film without screeners then fine. This is ignorant. This country is too fucking sue happy.

  2. Are they upset that the competition is limited? by Sheetrock · · Score: 5, Interesting
    I know that if I was producing an indie film, I'd gladly welcome the ban as a way of allowing me to further differentiate my product by continuing to offer screeners. The process has been dominated by big studios for too long.

    What's the issue here? If anything, I'd expect a big studio to be upset.

    --

    Try not. Do or do not, there is no try.
    -- Dr. Spock, stardate 2822-3.




  3. Leave the MPAA? by Hungus · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Why not just leave the MPAA wouldn't that really be the meaning of independent? Or, does anyone know if you must be a member of the MPAA to qualify for the awards? Another option would be for them to send them out anyways and disregard teh MPAA altogether on this. I am no longer part of the movie scene ( though was once a member of NATO) might such an action cause repercusions from SAG et al?

    --
    Bad Panda! No Bamboo for you! In matters of importance ACs will not be responded to. Want to say something critical,OK
  4. Silly MPAA by Mr.+McGibby · · Score: 5, Interesting

    So I had a thought. The MPAA (at least pre-screener-ban) was trying hard to encode something into screeners to find out who was releasing them. All kinds of silly tricks like putting dots on the screen. The problem was that copiers noticed anything they tried because they were trying to put too much information in there.

    Why not simply try to encode one simple bit in the whole movie? Then randomly give out the screeners but keep track of who you give the two different copies to. After say, 5 releases, you've narrowed down the field pretty well. At least they would have an idea of what types of people are releasing the screeners. Oscar judges? Reviewers? Soccer moms?

    Anyway, that would certainly help the problem.

    --
    Mad Software: Rantings on Developing So
  5. Re:Well maybe they should by bluekanoodle · · Score: 5, Interesting
    If you Read the article you will see that they are claiming the if they don't agree to the terms of the ban, then they are cut out of almost 80% of the distribution channels.

    The MPAA is basicalling saying, play by our rules, or no one will ever even know your movie exists

  6. Re:Well maybe they should by Thud457 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Isn't that anticompetitive behavior?

    --

    the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

  7. Wrong. by Atragon · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Disclaimer: I live in Canada, our dollar is a bit lower than the states, all dollar amounts below are in Canadian dollars. I used to work in a movie theater. Concessions are where the theater makes the majority of its money from. On an average week during the summer, our core concessions (drinks, popcorn, nachos, hotdogs, candy) would net over $40 grand a week. Our RBOs (retail business outlets, ie, Pizza Hut, Burger King) would net between $1 grand and $2 grand per week, each.

    Why is it so profitable? Popcorn costs literally pennies per bag, drinks? same deal. Then you pay a high-school student minimum wage to sell them to patrons. Speed of service goals are under 1 minute for a single person order. Min wage here is $6.85/hr. A large popcorn, large drink (which is what they're trained to upsell to) costs $10.75.

    Let's do the math, 50 orders per hour (when it's busy, on average), times 10.75/order (on average), results in... 537.50 per hour gross, minus the wage ($6.85, and the food cost, let's be generous and say a whopping $15 for the whole hour), per open cash, and when it's busy, about 10 cashes open, so about $5000 NET per HOUR on a busy night.

    Wow, that's not too bad at all.