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Blockbuster Chief: End DVD Region Codes
Xesdeeni writes "Blockbuster's President/COO Nigel Travis has called for the elimination of the DVD region code. At issue is the situation when a movie is released in one country several months before it is released in another. He points out that pirates 'can drive a cart and horses through these holes in the release schedule.'"
I honestly thought noone would stand for the DVD region system when it emerged... Hollywood have always previously had some technical excuse, but this time it was pure and simple profiteeering. Not that my DVD players aren't all Multi-region, but the principle of the thing.
The MPAA wants us to believe that region coding only existance is to allow them to release movies at different times in different parts of the world.
But why are old movies region encoded ?
Even DVDs of movies from the 60s and 70s are region coded !
The release schedule is the *only* reason I can see for region encoding. And since everyone and their dog can strip their DVD player of region restrictions, it's a useless 'feature' anyway.
Can somebody please enlighten me as to the benefits of region encoding? I simply cannot see how the movie industry makes more money by selling to certain people earlier.
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I went to an AV store recently (a specialty store, not Circuit City) and the conversation went like this:
me: do you sell multi-zone DVD players?
guy: no Sir, they're illegal in this country. (U.S.)
me: well, I'm surprised, some companies sell them on their website
guy: well, you can buy illegal drugs on the internet, Sir.
me: but they're companies in the U.S., one website said the company was based in Illinois.
guy: Even if it was legal, we wouldn't sell them. It hurts our economy. The movie people in Hollywood need that system to protect our movies.
me: protect them from what?
guy: piracy
me: but I'm trying to watch zone 2 movies that I legally purchased in Europe recently.
guy: I don't know about that...
And then I walked out. This is still the perception out there.
May be if Blockbuster calls for change it'll make a difference.
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Actually, you guys sometimes get them sooner. We are about a season behind in the Buffy the Vampire releases here in the states, because the FX channel currently holds the rights to air them.
The recording industry didn't take one _little_ thing into account - legislation in the countries that are supposed to be blocked from distribution by having different region codes.
So the whole region thing is not supported in some countries. I happen to live in one, a small country called Israel.
The outcome?
1. DVD Players legally sold in an already patched-to-RPC1 (region-free) state.
2. DVD Videotheques holding DVDs from just about every region code out there, 7 and 8 not excluded.
3. The few players that are sold in RPC2 state are sold with written instructions from the supplier on how to patch them to RPC1. In case you can't read, their help line will be happy to instruct you on how it's done.
4. Locally-licensed DVD's of hollywood films carry a region icon (which says region 2). A simple inspection with any ripping software confirms there is no encryption on the DVD.
I'll bet this is ignored by the law of most east-european countries, at least half west-european countries, and I don't even think I need to mention South America and the East.
And that's without mentioning the fact that any 6-year-old with a DVDR, CloneDVD and a certain 3rd party app I won't mention can reproduce a copyrighted DVD in less time than it takes me to write this comment.
So I fully agree with Mr. Blockbuster. The whole region idea was a bad idea which may or may not have initially set piracy back a bit, may or may not have returned the investment and saved a penny or two for the MPAA, and is nothing more than a complete nuisance today in most of the sane world. A little dialog box in CloneDVD or wherever saying "Reproducing this content is illegal in the United States. You are responsible for your actions. Press CANCEL to abort now or OK to continue" - like Roxio's CD Copier gives out for Audio CD's - would save everyone the time and hassle. Everyone INCLUDING the MPAA.
My 2 cents.
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As a retail store, I generally have more control over how the products change than any single consumer. When people complain about a product, I let the distributor or manufacturer know IMMEDIATELY. If I don't notice a change, I find other retail stores (competitors) and ask them if they're having similar issues, and if they are, ask them to complain as well.
Almost every complaint I've had in the past 6 months has been addressed pretty quick. But I would not complain if I didn't hear it from my customer base.
Blockbuster is doing the right thing in my opinion, but I doubt many of us here have complained to the retail stores about region encoding. Bitching and moaning at slashdot isn't a very good start. Tell Blockbuster (and Wal*Mart and Target and Borders and Tower) that you hate region encoding. Enough people complaining WILL make a difference!
I've even seen end customers bitch to the distributors and manufacturers to no avail, because most retail customers don't buy direct. I'm the customer of the distributor and they do listen.
I could never understand why some big company has'nt taken on this before - WTO rules say that you can not put artificial barriers when trading, yet DVD region codes are exactly that.
Its a bit silly also when 99%* of DVD drives can take a 4 digit code just to multiregion them up...
Paul
* in my experience... no data dudes.
Blockbuster renting DVD's is directly attributable to that format becoming the new "standard" for watching movies. Without them, it would still be VHS first, DVD second. Only this year have DVD's become more popular than VHS, in the US.
Blockbuster quarterly filing.
Also note that the gross margin has jumped quite nicely since converting to a DVD driven rental business. Better product for the customer, at a slightly higher price, with better profits for the company.
You mean like in the UK, where Sony stores will offer to pre-chip players for you and keep the warranty in tact. Even though they're affiliated to a film production operation?
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I rented Bruce Almighty for the family to watch. It's rated PG 13. The forced to watch preview is R. (unskippable American Wedding preview) I don't let the kids watch R material. I call that feature User Unfriendly. We knew to preview the DVD and skip the sex scene for the 9 year old. Too bad they make you wait so long running past the preview instead of skipping it.
It shouldn't be standard pratice to load a DVD in the player 10 minutes before turning on the TV just so the previews are over. It's very User Unfriendly.
Sombody fix the FF button on those DVD's! 5 seconds in a preview is usualy enough to tell if the movie and preview are something I do or do not want to watch. Forcing an unwanted age inapropiate offensive preview is as welcome as a goatse.cx link in a technical discussion. The previews should not be rated worse than the feature. R, X and XXX previews should not be on G, PG or PG-13 features. Thank goodness the worst I have seen so far is R previews on PG-13 films. But like the seven words you can't say on TV, I don't expect them to keep to the curent high but dropping standards.
That alone has kept me from buying several DVD's I have rented.
Also ditch the crazy attempts at copy protection. I rented Legaly Blonde 2. The FBI warning got stuck in an endless loop on both a standalone DVD player (Classic brand) and a computer.
Anybody else experiance this?
I returned the defective DVD for exchange. I was told 8 others were returned the same day for the same problem and an exchange would not fix the problem. Copy protection is lost revenue. I got a refund as I couldn't view it. It also caused extra overhead for Hollywood Video the handle the consumer complaints. Third, there is no way I would consider buying it later because I already know all copies are broken. I also suspect anything else by the same studio may be plagued by the same ailment so I avoid that studio's work, just as I avoid CD's by those dabbing in audio copy protection. It might work, It might not, but once opened, it's almost impossible to return. Why bother?
A look on the good side is several of the DVD's I have bought lately list right on the cover they are all region! This is limited to old TV programs so far and not movies, but hopefully that day will get here. The down side is due to the music copyright issues the original theme songs are removed. Bummer! A new generation may view these classics and never know about the original theme songs. I guess they don't want people to enjoy the music as it was intended. There are some people out there that do want to sell DVD's and have taken steps to make them user friendly. They even took steps to keep the price reasonable by not paying inflated ASCAP prices so the DVD is reasonably priced. Too bad a reasonable price could not be reached with the music copyright holder to include the theme songs.
FYI the altered DVD's are The Beverly Hillbillies and The Andy Griffith Show.
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Why think illegal? I live in Argentina (Zone 4), I dont rent from BB from a long time for this exact problem, all the movies they rent are about 3-5 months late. What I mean, BB is not the only video rental store around, smaller ones buy the movies in USA and rent those, there is no law that prohibits that besides loyalty to the local movie distributors, which my guestimate is: only BB has...
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Blockbuster's weight is significant regardless of Viacom ownership; they're the only North American wide rental chain.
Remember Divx players? The ones that would essentially force you to buy a disc at a modest cost and then purchase codes to unlock the disc for single viewing, multiple days, or forever? This was the competing format against standard DVDs for about 5 minutes.
Blockbuster/Paramount/Viacom was a MAJOR advocate of them; I considered (and may still consider) it to be the most regressive form of copy protection this side of a Microsoft product.
And now Blockbuster is essentially saying "Copy protection doesn't work; get rid of it."
Good on 'em. It's about time major industry started focusing on what matters - last time I checked the movie business was supposed to make movies, not walls.
People will pay for good content: maybe the economics of the industry are skewed by the Hollywood cartel and need adjustment, but people will pay.
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"You don't like our region codes? Fine--noDVDforyou." And that's all she wrote for Blockbuster.
Sure, cut off a major portion of your income out of spite and watch otherwise profitable movies become money losers. I'm sure the MPAA will do that.
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Ain't it the same way there in the States?
A few years ago in my home town, there was a big spurt. A BB and a Video Works and a Video Replay and a Rogers Video ALL opened up in the same small suburb. The Video Works and Video Replay were even in the same shoping center. And they all went out of business within a few months, and manged to take the local store in the area out as well, so now everybody on the north end of town has a 15 minute drive to the BB in the central region (Which also drove another local store out of business. Not by being cheaper, because they were more expensive, or by offering better selection, because they didn't, but because there wasn't the demand to sustain that many damn stores, and they had deeper pockets)
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