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MPAA Sued Over DVD Screener Ban
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."
What's that? Chef's movie studio?
That someone sue over the 10 minutes of commercials I'm forced to watch after putting a DVD in.
From the context I'm assuming these are pre-release copies, but the article shouldn't have assumed that all /. readers would instantly recognize this term.
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.
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.
I don't understand why they are bothering to encode each VHS copy, and why they are bothing to release the screeners on vhs at all. I mean, come on, who the fuck still uses their VCR for anything except for watching old home movies?! Also, what happens if Jack Nicholson throws away his copy of "Brown Bunny" and someone goes through his trash and steals it and then uploads it to the internet and starts selling bootlegs on ebay? Is the MPAA going to go after Jack Nicholson for aiding piracy? This screener ban will eventually be recalled, but hopefully NOT till next year. Why? All of the lame-o indie movies won't have a chance to knock Lord of the Rings from getting it's well deserved Oscars. Face it, this year has been pretty slim in the "Oscar Worthy" movie department. Sure, lots of good performances, but nothing really great. LOTR has to win for Best Director, Best Picture and Best Supporting Actor (Ian Mckellan). Jack Valenti needs to retire. He has made nothing but bad calls over the entire tenure of his dictatorship (remember he said that the vcr would ruin the movie industry and actually tried to outlaw it!).
"Jeremy, you need to get to an internet cafe and cut and paste some appropriate sentiments about me from the world wide
trying to stop movies from reaching the internet is like trying to put a baby back into a woman..
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
It used to be that in order to compete for an Academy Award, the film had to be released via a huge 80 pound cannister of film (or TWO!). Then, when smaller films were getting included (in an attempt to be inclusive), the AMPAS decided to allow some of these smaller films to bypass the rules. I'm sure they see this as a mechanism to expand on a "loophole".
MEANWHILE... they risk losing relevance in the minds of the public by ignoring those films that are garnering significant support throughy internet-first releases, or through DVD releases. The trick is defining the line between "film" and "tv" or "internet". Good luck with that one folks!
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
I thought it was rediculous that the MPAA was able to impose that ban to begin with. I'm not upset...sure, I've recieved my share of screeners, but typically only kept those I liked anyway, and only until the better commercial dvd version came out anyway. I say if a movie house wants to put their film out there, let them do it! It's rediculous to lose any kind of elegibilities for doing what you want with your product.
Hollywood is dangerously close to being an exclusive, communistic institution and state unto itself.
Close? Who am I kidding??
Damon,
http://actionPlant.com
Pessimistic outcome:
MPAA Wins, small movie houses crushed by debt, MPAA Declares screener ban a 'non-issue' cuz no one left cares. Piracy rates remain unchanged.
Optimistic but still Pessimistic ouctome:
The small movie houses win by throwing the 'discrimination' tag around, thus hiding the real issues under a miasma of political correctness (a very thick and murky miasma at that). Piracy rates still remain unchanged.
Really optimisitic outcome:
Small movie houses win, screener ban repealed, MPAA gets 'a clue', Valenti discovers the way out of his own ass after years of deep internal struggle (ha). Piracy rates remain unchanged, slashdot loses issue to complain about (soon to be replaced, heh)
Seriously though, I think this is a very good thing to be happening, the lawsuit that is. I hadn't even thought of these small movies losing financing because of lack of award potential, but now that they mention it, it seems blindingly obvious. This is certainly not a frivolous lawsuit, and very refreshingly so.
I say, best of luck, small movie houses!
ìì!
So, would those be the Hollywood "indys" that co-opted the TRUE indy filmakers after it caught on in the past few years? Kind of like the "indy" RIAA labels.
--
Power to the Peaceful
Let me see if I get this straight. Some people were putting their screeners up for sale or available for P2P. So instead of tracking them down for violating copyright or blacklisting them from future screeners, the MPAA imposes a ban on all screeners. Isn't that like a software company banning all game demos because somebody posted their demo on Kazaa?
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
When I first got my DVD player I found that if you try to "skip" to the next "chapter" it doesn't work; you have to watch the commercials.
:)
But if you hit "stop" and then "play" without powering off, it goes right to the movie.
The MPAA is basicalling saying, play by our rules, or no one will ever even know your movie exists
I went to an advance screening last night for the first time in 5 years or so.
Printed on the back of the ticket was a 10 line disclaimer/EULA/warning about bringing in any "electronic recording equipment", claiming that my attending means I agree to have it confiscated if they find it (yeah, unsigned contracts always hold up in court!).
When we got to the theatre, we had our bags thoroughly searched (this is a leather attache case btw, and I was dressed in a suit and tie). They also ran a metal detector over us, and our bags. It was quite honestly as invasive as an airport screening area.
Then, when we sat down, the promotors did their shpiel, gave away some prizes, and went on a several minute tirade about how we shouldn't steal movies, we're hurting artists, etc. Anyone caught with a camera will be ejected and possible criminal charges brought against them. And (get this) if you see anyone else with a camera, please notify us immediately.
Finally, the movie starts, and I get to listen to another idiot telling me that downloading a movie is no different than stealing a chocolate bar.
I've never, ever felt more like a suspect in my life. After last night, I can understand why Blacks in the US complain about supposed random stops on the freeway. In fact, I almost expected a few police to be on hand.
Of course, for fun I poked around on Kazaa last night, and lo and behold, the movie was there. All it takes is one person, you morons, and inconveniencing and/or pissing off the MILLIONS of people who pay to see your movies is NOT a good way of doing business.
This is the final straw. It was bad enough last week seeing Master & Commander, and those damn brown spots were all over this one scene with mostly light-coloured backgrounds in it, so all I could do was sit there and think "Ok, enough with the dots!" and then lose track of what was going on with the movie.
I can't honesly see myself paying for another movie again, if this is how I'm going to be treated.
Oh, and in case anyone's curious, this happened in Canada. I guess we have our own MPAA equivalent here, or their reach is just that long.
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
Isn't that anticompetitive behavior?
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
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.
IE what stop's Small film companies from simply sending out screener copies to awards voters any way?
It's not as if either small film companies or awards voters are under any obligation to comply with MPAA decisions.
AFAIC MPAA decisions only effect MPAA members, which I assume are the big studios. Anyway if the small makers are members they could simply renounce their memberships