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Night Vision Goggles vs Pirates
Cormorant writes "It was reported in The Guardian that Warner Brothers has sent night vision goggles to cinemas across Britain for ushers to don and scan for camcorder pirates during the entire length of the movie [the new Harry Potter], along with watermarks and codes displayed on screen during the film. Mr Graham said "Video piracy is rife everywhere, and with the UK screening the film four days before the rest of the world, Warner was concerned the movie would end up on the internet. Warner sees the investment as negligible compared with the threat to the whole industry."
Returning as Sam Fisher, you infiltrate the theaters of the UK...
Theater pirates may get lots of press, but most of the stolen copies freely available are taken right from the studios themselves.
Have you Meta Moderated t
It'll be interesting if this really stops piracy or not. It just takes one recording and all their efforts are wasted.
...if cam captures were the main source of piracy, but from what I've read, it's a lot more common for the leaks to come from "insider" sources. Either from post-production workers, or theatre employees in the projection booth.
... going to spout off about how they have no right to be observing us? I mean, what gives them the right to spy on us during a movie that we paid good money to see?
That seems like a waste of time.
All a pirate has to do is pay the kid making minimum wage running the projector a couple hundred pounds to let the pirate sit in the booth and record from there!
And before everyone start yelling about that it isn't Piracy but Copyright Infragment (is it spelled like that?) remember that words do live and change their meaning over time. Piracy is the new definition most people in the world use for unauthorized copying/distribution/ripping of copyrighted material, and hence, the word piracy will recieve a new meaning whether we like it or not.
(now to wait to get modded as a troll)
does it really stop our favourite cinema employee videoing it for us/letting us in for free?
It looks like I'm going to have to get some IR absorbing coating on myself and my camcorder now.
except, they can use this to boost up coverage in media.
which is what's this is really about, or they got some very stupid idiots deciding where to put the money.
maybe they haven't noticed that nobody really watches shitty cams made in secret during a public view? or if watches, wouldn't be very likely to watch it in the theatre anyways if he'll settle for that.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Wasnt a similar story posted a month or so ago about projectionists using NV gear to look for pirates video cameras in the audience?
correct me if im wrong... but the only reason to use infra-red goggles would be to spot the lil distance finder beam that most camcorders use for their auto-focus.
if thats the case all the pirates have to do is cover that up with a bit of tape & focus manually, right?
Now when the projector gets screwed up or there's no sound, there will be theater personnel on hand to notice!
"It's a wonderful idea. But it doesn't work." -- Tad Danielewski
We had a set sent to our theater, and have had a bit of fun playing with them. We were amazed to find how many people actually use their cell phones during a movie. Just goofing off I've seen cell phones, laptops, and a gameboy! But no camcorders, yet.
Turn about, me Buccaneers, lest we be cast to Davey Jones' Locker! Tharr be Night Vision Goggles on yonder shore!
\Shiver me timbers etc.
Seriously, how could bootleg piracy videos really hurt their industry?
Harry Potter's target audience isn't the people who scour the net for zero-day pirate releases, and anyone who doesn't go see the movie because they saw already saw it in a grainy fuzzy download, probably wasn't really that interested in the movie anyway.
Anyone know of a legal way to blind/over glare these night vision googles? Could I bring in a high intensity IR light and have it going and not bother the regular folks? Do they make IR flashlights? Is it legal for folks to be watching you like this? Is it legal for you to be 'broadcasting' a normally not visible spectrum of light? I guess they could kick me out anyway...
"If you are on fire you can just stop, drop, and roll. If you fall into Lava you are just dead." - my 5yr old daughter
First, the guys working in the theatres who make minimum wage are not going to report anyone for pirating a movie. They aren't paid enough to care
Second, all the good pirated coppies come out before the movies hit the theatres and are from the studio themselves.
Sounds like the guys trying to thwart the pirating aren't very knowlegeable themselves about what/how it happens.
Evolution or ID?
Remember when the ushers used flash lights? This weekend I bought some new batteries and bulbs for some of the flash lights I own... Maybe I should rather invest in a set of night vision goggles. Hear a noise at night? forget the flash light! hand me my night vision goggles.
Sniper rifeles and teargass granades and perhaps the who outfit.I really want them to make a movie based on Rainbow Six...Harry pothead got too old for his role too...
It may not cost the film industry much to implement this policy, but the biggest cost will be to their reputation. They are following the music industry by removing one of their best forms of publicity - the small-scale, private piracy that ultimately leads to increased sales of their products.
43 - For those who require slightly more than the answer to life, the universe and everything.
You're a wizard Sam Fisher
when the usher walks in with night goggles, the pirate will only have to flash at him, or point at his face with a lanternt to blind the poor fella untill he can put his gear appart and save the day for all the other pirates in the same room.
"The quality of life is inversely proportional to the number of keys on your keyring."
I guess this means no more nookie in the back row of the theater, or my $1.99 bag of gummy worms from the corner store. Next thing you now they might start using them airports for perimeter checks and make them as secure as my theater.
War isn't about who's right. It's about who's left.
I could really use some nightvision goggles to observe the night life of that hot chick next do... Uh... Of a random small group of badgers. Yes, badgers. And mushrooms.
I saw this on Monday night here in the UK.
The warning at the beginning of the film about night vision goggles being in use in the cinema made everybody crack up laughing at the absurdity of it all.
Pirates will begin modifying their video equipment to look like these devices, thus foiling the ability of pirate scouts to spot actual pirates.
Then, one day, a movie theatre employee will kick out a blind man, suspecting him of pirating the movie.
All matter of hell and lawsuits will spew forth and in the end, only the blind people will suffer.
So, ban movie theatre pirate scouts before it's too late!
I always save my last mod point to mod up a good troll. You people are too serious.
How is it damaging if a crappy copy of Harry Potter gets out? I'd WANT those crappy copies out if I were Warner Brothers. It prevents someone from getting a DVD preview and then putting that all over the place. If there are crappy versions that have horrifying sound and horrible video, people will see that as a tease and go see the real movie. It's a freaking kids movie! Kids won't be happy watching something on a small screen in the worst quality possible!
That's scary.
It sure is good to see the Movie industry finally catching up with the Music industry.
of the 'feet off the seats rule'. And stop all embarassing episodes of PDA - both hetero and homo-sexual (not that there's anything wrong with that).
Perhaps if they started showing the movie everywhere on the same date, this wouldn't be such a big issue.
Why are the brits (or americans, most of the time) gifted with early showing while the rest of us have to wait? Aren't all movie goers the same?
Someone at these movie companies has got to wake up and realise that some of the people who download these movies recorded from the cinema (in rotten quality) are so eager to see the movie that they would pay the ticket if it were opening in a theater near them.
Instead, it's the usual screaming of PIRATES!! to avoid looking at the real problem.
Whoops.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
Besides, who would be that desperate to watch a movie recored from a theatre ?
for the last time people, I am "frodo from middle eaRTH", not "middle eaST".
And there is yet to prove whether or not pirate copies on the Internet prior to its theatrical release are detrimental to movies gross box office totals. It's like the music industry claiming loss of sales based on unrealistic assumptions about file swapping. Studies about this topic do in fact contradict each other, depending on who funded the research.
First the Web, then groups, then images, then froogle, then Gmail, and now.... NIGHT VISION!! ON 100,000 Linux boxes!!! NOW I CAN SEARCH THE WEB IN THE DARK!!! ...oh... goggles.
ZERO
Wow ! What a cool perk for the poor kiddies who have to deal with all those sticky seats and whining kids ! I see a lot more use of the NVG's that get 'borrowed' after the cinema closes. Anyone ever tried night driving with NVG's ? It's very cool- something about blowing past the cops lights off on a dark highway. (I tried it many years ago with a pair of USG pilot's NVG's.)
.. because in a few years time (3-6 ?) there will be video quality recorders which can hide in the centre of a persons glasses.
I'm not promoting piracy here, just saying that they are completely wasting their time - if they really want to "maximize profits with their combined synergies" then they would simply reduce the price.
You can't expect to wield supreme executive power, just because some watery tart threw a sword at you
Say you took a reasonably high powered IR LED, and fitted it to a 9v battery, would its output be enough to blind the night vision?
I've got no interest in seeing OR ripping off Harry Potter, but I don't take kindly to being spied upon in a movie theatre.
yes, www.dotcomforwardslash.com is my real URL.
watch all those goggles get stolen. the minimum wage kids will take them. The studios are helping support the next generation of peeping toms.
Evolution or ID?
Of course, there are still pirates on the seas today, and maybe people do use night vision technology to spot them, although radar's good, too.
Mod parent up!
Honestly now, how many screeners have you downloaded and watched? Not very many, probably. Why not? Because the quality is dismal compared to leaked copies. Most of the movies I've seen are of VHS (if not DVD) quality, not screeners. IR goggles aren't going to help. These studios just don't want to accept that their primary source of leaks is an internal one, either from promotional copies or early edits.
Nothing but the finest in meaningless drivel
will movies stop being made because a (likely insignificant) percentage of the population has a crappy-quality bootlegged vhs tape of the back of somebody's head?
i suppose it's a similar argument to the one against music sharing, but people who are willing to watch a bootlegged movie (i would think) are either a) not going to see it in the theater anyway or b) are quite excited about seeing it in the theater.
but hey, whatever. if you've got a couple bucks to throw around on night vision goggles in every single theater in a country, go for it.
Anyone who is happy with the resolution, steadiness (lack), and sound quality of handycam movie ripoffs is going to wait to rent from the 99 cent category, if anything. Anyone who is unhappy with those attributes is going but watches it anyway is a dedicated fan who is going to go anyway to the theatre when it comes to their hometown.
when all you needed to take on pirates was a cutlass, a musket, and of course if you're in Bengalla and it's the Sengh Brotherhood you're dealing with, the Phantom wouldn't hurt.
Im actully planning to go see it based on who is directing this one, Alfonso Curan (sp?)(Y Tu Mama Tambien, Great Expecations, The Little Princess). If it was the hack they had before, i would never have cared to see the movie. So really, if hollywood doesnt want to loose my money, they should put good directors in charge. I think bad movies are more of a threat than piracy is, well to me anyway.
In America we are imprisoned by our fear of them.
How I understand it, watermarks create slight variations in the encoding of the movie (color, in this case) that are invisible to the eye, but detectable by computers. I wonder, though, whether these watermarks actually make it through to a camcorder rip of a movie, seeing as the quality is so degraded, and the color is so washed out.
Maybe it would make more sense, i think, to flash the serial number of the film print for a frame or two at random points in the film. At 24 fps, the human eye would not notice, especially if the number is simply super-imposed on the video, possibly in a section of the current frame that attracts the least attention of the viewer's eyes. I went to a research talk once of an algorithm to automatically detect the point of high interest in every frame of video, so this could be done automatically.
If I had any intention of going to the Harry Potter movie, I would go. Regardless of whether there's a ripped copy available online. People don't go to movie theatres because it's their only way to see a flick - they go for the theatre experience: big screen, big sound, greasy food.
------- "From bored to fanboy in 3.8 asian girls" ----------
Could this be avoided if they just released the film on the same day everywhere? If it is only four days early in the UK, they must have the film produced for all the markets already so that shouldn't be a problem. I sure they probably have some marketing reason to hold it back but does anyone really think that they can get more customers in other countries by showing it later?
(from stanthecaddy)
% Anna and George in George's car.
George: I'm a bootlegger.
Anna: You're a what?
George: I'm bootleggin' a movie, baby!
Anna: Isn't that illegal?
George: I can do hard time for this one. And community service!
Anna: Is this your FiberCon?
George: (Takes it and throws it out window) Get outta my way!
C'mon ... they were checking out the action in the seats !
Everybody knows that they make all their money from selling inflated priced popcorn and frozen 'coke'...
I know you are psychotic, but please make an effort.
Here in Manchester, it's much less high tech.
At the opening night of 'The Day After Tomorrow', the house lights were never dimmed properly and
every 15 mins or so, someone came in with a camcorder scanned the audience and left.
I suppose they can then see who (if anyone) was using their own recording device.
More of the 'presumed guilty' state.
No sharp objects, I'm a programmer!
I think this is the first time I heard of studios providing NVG to prevent piracy in theaters.
However, I also think this is doomed to fail.The quality of some cam recording lets me think that some pirates may be friends with a projectionnist, thus giving them access to "private" screening with no audience except a camera.
And what of the ushers themselves. Surely quite a number are in facts students with part-time jobs. The same students that download films on p2p. what's to prevent _them_ from camcording the film ?
The only real defense against this would be releasing the film the same day everywhere
forget piracy, this is interfering with all the "fun stuff" in the theatre... sheesh... now I'll have to cuddle with her there too!
(heh)
"why don't you just slip into something more comfortable...like a coma!"
I wouldn't worry too much about the night vision goggles. Anyone smart enough to bring a camcorder into a theater is surely going to know how to defeat anyone with night vision goggles.
Magnesium flares!
Karma: SELECT `karma` FROM `users` WHERE `userid`=138474;
If you were a theater owner, what financial incentive would you have to pay an usher to look for pirates?
Note to self: look for cheap night vision gogles on ebay in the near future.
Most CCDs are highly sensitive to IR, and IR filters are not that good (they heavily degrade photo quality). For $30 worth parts they could just put IR-LED strobes on or around the movie screen. It would basicaly make using electronic recorders useless.
I suspect so would out of humman range static sound pulses.
KISS
I would rather be ashes than dust!
I'm guessing most of the people who download/buy a camcorder'd version wouldnt be paying to go see the movie anyways.
Kidding, of course...
-- In Soviet Russia, radio listens to YOU!
What bugs me, is that movie goers excpect a bit of privacy in the theater (as many couples can attest). Unless big 'we are watching you and we can see you in the dark' posters are posted in front of the theatre, I would think this should be regarded as invasion to that privacy.
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html
Shes 14, so two years for the UK. Sicko.
So, if the goggles intensify the light then wear all black, use a camcorder that is black and isn't showing any light. then they can't see it.
Evolution or ID?
....that doesn't have people shagging in it? stolen copies are the cause of most illegal distribution. Of course, by talking about camcorder "pirates" the studios can convince people that "pirated" copies are always grainy and full of background noise, rather than the near-DVD quality you can download via bittorrent.
Mod parent up!
Since a camcorder in the cinema is possibly the worst way to copy a movie, doesn't that just mean that the film industry will be acting as quality control for the pirates?
I would bring a camera into the movie, but not film anything. Set it out on my lap so they are sure to see it. Then when they pull you out in the middle of the movie, arrest you, etc. I'de say you have pretty good grounds for a lawsuit. After all, it's not illegal to have a camera in a movie is it?
"Hey, where are you going with the goggles, man?"
...
...
"Boss told me to check for videocams in the theatre."
"Dude - fair warning, Paul Reuben is in there. I wouldn't go if I were you."
"Who? Look, I just do what the boss says. See ya in a few."
"!"
"You got a fork suitable for removing eyes around here?"
Hope WB is able to handle the 'problems' of this technology.
-Adam
They can also use this publicity to help stop some of pirating from happen. Just the announcement of higher security will reduce the amount of pirating going on. The point of this is to not to catch the criminal, but to prevent him from even doing the crime. The perception of tighter security is probably the main reason this annoucement was made.
I couldn't think of anything witty to say, so...you're stuck with this.
I don't personally download movies, I'm too much of a videophile snob to want to watch a low quality rip with bad audio. But I know many who do, and very often (very very often), if the movie is good they pay for a movie at a theater AND buy the DVD... So how much are these people *REALLY* hurting the movie makers, possibly they *MAY* have bought a stinker or two by mistake... But in reality seeing a movie on the silver screen and getting the DVDs offers enough incentive to warrent the purchase.
Fire off a nice bright flare in the movie and watch all the ushers walk around bumping into walls and tripping over half empty popcorn buckets (the size of 10 gallon hats) as they are temporary blinded. You may not be welcomed back, but that would be something worth watching.
"Look Lois, the two symbols of the Republican Party: an elephant, and a fat white guy who is threatened by change."
When I first heard that theatres were thinking of doing this (this technique has been talked about for quite awhile), my first thought was that I needed to get myself a really bright infrared LED to mount on a hat...
Do you really need reason for beer? Wingman Brewers
So when I go to the movies, the employee's will just think I'm some crazy anti-piracy vigilante, but in reality, I'll be recording the movie!
In NYC, it's almost double that.
...I'm getting a job as an usher right now.
Pirate Party UK
We need to get a cinema full of Slashdotters to go and take the remote control for their telly with them. When the usher comes in with the goggles everyone should descretly flash them with the IR beam.
Their reaction would probably be more entertaining than the film itself.
Philip
Signatures are broken
...and flash them right between the eyes.. I mean, these are probably of the type that just amplify the light 1000x or something :-)
P.S.: I'm not really suggesting that you should do this of course :-)
How long is it going to be before we see the first lawsuits from this.
In the back row of a darkened movie theatre "things" happen. People disturbed in the middle of an essential part of the human mating ritual by drooling minimum-wage usher-boy aren't going to be too happy.
And that's not counting the dangers from one person armed with a pocket flash/laser pointer and a malicious sense of humor
'Don't worry' said the trees when they saw the axe coming, 'The handle is one of us.'
I heard a story about a guy with a Ferrari or Lambroghini in the 80s who had some night vision goggles and would drive by speedchecks at 150+ for laughs. The story went that he did it a few too many times and they put up a barrier to see what it was and there were little pieces of car+driver all over the road. I'm pretty sure it's an urban legend, but it made for an interesting story.
I got to use a gen 4 or 5 (lab prototype NVG in the late 90s) you could have read or driven with this it was amazing (about the size of a credit card). Even cooler, though, was the scope off a stinger missle. It was as big as an old camcorder (the full size VHS ones). But you could see all sorts of stuff (studs in the walls), the recently turned off lights, and of course the people. Looking back it was impressive that they passed all of this around in a crowded dark lecture hall.
Degaussing scares the bad magnetism out of the monitor and fills it with good karma.
So, where's the study that proves that people are MORE likely to go to theaters or buy DVDs, if they can freely download a movie?
I suppose that the movie studios can do what they want to - but we can lobby to change the laws. I think that IP Laws and IP enforcement have gotten silly beyond imagining, when things like this happen.
Education is the silver bullet.
If Warner sees a poor quality copy of its movies as a threat serious enough to track down camcorders in theaters, maybe they should ask themselves why people would want to download them. Could it be that recent movies are so lame that the extra comfort of digital image and surround sound are not enough to make viewers fork out $10 or more ?...
Except for the "I saw it first" factor, the main drive behind joe user piracy is the "it's not worth $10". Or for music albums, "it's not worth $15".
Again, they're using the wrong tactics to lure consumers back in the shops. I'm not condoning piracy, but it's the same old debate over and over again. What people want are reasonnable prices. Or else they'll get their kicks with bad quality copies and still be happy with it.
At least they're clear on who the villains are in this case. I eagerly await "Harry Potter and the Movie Industry".
Why, in any case, are they opening it first in the country where the recordings came from previously?
Too late, I've already download it. However, that does not mean I won't pay to see it when it opens in the States. It was good...
Notice how little mainstream press there was about the DVD screener(s) being traced back to comp copies given to members of the Academy.
Damned in-theater pirates... they give piracy a bad name.
OTOH, I should also point out, that this type of copy is often made from the projection booth. Good luck scanning the audience for that piracy problem.
Kinetic stupidity has a new brand leader: Allen Zadr.
The fascist capitalist bolshevik corporate overlords are yet again conspiring to encroach on my freedom to record all that I see, even though i happen to be in a movie theater that is privately owned and even though that couple in front of me is totally unaware that i am filming them more than the movie and plan to distribute videos of them making out on emule; But they have no right to film me! Those communist fbi Hoover-worshipping hippies think they can just go around filming whatever they see, even me in the theater, uh, itching myself, while filming the couple in front of, i mean the movie.. oh jebus.. i mean Privacy Forever!!
In fact, the awards screener DVDs are only one source. (A "screener" is a promotional preview videocassette/DVD of a film provided by a film company, or its distributor, to video store owners or movie award voters prior to its general release date. Selling, trading or distributing these "screeners" is frowned upon by the MPAA)
Every point in the production cycle where the movie transitions from print to electronic version is a possible leak.
Screener traces are already in place. And there was a notable incident this year where an Acadamy of Motion Pictures member was caught bootlegging his screeners by the trace technology.
Have you Meta Moderated t
Night Vision goggles have built in safety mechanisms that prevent the user (and device) from being damaged by looking at bright light sources while they are turned on. Using an IR light to "blind" someone looking for pirates would only serve to draw attention to yourself and get you kicked out.
What does it cost to see a film in the UK?
You're right, it's an urban legend:
http://www.snopes.com/autos/law/stealth.asp
"A friend of my father's was a cop in Nevada, and he was assigned the graveyard shift, posted outside of town on a little used section of road, given a radar gun and ordered to stay put and to pull motorists over for speeding. One night, while the officer waits by the side of the road, the radar gun starts screaming for no apparent reason at all, registering about 140. The officer, who was sleepy anyway, attributes this to a faulty gun, and ignores the incident.
A week later the same thing happens again, on the same stretch of road, at about the same time at night. This time, however, the gun registers 145, and the officer pays more attention. Later, after his shift is over, he has the gun checked out for problems, and is told it is operating perfectly. A week later, same road, same time, the gun goes off. By now the police officer is confused, and angry.
The next week he has men stationed at a road block a few miles down from the spot where he has been positioned. Like clockwork, the radar gun goes off, and he alerts his friends to get ready for whatever is racing down the highway.
At the road block is stopped a black Lamborghini, with an engine iced and baffled for silent running. The driver is a drug mule, hauling a load and staying on the backroads, and less frequently monitored highways. The car itself is running without headlights, while the driver wears night vision goggles.
Status: False"
i think this is just a publicity stunt on the part of the movie industry. they want to be able to say to congress (or to the public via those inane ads), see what lengths we have to go to in order to protect ourselves from these nasty pirates?
We've got a 3 year old and a toddler so we often go to the Drive in. Great screens at our drive in and sound is broadcast through our FM receiver which I'm sure I could synch up with the Video feed given the right camera. Just a thought.
They're using these to protect the movie? How about the viewers that have to put up the loud mouths?
I say use the goggles to discover and eject the jerks!
In the U.S., it's usually low-paid teenagers working as theater ushers. Yeah, give them night vision goggles to play with. Now you have a pirated movie AND missing night vision goggles!
I'll just put my camera in a big cowboy hat...
I took the kids to see it last night... its about a wizard and his mates - they get up to all manner of wizarding stuff and in the end fight a werewolf and something which looks like it was copied from the LOTR - dont bother going to see it... I just told you the whole plot
Previous AC poster might have struck gold.
1.) Studios: provide freely available versions with high compression and cut/blackout some key scenes
2.) Attach advertisements for local theaters
3.) Rake in cash?!?
Pirates hijaak your ship, abuse your crew, and steal your goods and money!
These lily-livered, zit-faced kids perpertratin' copyright infringement are not pirates!
YAAAAARRRRRRR!!!!!!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
If the movie is really bad, but still gets a ton of hype having a grainy spoiler show up on the net could knock the hell out of the first big weekend the studios counted on to recoup their loses
I used to have a cool sig, back when I cared
So what if the ushers catch them. What happens then? Do they just kick them out of the theater? They'll just show up for the next show. What should happen is that police are notified and 10 of them swarm in, yank the guy out of his seat, and then make sure that the first ones caught get 3-4 years in jail. After a while, the others will get the message. And it's cheaper than issuing night vision glasses to every movie house.
If we have night vision goggles, we can see ahem...night vision "action" and as long as there was to be a video camera anyways as well as money, we point money, camera and night vision goggles to the couple snogging in the back row and make a profit upon selling it on the web...and to their parents :-)
I have a theory that the truth is never told during the nine-to-five hours. -- Hunter S. Thompson
I've seen a couple of videocammed movies. Wow. A grainy, jiggly, low quality image with bad sound. Is there really a demand for this?
--- Ban humanity.
to catch Pee-Wee Herman?
Don't night vision goggles require a fairly constant light level to work? Wouldn't the constantly changinh light level in the theater make them useless?
We're spied on when we go shopping/gambling/banking/etc - how's the goggle thing different?
Phones? Laptops? Camcorders? Start looking for the ladies being banged on the back seats and then you use YOUR camcorder ;)
Okay, I don't get it. In one breath, slashdotters complain that they don't understand why people are willing to buy or otherwise obtain a bootleg video taped copy of a big name movie. In the other breath, they complain of movie ticket prices reaching upwards of $9 apiece. That dull thud you heard was a clue bouncing off a dense cranium.
Thanks to my 8-5 job and steady income, I can afford to pay these immensely outrageous ticket prices these days. I still enjoy the experience of going out to the movies and sitting in the theater with a bunch of people and watching a huge screen.
Not everyone can afford the price. Not everyone cares about the quality the theater gives you. Lots of people want to see these big release movies. And not everyone thinks its immoral to get a bootleg copy of a movie like this.
You'll find plenty of people who fall into the above four categories. That's a market, a market the MPAA is loathe to exploit because to reach the market they'd have to lower ticket prices and that's not going to happen. However, while they have no true figures on what kind of damage piracy would do to any industry, they don't want to take the chance that what's happening to the music industry happens to movies.
Many people don't particularly care for the movie theater experience. As it stands, you MUST go to the theater to see a first run movie, and wait otherwise. If you don't have to wait, why go to the movies? The MPAA would lose control and in order to make movie theaters attractive again they'd have to... yup, you guessed it, drop ticket prices.
Ironic, ain't it?
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
Too late. Get your latest Harry Potter film on IRC.
Vote for new mod!!! Score:-2,Imbecile
When I worked at a theatre the biggest pirate was the theatre manager. Every once in a while I'd see him in the projection booth copying the films via a mirror reflector. We once had to get a new print because he would cut out so many frames that the film lost five minutes - I have no idea what he was doing with the frames.
As an usher you could bet I wouldn't be wearing those goggles, either. It was bad enough doing the Will Rodgers collections and stopping people from bringing in outside food. For what they paid, let them do their own undercover missions.
Most of the pirated movies, of decent or better quality, are taken BY THE MOVIE THEATRE STAFF THEMSELVES after hours. A couple of years ago a friend of mine told me that he did this a few times to make copies for himself (he stopped doing it for some reason, possibly moral), and what he would do would be to just play the movie after the last showtime and record everything himself in perfect sound and image.
;) lol.
Can anyone else see us weird special 'codec capable' glasses at the movie theatre to prevent piracy?
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What I don't get is why the watermark thing works at all.
Has no one written a program to merge several films and subtract out the noise (e.g. watermarks)? I mean, comparing two videos and establishing which bits are identical IS old tech, no?
All you need is software like that and video from two theaters, and you should even be able to enhance the quality and remove motion.
The report doesnt mention the chloroform napkins that come with the goggles. Step 1 - Use goggles to spot pirate Step 2 - Approach from behind gingerly armed with chloroform soaked napkin Step 3 -
The next step will be to add a "record mode" to the night vision goggles to aid prosecution.
Shortly thereafter, someone in the movie industry will publish the footage. Reality cinema arrives when we pay to see this footage. Finally the loop is completed when pirates copy this footage.
They're not goggles, its a hand held night scope, the sort that you would fit to a rifle. They're fun, but they'll not stop any piracy. I'm pretty sure there's a bittorrent out there already, I know there is for The Day After Tomorrow and that only opened this weekend too.
I don't think they're trying to stop the widescale pirates, what they're trying to stop is someone taping the film so that they can watch it again at home, without having to either: go back to the cinema, or wait 5 months for the DVD.
That possession of Night Vision Goggles is a crime?
It's seldom prosecuted, but it is in fact illegal - they are considered "armament" in much the same way that bulletproof vests, helmets, and "gas" masks are. It is illegal to stockpile weapons, and NVG's are considered "weapons" by the State Department. As I imagine that a large theater probably has more than a few pairs, they'd probably qualify as a "stockpiler" under the law.
Kind of ironic, isn't it - in order to prevent a civil offense, movie theaters are inadvertently committing a federal crime....
Also, more interesting - should a court find that a theater overcharged its customers, the presence of "weapons" - as defined by armed robbery laws - would make them guilty of armed robbery as opposed to a simple theft. I wonder if anyone has thought about the implications of this...
And yes, there are states *cough* Arizona *cough* with attorneys general that do enforce the law, word-for-word. (A recent father was convicted of murder and sentenced to the mandatory minimum jail sentence for a traffic accident which killed his child. A law was recently passed which automatically makes the perpetrator guilty of murder if anyone is killed in the commission of a crime, even if they themselves didn't directly cause the death - his offense was running a red light. In another case, a startled homeowner shot his own son during a burglary attempt and the burglar was charged with murder - even though neither had any intention of killing anyone.)
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
You know... I never saw myself ever wanting to see this film, but now I have a reason. Oh yes, a very good reason. (Insert evil laugh here)
People that believe in their opinions don't post AC.
Man there goes my necking with the woman....... oh wait!!! I see a new soft core porn industry!!!!
-Ghost
To put it simply: Good
Taking a camcorder into a theater is breaking the law. If they can spot people with night vision goggles, that's great. They shouldn't be doing it.
Completely setting the MPAA aside, this is blatant copyright violation. It's clearly prohibited, and no one can reasonably feign ignorance on this. How many people reasonably take the camcorder for purely personal viewing with no intent to distribute the copy?
If it's for personal viewing, they can wait, spent $4 more, buy the DVD, and be legal.
What does it mean and what happens to it when it gets nuked?
Well, here we have proof that the brain can be insidiously rewired by means of a simple repetitive challenge / reward cycle (Google search -> Google search found -> increase in endorphin levels -> addiction to Google -> more Google).
This will probably lead to a sort of cultural phenomenon: GoogleFans -> GoogleMania -> GoogleAddicts -> Google plays Shea Stadium -> It's Been a Hard Day's Search -> Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Google Hit -> The Walrus is Google -> The White Search Page -> Google Splits - > ... -> "Oh yeah, Kid. I remember Google when they first started out".
I know because I looked this up with, er, Google.
Either that or he just made a mistake.
Sigs are bad for your health.
There are lots of places that sell movie coupons for a drastically reduced price (they are usually good for a year from month of purchase).
:(
Through AAA I think its ~5.50 for them. The only catch is that you have to wait till the movie is out for 10 days before you can use the coupon to see the movie.
Only other catch is that it costs an extra $1.00 at the box office if you use them in NYC
This space for rent. All reasonable inquiries will be entertained at proprietors discretion.
Whats next? Now that we have gmail, this could be their next big thing.
Yes, but how many younger individuals do you know whom would find it a really cool idea to nail somebody using neat stuff like night-vision goggles?
"And I put on my trusty night-vision, and then, wham - right beside the hot chick there was some dork with a video cam. So I walk up to him and I'm like... sir... will you please come with me"
I dunno, but night-vision sounds a bit cooler than "pirating" a movie to the net.
I'm sure if it had failed to come back to the front, they'd have been able to spot the culprit.
What the hell is a crisp packet or a sweet paper? Thanks.
___ Shout Central - Crushes your nuts!
Federation Against Copyright Theft.
And hey, you know, maybe that'll work to dissuade some kid from grabbing an off-center video grab of the nekkid scene, once or twice. Maybe. It'll scare off the basically innocent 14-year-old who might do something like this on a lark. They might be just slightly nervous.
The copies all over the net supposedly are taken after hours in empty theaters, for cleaner copies, or they're ripped from preview CDs within the industry. Neither of those is going to be stopped as a result of this news. Neither crime is committed by 14-year-olds who'll fall for this.
That's leaving alone the task they've just (supposedly) inflicted on mid-level managers at huge movie chains. You think the 28-year-old guy who spends his days trying to get minimum wage teens to serve popcorn faster really wants the task of policing for this? Theater chains don't have enough people to catch bad focus that consistently -- and we think they have the spare time to stand vigilantly over each showing with their goggles on?
"Fundamentalism" isn't about divine morality. It's about human authority.
Last time I checked, it will put a nice hole in the field of vision in the goggles. And guess what - IR lasers are not illegal to own or carry into a movie theater.
Sorry sir.... I was trying to read my watch without disturbing those around me.
Of course IN THE PAST screener copies got out. This is now. Screener copies are not an issue ANYMORE.
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
How many people really want to watch a pirated version of a movie? I mean, one that was done using a camcorder as opposed to a leaked original Yeah, there are fanatics who just can't wait to see the latest release of whatever movie, but does this really satisfy them? Seems to me that pirates are just cheating themselves out of seeing the movie for the first time the way it was meant to be seen.
I could go to the theater and watch the movie with great sound and a huge picture or I can download it and view it sitting at my desk or on a laptop LCD. How is the latter even an option? WTF? I know the theater is expensive, but jeez. Don't cheat yourself.
-matthew
"THERE IS NO JUSTICE, THERE IS ONLY ME." -Death
I don't think people with handhelds in the theatre are the real problem. When I saw the opening of Return of the King, the projectionist had a DV cam set up to record from the booth. It was very obvious and yet nobody working there said anything.
Frontline recently ran a show, "The Day the Music Died," about the demise of the recording industry at the hands of money people. (as opposed to music people) I missed it, but supposedly it is on the PBS website, though I haven't had a chance to search for it, yet. Your points highlight the rise of money people (as opposed to movie people) in the movie industry.
For that matter, perhaps we can at least partly blame the whole DMCA, copyright, etc mess on the rise of the MBA. Figure a media exec more comfortable with money and legal instruments than with the media, itself.
IMHO, this isn't limited to the media industries, to give 'business method patents' for one example.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
no shite. the ushers are in on it.
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
I've been known to try to finish off one last advance wars level during the opening advertisements...
What we call folk wisdom is often no more than a kind of expedient stupidity.-Edward Abbey
Of course it won't stop piracy. That merely means that the legal measures are not sufficiently draconian. We obviously need ever stronger laws until that piracy is STOPPED!
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
Why don't they just send SWAT to guard the inside of all movie theaters???
1. They lose money from people making bootleg copies.
2. Bootleg copies are made because the movie is released early in the UK.
Why go through the trouble of trying to prevent (1), when it's a lot easier to prevent (2)? What's the deal with the 4-day delay anyway? Do they need the extra 4 days to translate British to American?
Night vision cameras mounted on the walls of theteres. Seriously, It wouldn't be a big invasion of privacy at all at it would enable the stwards to kick out those talkers and messers that RUIN EVRY film I EVER go to
Uh, most of the piracy is started by INSIDERS!!!
Perhaps someone should usher the ushers and the film projector booth guy?? Maybe the people that send the films out are ripping them before they go out?
Movie studios presuming 100% audience guilt should get a clue.
-- I am. Therefore, I think!
The easy way to circumvent would be to use an IR filter. Don't know if it would also affect the quality as well.
(Reporter): Excuse me sir, do you have a minute?
(Man with family): Sure.
(Reporter): How was the film? Does it live up to the previous releases?
(Man with family): What film is that?
(Reporter): The new Harry Potter film, of course.
(Man with family): Oh yes, we're looking forward to seeing that soon!
(Studio exec lurking off to side): Priceless!
Sigs are bad for your health.
Warner sees the investment as negligible compared with the threat to the whole industry
... which is negligible since if people want to see it in the cinema they will and if they won't they won't. Funny they haven't learned that yet.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
How long will it take kids who make minimum wage to steal the NVGs? NVGs are expensive & fun-to-play with toys!
if we throw ninjas and monkeys into this. This could get exciting.
Nothings more fun than Pirates, Ninjas, Monkeys and Night Vision Goggles! Heck, and the MPAA could record it and sell it as a movie. It'll probably be better than 99% of the crap they've released over the last 5 years.
~ kjrose
They didn't have them when I was dating in high school.
Pete Carr Owner Chatmag.com
I took my Camecorder into the theater to record my daughter seeing her first movie. The light came on automatically because it was too dark and I blinded the people behind us (which completly distracted them from one of the more intense scenes in "Home on the Range"). When I turned the light off, all I got was a black screen because it was too dark.
Anyway, all 10 seconds of this footage got leaked to Kazaa.
A new paperback costs $6-$7. A used one can often be had for $1-$2.
Who moderates this sort of obvious nonsense as "Insightful"??
/. If the government wants us to respect the law, it should set a better example.
Funny, DVDs cost about the same. Fact is, CDs are a rippoff, so much so that the courts have fined the industry big bucks for price fixing. So while I do feel that movie prices are too expensive, I can blame some of it on inflation, whereas there is no valid reason for the price of music CDs being what they are. You are whining about what you personally feel is a fair value. Newsflash, other people value things differently than you do. You do not determine what is a fair value for something, that is something the market decides, and piracy is all about the market speaking its mind.
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
I used to project films for a local cinama (here in the UK) from the age of 15. Films I wasn't even legally entitled to watch.
Large multiplex cinemas may have well-paid, adult projectionists with night-vision monocles and decent security - but there are thousands of smaller single-screen cinemas where any old kid (like me) runs the projector for pocket money. All it takes is for one of them to bring in a camcorder.
Not so much the camcordering and NV goggles to counteract them, but I cannot stand the copy protection that's on prints nowdays...
The copy control dots that are on screen drive me nuts. Look for brown dots to appear on screen in white/cream colored footage onscreen. You'll see little brown shit-stain colored dots onscreen sporadically. I see them all the time now. Starting with Kill Bill, EVERY movie I've seen has these things in them.
They even had it in the extended version releases of the LOTR movies that played in theaters...
And now, to top it off, I saw Troy on Friday, and the print's brightness wavered constantly through the movie... The projectionist told me it must have been the print, because the lamp was okay. I trust the projectionist at my local theater... He knows what he's doing as opposed to most multiplexes...
If studios want to continue this paranoid habit of churning out shitty looking prints to theaters, I'll stop going. And I can convice friends and family of the same, real easy like.
...paintball guns!
Forget the police. If the users see anyone recording, or talking, or using a cell phone, or being disruptive in any way, they get to peg that person right in the head with a long range paintball gun!
Now that's something the users could get into.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Pirates are really hurting the box office income
Please...
Could you flood the theater with infrared light and badly pollute the light reflecting from the filmscreen? Wouldn't that render caming useless? Or emite it from the edges of the screen, or from behind the screen.... You could at least lower the image quality to unnacceptable levels.
-My cat's name is mittens
...to complain about anti-piracy measures these days, one forgets this is perfectly fair and legit. I can't say I think this is going too far at all. It is illegal to tape a movie in the theater, it always has been, and everyone knows it. I can't see how anyone but people who want to pirate the movie early would be upset about this in any way. They're not affecting the operation of any equipment you own, they're not placing heavy restrictions on copyrighted material that also prevent some forms of fair use, they're not invading your privacy (hey, keep your Harry Potter in your pants, this is a kids movie), nothing.
I can't see one reason to complain here other than "it's the MPAA". Doesn't give them an excuse to pull some of the other crap they're trying too, but I think they deserve to be praised when they do something right. Perhaps they'll make note of it and start getting it right more often?
CAn'T CompreHend SARcaSm?
I went to the "Vue" in Shepherds Bush last night to see Day after Tomorrow. First we had this advert about how piracy funds terrorism, then there was some gimp at the front of the theater with some binocular type device. I accidently shined my keyring torch at him (they didn't say they were going to spy on us)
This films been out over a week in the UK, god knows what they were looking for. They sadly didn't throw out the mentally ill idiots a few seats to my right (texting all through the movie, didn't have the courtesy to put it on vibrate), or the person that was actually talking on a phone part way though, or the idiots behind me that kept saying "here come the wolves, look out!" and "look behind you" and other shit.
It's probaby just the area, never get these twats in Penzance, or even in Exeter or Manchester.
Look, $15 for a CD is reasonable IF it was a 60 minute high quality audio experience. Instead it's three good tracks, 12 filler tracks and in the end a total rip off. I agree in principle with your movie statement but imagine if you went to see a film and only 15 minutes of it was well made and well acted and then the rest of the film, despite the quality of the actors was poorly produced and poorly acted with crap special effects? Exactly, you expect a an experience from a film but you expect to pay $15 for a shite experience from a CD with a couple of good bits. So if I want to pay for the stuff I use then in principle I should be able to buy the three tracks I want (and not DRMed, but high quality, high fidelity and free use) for $4.
Two tears in a bucket. Motherfuck it.
Although this cloak and dagger stuff is interesting and will be reported widely, the real problem still remains. People are going to pirate movies. No matter what technologies are used to avoid this, people are going to come up with new ways of defeating it.
The reason people pirate movies is probably similar to the reason people pirate compact disks. They want the product in a more convient format, or they want the product at a lower price.
Long term, here are some suggestions to movie studios to avoid piracy. Most of these require the studios to look past the short term bottom line, and try to serve their customers.
1. Release the movie simultaniously world wide. By releasing movies on different days in different parts of the world, movie studios create demand for piracy. It is understandable that a languague translation might take extra time, but there should be no other delays in movie releases.
2. Get rid of region coded DVD's. These are simply pissing off legitimate users of your product. If you want to reduce piracy, make your product available as conviently as posslble.
3. Release the DVD the day the movie is released in the theater. Doesn't have to have all the special features. That way people who can't get to the theater get the product they want.
4. Stream movies over the internet. If the consumer wants to watch movies on the internet, give them a way of doing it legally.
5. Lower prices for movies. If studios want to capture the low end of the market, they need to lower movie prices. Video games can have play times of upwards of 120 hours, yet cost $40. If an average video game lasts only 60 hours, that is still only 66 cents per hour of entertainment. Movies last two hours, yet cost $8. That is four dollars per hour of entertainment. They can make up any lost revenue through merchandising, product placement, enhanced DVD's, etc.
The big problem with almost all of these suggestions is that the cut into revenue sources, such as pay-per-view, TV premieres, etc.
In the long run, customers will demand more convience, just as they are doing with recorded music. The studios will have no choice.
Sitting in the dark, unable to see anything other than the few people around me and the screen, I do not want a handful of kids watching me with night vision goggles. That's just fucking creepy, and that's all there is to it. The first time that happens to me at a theater, that theater will hear about it when I demand a refund. The second time, I won't be going to movie theaters again at all until I hear that the practice has stopped.
This would be a great use for those little LED lights that emit infra-red. I just did a quick look at thinkgeek... the Photon 3 light used to be available in infra-red (as opposed to a regular color), but it doesn't appear to be available any more. Maybe ebay has some.
"Would it kill you to put down the toilet seat?" -- Maya Angelou
i had a housemate that would buy movies from a guy operating off a folding table on his college campus. i can tell you most all of the movies he would bring home were copied from some sort of screener or advance. i am not sure i ever actually saw one that was filmed via camcorder. a few had the occasional banner on the bottom declaring it was a promo tape and to call 1-800-no-copies or whatever....
did anyone else read this as Night Vision Google? I've been on the Internet way too long.
640YB ought to be enough for anybody.
Newsflash: 8 bucks for a movie is REASONABLE. I challenge you to find me any other form of entertainment that is so cheap.
I've got one for you!
My Star Wars Galaxies membership is $14.99 per month. That works out to about four cents an hour for top quality entertainment...
"If you think you have things under control, you're not going fast enough." --Mario Andretti
because I can't wait the first time that they're wearing them, and look at the movie to see 'that cool part' then scream as they effectively look at the sun. It'd be rude of them, but I'd still have to smile....
It seems to me I've said this before here but I really don't get why studios give a damn about this problem. Maybe its just me but I don't kow why anyone would prefer to watch a monoaural and sort-of-focussed 'copy' from a video camera in their living room (or even worse, on their PC) over a Dolby Digital version of the same film for $8 in a theatre. I can see where digital copy pirated DVDs are an issue but the 'shaky cam'...hell even steady cam versions taped with video cameras aren't in no way a replacement for seeing a film in the theatre IMO...
Of course, when digital projectors are more widely used all you will need to do is nick the Hard Drive with the nice HD MPEG2 veersion on :)
Infact i remeber hearing that digital projection is to be used widely in UK cinemas quite soon.
I admit that I may or may not have "pirated" music, movies, games, motivational posters, software, art... But in the end I buy a copy of *most* everything. For every eighteen songs I download from an artist, I buy a CD. For every movie I download, I buy the DVD, unless I found the film to be abhorrent. Need I have to remind everyone of "The Time Maching"? "Sordfish"? EVERY BATMAN MOVIE AFTER RETURNS? No. These films are the reson I pirate movies: to preview them before I see them in theaters, to see if they are even worth watching. Some say that this ruins the film; spoiling the plot, cinemetography, and fine acting. To this I ask these people to watch a copy of a bootleg. It is grainy. It has crappy sound. In some cases it skips. One may even be able to hear, or even see those next to the person who recorded the film (In one instance two people were having sex next to the person recording "Save the Last Dance", which was the only decent part of the movie). It is to see these films in all of their glory that I see them in theaters; that I buy them. And buy them I do: I own Three copies of "The Fellowship of the Rings", two copies of "The Two Towers", and one of "Return of the King". I pay for good products. Why pay for media that sucks? Why see a movie in theaters that is painful to watch, but you sit through because you paid $12.00 for your ticket?
Hollywood has a right to complain about movie piracy... right after they stop funding crappy action movies that have about as much depth as a puddle. Meh, time to end this rant.
3 degrees of separation from Vladimir Putin
Well I'm sure we're all glad to have you here to tell everybody what is REASONABLE! Heaven forbid if we don't all agree with your assessment.
Want cheaper entertainment than the movies or CD's? How about TV? Duh. $200 for a TV set and you can watch all the shows you want until it breaks. Only cost is electricity. Now, if you insist on paying for cable/sattelite/whatever thats your own business. Even still, depending on how much you watch TV could still easily come out ahead. And yeah, most TV shows are crap, but so are most CDs and movies, so its not relevant.
Don't like TV? How about books? Buy a paperback for $8 and you can be easily entertained for 10-20 hours depending on how fast you read. How can movies compete with that? You can resell the book too, so it likely beats CDs in terms of cost/benefit as well.
Movies and CDs are essentially monopoly markets. As such, the price of such goods can be (and is) set artificially high. Just because you can afford it doesn't mean its a fair price. *I* would say that a fair price is one which is say, maybe 20% over cost of production, at most. I'm not sure how a movie price will compare to that, its probably fine. But we all know that CDs are priced for a much higher profit.
8 bucks for a movie?? Where do you live and can I move there? try $15-20 if you live in a major city
To reiterate some of the other responses to your post, 50 cents an hour? Try going to a used book shop, or if you choose well, even a new book store.
A number of video games have given me hundreds of hours of entertainment, wait a few months until they're on bargin and you're paying $30 for quite a bit (though there's a lot of crap out there too).
The Music Industry's prices have already been shown time and again to be the result of price fixing. Before they started fixing CD prices had dropped to 7-8 bucks for a short while. Read up on the case they just lost.
It's nice to have enough money to buy media at the current rip-off prices, but the current level of piracy is showing that people do NOT value what's currently being released and how it's being released (they're literally valueing it at $0).
whatever
Surely someone is going to sue becuase some adolcent usher watched him play with his girlfriend or the other way around in the theater when the couple thought nobody could see them.
Is this is actually happening? Theatres don't run with lots of staff. You basically have a kid taking tickets and a kid selling popcorn. Everything else is computerized. Who exactly is this person who is going to be donning night vision goggles?
It's simple: I demand prosecution for torture.
Forget buying books, the library down the street has them for free. Sheesh.
But isn't the UK usually the last place on the PLANET to get a film released :(
"...you'll be going to a special Hell; one reserved for child-molesters, and people who talk at the theater."
Hm...despite being threatened from all sides, even already floundering from piracy losses, the poor suffering movie industry still hit a record memorial day weekend: "The two movies [shrek2 & day after tomorrow] led Hollywood to a record Memorial Day weekend haul. The top 12 movies alone took in $233.5 million, easily topping the previous best of $202 million for all movies over Memorial Day weekend last year." And that's just US figures! (CNN source)
Threatened my ass. At lest they can afford those spiffy new toys though...
Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored. - Aldous Huxley
Ahhh, the short guy in the crowd. Always has something to prove.
Your teeth are whiter, you think you have a better job, you try to get the hottest chicks (and fail because they don't like short guys), and claim to have the biggest dicks.
OK sure, let's talk about it while I rest my beer on the top of your head.
That won't help. They imagine it's "us" the entertaintment world and "them" the evil pirates (with a handheld on their shoulder instead of a parrot). In reality the employees of the movie theatres are probably the ones pirating the stuff, now they'll just have cool night vision equipment to show to their friends.
"Hey, where are you going with the goggles, man?" ... ...
"Boss told me to check for videocams in the theatre."
"Dude - fair warning, Paul Reuben is in there. I wouldn't go if I were you."
"Who? Look, I just do what the boss says. See ya in a few."
"!"
"You got a fork suitable for removing eyes around here?"
But would you really want your memory of the last thing you saw to be Paul Reuben?
And PA is not just one state away. It's a world away.
but they're targeting the wrong people.
the guys doing 'cams' are barely ever part of the normal movie going audience these useless measures are put on against.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Bring a few of these badboys into the theater and I don't think the night vision will be terribly effective.
"My eyes! The goggles do nothing!"
You must not live where I do. The "theater" (which often is represented by a 21-year-old manager) - any theater, here, which comes to mind right now - is not on the "side" of any patrons. They want sheep who pay up and do not disturb the staff any more than is necessary.
If you know of a chain of "quality" theaters, please advise. In real life - here, at least - the closest thing to "quality" establishments I know of are my living room, and my friends', where we don't charge each other US$9.25 just to get in the door.
A reasonable expectation of respect must be nice, for those of you well over 6' tall.
<grrr>
Bull!
Major city: Philadelphia, PA
Movie Ticket Price: $8.75 (Matinee $6.25)
Stop lying.
Political correctness is the newest form of slavery.
Why leave this essential mediacoppery to slackers who don't even ush? Let anyone claim a pirate bounty by phoning in a snap of the pirate in pillaging the theatre! If the bounty hunter heeded the trailer supressing Annoying Cellphone Rings(TM), they might get their reward directly from the studio goons arriving before the picture even closed. If their claim is denied, they can just sell the movie, cropped from above the head of the pirate they almost landed.
Yes, this is all just a way to get movie studios to pay for nightvision for mobile phones.
--
make install -not war
CAM recordings are horrible. I vowed never to watch one of those again after I saw return of the king as a cam recording. You just waste watching a good movie from such a crappy source. Better to wait for the dvd and enjoy it fully. Imho they really have nothing to worry about. the quality is crap.
did you forget to take your meds?
wonder how long it will be before movie goers start to wear hats covered in Infrared LEDs? If everyone in the theater wore them them, the ushers would be blind!
"If God can do it for 10% why can't the US Government?"
"Pay for the friggin' movie, or don't watch it."
Ok.
That's precisely what I've done. With each passing year that brings a price hike, and longer and longer trailers (ads) I see less and less movies. I have the ABILITY to see more movies, as I now make more money and am, literally, in walking distance of a very nice theatre, but I don't. They cost is simply too high.
Where do I turn for entertainment? That evil source that the media industry has been whining about: video games. I just bought Unreal Torunament 2004, cost me $35. So far, I've played it for about 10 hours. Given the cost of a ticket to a movie and the average length, I've already gotten more for my money, and I've owned it only for a weekend. I expect I'll get a few HUNDRED hours of play out of it before I finally get bored of it.
Now I don't expect parity between different forms of entertainment, I'm not going to demand that I pay the same amount per hour of movie as I do per hour of gaming. However I find that movies in the theatre are WAY expensive compared to games. So, I spend my money on games.
This hysteria over movie taping is a crock. That isn't what is causing falling sales. I mean I full and well have the knowledge and technical ability to download movies but I just don't bother. I'm getting my entertainment through other sources. I (like everyone else) have a finite amount of money and time. Games are providing a much better value to entertain me, and so that's where my time and money are going.
The movie and music industrys ARE getting overly greedy. It is cheaper than every to distribute their media and they are charging more than ever for it. More, they now have serious competition in the form of games. This is capatalism, adapt or die. I shed no tears for them because it's NOT copying that is their problem.
-
And what of the ushers themselves. Surely quite a number are in facts students with part-time jobs. The same students that download films on p2p. what's to prevent _them_ from camcording the film ?
Just the dark, they'd need some night vision goggles to see so they didn't trip over audience members. Oh wait....Folks... packetnews.com , search for potter prisoner. It's all over the net already.
Movies and CDs are essentially monopoly markets.
Wow. I don't think you really understand what "monopoly" means. There are plenty of different companies out there making and distributing movies, all competing with each other. Paramount, Universal, Warner Brothers, Disney... these are all major, major companies that are completely independant of one another.
CDs, same thing. Lots of different labels out there competing for your entertainment buck. If by "monopoloy," you were referring to the RIAA, well, the RIAA is an association that represents the interests of all music labels, so it would make sense that there is only one, but they most certainly do not control (or even own) the content itself. They are no more a monopoly than the Screen Actors Guild is a monopoly, or the Professional Engineer Association is a monopoly.
Before you go labeling all these independent, capitalist, free market companies "Monopolies," I strongly suggest you take a look at a couple REAL monopolies. Why don't you start with OPEC?
Like woodworking? Build your own picture frames.
A little goatse should go a long way...
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Just by people I know watching Van Helsing and telling me that listening to the script/dialog makes you want to tear your ears from your head and unlearn the English language meant that I decided not to go and see it, despite the nice graphics.
Soon someone will come up with a hack for the Apple IPod that will let a firewire camera (like the Apple iSight) dump it's content steam to the iPod. I think it would just be a matter of time, and with the iSight the thing is small enough to hide up the sleve of a long shirt and would be virtually undetectable short of standing infront of the person and looking down the sleave in question.
MacOSX, because making *NIX better is a lot better than waiting for Micro$loth to fix Windows
8 bucks for a movie?? Where do you live and can I move there? try $15-20 if you live in a major city
I call hogwash. Name the city. I challenge you to provide a link to a website where I can buy a movie ticket that costs $15 (the low point of your claim). Imax doesn't count. You can choose any theatre in any city, for any movie at any showtime. I challenge you to find one that is $15. They don't exist.
I'm in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, and up until a few months ago, movie ticket prices had climbed to $13 CDN for regular admission ($9.50 USD). However, the theatres pulled back a bit, and now, I can get a movie ticket for about $9 CDN ($6.50 USD).
the current level of piracy is showing that people do NOT value what's currently being released and how it's being released (they're literally valueing it at $0).
I don't think that's true - they value them enough to still spend 2 hours of their life watching it, so that's not "nothing."
I think what we're seeing here is kids don't value their time. Kids don't want to pay to see websites or TV, but they don't mind watching some ads if that's what it takes to keep the content free. Kids don't typically have a lot of money, but they view their time as limitless, mostly because of their sheer youth (i.e., abundance of time). As people get older, however, their buying power (usually) increases, and they start to realize that their time is in fact precious.
So they're not valuing the movie as "worthless," they'd simply rather pay for it with their time (which they perceive to have an abundance of) rather than with money (which they usually have comparatively less of).
Like woodworking? Build your own picture frames.
At first I thought it was some new sex-offender legislation :-)
But then I thought, Oh, the studios are pushing some propaganda to (in the long term) make the population more fearful (ohmigod, I have a camera in my bag, I might get chucked into jail by the IP police) and resigned to think "intellectual property" is a meaningful term.
There are far too many people with mod points out there...
This is f??king hilarious, the people that copy the movies are the people that work in the theaters, so now besides getting the latest movies, they will also get night vision goggles. Sounds like one hell of job to me.
No, the only way to deal with pirates is to board their ship and make 'em walk the plank. Either that or hang 'em. That's always good for a lark.
Disembowelment sounds like a barrel of laughs, but then you have a big mess to clean up. Plus it's just plain unsanitary. The same goes for beheading. You get too much blood on the deck of the ship and it's just a lawsuit waiting to happen when somebody steps in it and falls and breaks a leg or something.
WWJD? JWRTFA!
I read about 3,000 words a minute for light fiction. If $/hour is the standard, I'm the epitome of the person getting poor value for buying a book rather than a film ticket. So how come I don't mind buying a 6.00$ US paperback, but I think 17.00$ is unreasonable for a CD? By the original logic, the faster you read, the less books you should buy. And you'ld have to be insane to collect hardbacks unless you read about 30 words a minute or less, in which case your entertainment value is so great the packaging costs become trivial. In fact, all book sales should be to functional illiterates, and since these will largely skill themselves out of that category on the first book, no sequel ever makes economic sense.
"Reasonable" - i do not think that word means what you think it does.
Who is John Cabal?
You'd have a hard time seeing past the light of the movie. Night vision is good stuff, but, an image intensifier is blinded by bright light. As an example, my neighborhood has no street lights. WHen it's dark, my gen 2 nvd sees quite well. However, if a neighbor has a porch light on, I can't see the front part of their house with it.
Pointing an IR LED at it would indeed blind it. I can't look in the mirror with my NVD when the IR illuminator is on. A TV remote is enough to light up an entire room.
If your stupid enough to use a camcorer your asking to get caught... just plug into the projector and copy it off while the movie is playing...
I've made out in the cinema quite a few times past year. Aswell as getting a hand job in a full cinema (You use an empty [steal/ask for a unused one] pop corn box rip out the bottom, and angle it right). I've even got a head job in a cinema but it was only at about 10-15% capacity.
;)
It just depends how much you care if someone else sees you, and how exciting you find it knowing you could get busted.
I'm the annoying guy in the cinema making out next to you, while you try to look the other way
Where have you been? The goggles already have recording, for "evidence". Thanks God for DRM in those things. It's bad enough I have to see other people's O faces, I would not want that kind of trash floating around the internet. Let me put it to you this way, Paul Rubens took a big interest in this "screening". Got the picture yet? Be glad you don't!
No, Twitter is not in the UK and has never been an Usher nor seen a Hary Potter (TM) movie. The above is fictional and designed for your amusement only.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Now the distributors will say ok here are your night visions goggles make sure it doesn't happen again. If your movies are copied no more 1st run movies for you.
There has to be a work around for this problem. It'll just take a couple of 7337 k1dd135 to buy a ninght vision monocular (less than $150 USD now)and borrow mom and dad's cam corder and figure out a way around it. Night vision relies heavily on IR light. Using dark blue gels over the lcd (or other light emitting parts) might be enough to circumvent this method of detection. Military flashlights do come with blue and red filters after all. Also if it's the LCD being detected wouldn't a plam pilot make for a nice false positive? I'm not advicating piracey but it does create an interesting technology race, sort of like the one between speeders and the police.
Kombat's calculations are based on the assumption that a CD purchaser will listen to it 20-50 times. Obviously, to draw a valid comparison to books you must use the assumption that a book purchaser will re-read it 20-50 times. That gives a total entertainment time (and corresponding value) at least an order of magnitude higher than your estimate.
/. If the government wants us to respect the law, it should set a better example.
You can quite easily notice one frame at 24 or 29.99fps. Especially if it's a major difference (think black screen in the middle of a movie). Your brain can't read anything on it, but it can tell something was wrong.
If they changed a scene slightly tho, such as in the bottom left hand corner show small numbers near the same colour as the objects it was on. Then it 99.8752% of people wouldn't notice it.
Nice to see someone RTFA and quoted where it said "100% of bootlegs are audience bootlegs".
If they thought that they wouldn't be trying to lobby to stop screeners, and putting watermarks on all the screens. Aswell as having tight security at their production houses.
They spend a lot more money securing themselves than the cost of a few night vision goggles.
You just don't hear about it because it's not exiting to hear that "Warner Brothers hired 4 more security guards to check their employees".
Slashdot posters should get a clue.
(Yeah, I am new around here)
> but supposedly it is on the PBS website
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/m
Do they seriously think people eager enough to spend their bandwidth and sanity to watch a cam of, say, Star Wars Episode 3 will not go to the movies for the real thing?
They're insane.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
Okay.
Nethack, played for a year. Still play routinely. Bandwidth (download) and electricity costs on the order of cents.
Slashdot, been here for years. Bandwidth and electricity costs on the order of cents.
Still play StarCraft, WarCraft III, Thief series (when I've got functional Windows... Need to take care of that fairly soon), and other moderately old to very old games, getting way more value than $4/hour. Beats $2/hour, too. In one Spring Break I probably broke the $1/hour threshold with WarCraft III. That seems a reasonable price to me for any entertainment, but I think the real value here is that I can use it at any time without paying more. A movie costs $8 for two to three hours per viewing, not, say, $100 for a summer's of "all you can view," or $400 for a year's. It's possible some theatres have season passes like this, which may or may not be reasonable. I don't know that they exist, so I assume they don't. $400/year still seems high compared to 8 just-released video games (of which there aren't usually 8 truly excellent games released in a year).
So, no, more than $0 is not "too expensive" as far as I'm concerned, $4/hour is. Different people have different thresholds. That's above mine while yours is at least that high.
Sigs are like bumper stickers.
Who cares if people bring camcorders in and copy the movie. Have u ever seen a movie bootleged on Cam. They suck. I would reather spend the $7-$10 to see the movie than to wast my time Downloading it.
yep, although "The Bridge" on UPenn's campus totally gouges Penn and Drexel students. Fri and Sat nights tickets are $10. i think every other night it's $7.50 with student ID. And the next county up (about 30 min drive) it's $6.50 every night with student ID. So, yeah, I live in the 4th largest city and I feel that $10 is insane to be paying, so I'm a little confused where that guy got $15-$20 from.
All you need to do is have a camera flash with you ready...
:-)
someone approaches you in a theatre close your eyes and flash in their direction.
NOBODY that is flashed in the eyes in a dark room will be able to do anything but stagger wildly as you calmly move.
I personally want a nice 100 watt IR flashing lamp to see if I can annoy them
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
I used to work in the reel room of a large cinema (think of the scene from 'Fight Club'). I would get offers of money in exchange for taping movies from inside the box; whenever I would, the sound quality was much better because the noise of the audience was cut out completely. By disabling the built-in microphone on the camera and running an external mic (to cut out the noise of the reels) we could get excellent sound quality, and the quality of the picture is exactly like what a person can download.
Smuggling the camera in and out of the box is no problem whatsoever; stick it in a backpack and absolutely no one gets curious, ever.
The point is: I don't think I'm the only one who has done this. The people in the theater are not the only ones you need to watch out for--the people who have free access to ALL the movies the cinema offers are likely where most of the downloadable movies come from.
Just before the film started there was a notice on the screen saying that they were going to be doing this - something about night vision goggles to avoid piracy.
Quite a number of people in the audience laughed or gasped in a shocked way...
It seemed rather unusual to me, I must confess, but I figured it would be a piracy thing.
They weren't really goggles it was small enough to slip into a pocket pretty easily. It was about the size and shape of a small clamshell phone with two lenses on it (like a small toy viewfinder really). 100 college kids in the room and one person could have slipped out early when the lights were out. They were pretty trusting of us. The tech was R&D for the military, too (speaker claimed general use for the Military was 1G ahead of consumer tech--although I don't know if that still holds). The prof sent all the equipment around (two or three pieces IIRC). Was an amazing display of technology, the only other one I recall (these were pretty regular) was the guy doing RFID tags in 1998. They were testing them in warehouses at the crate level (~$0.10 ea.)
Degaussing scares the bad magnetism out of the monitor and fills it with good karma.
Last weekend i went to see Shrek2 at my local 18mega theatre, in the theatre next to mine they were showing a sneak preview of HP3 to some winners of a local radio contest, they had people there with metal detectors!! The little paddle kind that they like to rub all over you. They claimed they were looking for cell phones and asked people that they have theirs out of their pockets and turned on, yet even people that did this were being scanned.
These guys didn't look like the normal kids you see in a theatre. And for want of a better description i must say they had a very, deadly, aura about them. They sure as hell wern't the normal rentacop guys either.
Why not bring a flash to a movie theater, set it off before the movie starts. Hopefully noone around you will be annoyed, and maybe you'll burn out those NV Goggles!
It was supposed to be a joke - that it wouldn't be hard to observe people despite the darkness of the room if the thing you're handing round is night vision gear. But never mind.
There is NOTHING unreasonable about the prices of movies and music where they currently are.
In the case of CD music, there is case law to the contrary. But that is ultimately beside the point, and the history of the modern content industry is a good example of that.
There was a time when it was technically impossible to distribute something like a movie by means other than commercial film distribution. As such, the movie enjoyed a monopoly on that distribution. This is no longer the case. Supporting a multi-billion dollar industry on the revenues created by distributing content is no longer technically tenable. Information is ubiquitous and transporting it is cheap. The business model of the movie and music industries, as we have known it, is no more. It is not a question of morality or of whether anyone is stealing anything. It is simple, cold, technical fact, and the opinions of content distributors has no bearing on the issue. (at least in the long term)
As reasonable as Edison, for example, might have thought it to force movie makers to pay royalties on the use of his projection technology, the technical reality of his invention- the ability to create and store entertainment content for later performance, exceeded the formidible legal boundaries he sought to place around his own invention, and forced a divorce of the use of his technology from its implications.
In this way, despite Edison's own all-caps bold typeface rants, the movie industry took hold in the only place they could be safe from his patent enforcement goons - a city on the other side of the continent, just north of the Mexican border. A place we now call Hollywood.
The question is not whether it is right or wrong that you can't make money distributing media content anymore. How we feel about the death of that industry is completely unimportant. The only interesting question at this point is - where is the next Hollywood?
who are those slashdot people? they swept over like Mongol-Tartars.
IF YOU MAKE A MOVIE THAT SUCKS, IM NOT GONNA GO SEE IT!
If you make a movie that is AWESOME, I'll see it. I'll see it twice. I'll DOWNLOAD it because I love it. And then I will buy the DVD.
This is how it should work. I'm sick of hearing the studios complaining about piracy when they don't realise that if you make a piece of crap movie, people will pirate it instead of downloading it. I only download movies that I have paid for in the past, or I download them to see if they are any good before I see the actual movie. Either way I download it. If it's good, it gets my $10.
I agree with the parent; in regards the low-quality copies at least.
The first time I saw Star Wars 2, it was that horribly washed out copy off the 'Net. The second time I saw it was in the theater. The third time was on the DVD I picked up at Best Buy.
I can understand the studios' problems with high-quality rips, but who cares about the low-quality stuff? From what I understand, people are using those to determine if the movie's worth the $9.00 ticket price. The studios don't like the fact that the public is figuring out the movies aren't worth the price of admission before they've already parted with the money. Remember those articles about studios getting upset about instant messaging about bad movies?
I think both the American music and movie industries need to get real with their market, (a) lower prices and (b) allow for returns/refunds. How many music stores let you return that crap CD you decided to try? How many movie theaters will refund the ticket price if the movie sucks? I know some will, but they're the exception. If the industry won't do this, then they shouldn't be surprised when the public rebels. Unfortunately the public has no alternate supplier for the specific product other than the Internet.
By accepting these goggles, they are now implicitly accepting liability for any piracy that takes place in their theatres. I'll bet lawsuits against theatre chains aren't far away.
* WHITE WOLF ZERO SIX TO TWO SIX.
This is two six.
* WE GOT ACTIVITY OUT HERE, BUT I DON'T THINK WE NEED TO REPORT IT.
What do you see?
* APPEARS TO BE FORNICATION IN A CONVERTIBLE.
Do a target store and I'll be there in a sec.
* UH, WE'RE TAPING IT.
Roger.
(Get the joke)
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
Yeah, ok I'm gonna download a copy of a movie shot with a digital video camera that was handheld, shaking, poor quality, mono sound instead of paying to see it or waiting to rent it.
NO
People who do this will rent the movie when it comes out on disk anyway, or go see it in the theatre when it comes out.
This is just another red herring by the MPAA.... ooooh those evil pirates are stealing from us.
Sure, a swat on the ass when it's warranted is fine. Extra chores, withholding privileges, etc... I did know the difference between rude and polite, or right and wrong (although I'll be damned if I always honoured them when Mom&Dad weren't around).
:o)
Trouble is, if parents overdo it (beat you for every little wrong thing, never reward you for doing the right thing, and NEVER punish your siblings the same way), it makes for some interesting family problems. Going from personal experience, this mode of parenting didn't bring out respect for them, but led to eternal fear of the family and general estrangement.
Anyway, I'm an advocate of something in the middle, between the "OK, have a time-out" type of softie parenting and the "You're nothing but a fuck-up! You don't deserve to live!" types. Sure, spank the kid within reason, but don't let the physical punishment be a substitute for an explanation that can only be delivered via a talk.
(Somewhat back on-topic, rude people are the reason I never step into a theatre anymore. Most of these rude people are adults. That Hollywood is cranking out steaming piles of shit anymore is only helping me stay away.
--
Me spell chucker work grate. Need grandma chicken.
For those who would like to download files instead of streaming them (so everyone with half a brain), here are some URLS. Part 1: mms://video.pbs.org/general/windows/media4/frontli ne/2214/windows/ch1_hi.wmv
I guess for the other parts just increment the last number in the URL above. You can't download this file using normal means however since it's using Microsoft's proprietary streaming protocol. However, I found this program for Windows (I'm sure there's a Linux way but I'm not looking), which seems to work:
http://sdp.ppona.com/
meh
Damnit, why the hell do I insist on not using the preview feature. Let me try again. For those who would like to download files instead of streaming them (so everyone with half a brain), here are some URLs.
i ne/2214/windows/ch1_hi.wmv
Part 1:
mms://video.pbs.org/general/windows/media4/frontl
I guess for the other parts just increment the last number in the URL above. You can't download this file using normal means however since it's using Microsoft's proprietary streaming protocol. However, I found this program for Windows (I'm sure there's a Linux way but I'm not looking), which seems to work:
http://sdp.ppona.com/
meh
Under what law is it illegal to bring a camera into a cinema?
(damn i've been playing too much SpCell2)
00101010
I always thought the problem was more with copied DVDs and VCDs, not asshats with camcorders in the theatre making craptacular recordings of the movie... Most people I know are aware of the quality of the recorded ones...
Please flee in terror in an orderly manner.
Why wouldn't you just see the f**king movie? Have you ever seen one of those "cam" movies?
A new paperback costs $6-$7. A used one can often be had for $1-$2.
And here in New Zealand, a new paperback is around $21-23. That equates to about $12-14 US. Consider yourself lucky you're in a part of the world where entertainment costs are so cheap.
(For interest's sake - NZ average wage around US$19,200.
A new DVD: US$21-24
New CD: US$18
256kbps broadband (10GB monthly limit): US$42/month)
That's right - we make less, but pay much more.
New Zealand: A nice place to visit, a horrible place to live.
that night vision unit would be an IR unit, if the theaters use that, i will be forced to bring in a TV remote in order to fuck with them.
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
It isn't a Mafia or Teamsters tax. It's an "I'm living in NYC, the center of the everything" tax.
Only people IN NYC think that it's the center of everything. The rest of us couldn't care less.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
We have them in America. They're called potato chips.
What? That's an odd name. I'd have called them "chazzwazzers".
You're actually supposed to use soft cheese curd. Mozzarella would work ok I guess, but it'd be more gooey and gummy and messy (like a pizza or nachos) than poutine is supposed to be. The real Québecois cheese curd seems to hold together a bit better.
People who whatch crapy-quality cam rips are either :
1. Hardcore fans. They'll die to see the movie 2 days before everyone else in their country.
As fans, they're anyway going to watch the movie 3 or 4 times once it comes to a nearby theater and buy 2 copies of the DVD + almost every other related crap.
Bottom Line : Media industry isn't loosing money on them. They're actually making a lot of money with these people.
2. People who aren't interested at all by the movie.
If they really wanted to watch it, they'll either go and see it in a theater, or rent it on DVD or at least get some hi-quality rip.
But they don't give a damn fuck, and what the crappy quality.
They whatch it by curiosity because they happened to find the cam rip.
Media Industry doesn't loose money on them either : they're never going to pay for the stupid movie.
There's even a slight chance to make money on them : maybe while watching the cam rips, they'll like the movie and go out to watch the real thing in a theater.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Or, release the movie at the same damn time everywhere ... I can buy a movie on DVD from the states before it comes out in the cinemas in Australia ...
When you get caught, show them that there's no tape inside and gloat.
I mean, who the fuk wants to watch a dodgy camcorder recording of a movie???
Ive seen a couple and just couldn't see why people would pay, no matter how little, for that crap?? HEre in Australia a movie ticket isnt cheap, but its still only $12.50 or so... The only folks who would watch a camcorder pirate of such a movie are the folks who wouldn't pay to see it anyway!
Why fight something that is only likely to increase the number of people who see and talk about a film; I would severely doubt there would be any impact on ticket sales (or even dvd sales) by this... I'd be more worried about cheap asian digital copies of the dvd impacting their sales...
But then I have the same confusion about macrovision and p2p sharing... why fight something that will have a negilgible impact??? use the money you *DONT* spend fighting this crap to make your product a buck or 2 cheaper...
err!
jak
Knowing that the movie industry has decided to treat each and every customer as a thief really makes me want to go out and give them some cash for the honor of being one of their suspects.
"!"
Paul, go to prison!
Vino, gyno, and techno -Bruce Sterling
Find one or more other people who have a different watermarked copy!
You have then identified the watermark, or at least that part of it sufficient to disambiguate its origin to you or your theater.
If the modifications are non-overlapping, use the other copies to "patch" your own.
Where the modifications are overlapping, change your copy to be the product of all three or something like that.
And the best part is, only one of the copies used to mask these changes needs to be released. Thus, they can never track down which other copies were used to mask your own.
Or in the worst case you all have copies with the same watermark. But in that case, they will not have sufficient evidence to stick it to you.
But then again I don't go to movies and I do not watch movies. I haven't been to a movie in over 8 years and I never intend to go to another.
At least not a movie made by a the capitalist devilspawn that is our corporate conglomerate masters
Warner Brothers needs to appear to do what it can since it's hard enough being a Hollywood based company. If Warner Brothers screws it up, they could loose out on the next harry potter film and loose mega dollars.
Disclaimer: I'm just guessing WB is a USA based company. J. K. Rowlings is quite particular about who post-produces her work.
Give them laser rifles which fire a laser pointer beam at a miscreant...but also send a wider IR beam to mess up the camera.
Reminds me of the SW movie when there was a rumor that Han's flight through the asteroid field featured the Falcon zooming over the audience, through some new 3D technology. Knowing how light works, I was quite amused to see in the front of a theater a large box covered in black cloth, with theater staff standing guard.
"Well, he brought a cutlass to a gunfight..."
the ushers are often the ones who record the film off anyway.
If they released movies/dvd's/games/tv programs at the same time you will stop the people getting pirate versions just to see it when the rest of the world does. So the movie/"last episode of x-files" etc does not get ruined by some idiot posting to some forum without a spoiler alert!
Why would the driver want to go so fast anyway?
so, why does The Matrix (2, or 3) soundtrack cost the same as the DVD? Am I supposed to believe that the music is worth the same as the movie (greater than 100 million USD budget)?
P.S. I will argue that alot of DVDs are too. come on, The Apple Dumpling Gang for $15? Gimme a break Walmart.
Jeremy Logan's Website.
damned my inability to correctly use the previe feature... here's what I ment to say: so, why does The Matrix (2, or 3) soundtrack cost the same as the DVD? Am I supposed to believe that the music is worth the same as the movie (greater than 100 million USD budget)?
I agree with you on the movie thing... movies are worth about $4/hr, but music? No, it's vastly overpriced, almost reaching extortion levels.
P.S. I will argue that alot of DVDs are too. come on, The Apple Dumpling Gang for $15? Gimme a break Walmart.
Jeremy Logan's Website.
If I see a watermark in the corner of the screen, I'm getting my money back. I hate those damn things on the TV, now I have to see it in the theatres? Let me ask this... is it REALLY a problem? How many of you DIDN'T go to see a movie last year cause you could download a crappy ass screen recording of it?
Get a few minutes later to your seat, once the advertisement is over.
All what it takes is a little torchlight.
Talk about throwing the baby with the bathwater....
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Much as I hate being a pedant... (ok so I lied ;-)
;-p
I don't know about you but I can read your average paperback in about 2 - 4 hours. So a new paperback will cost me between 4 - 2 bucks an hour. I tend not to re-read books I have already read.
insightful eh?
A crash reduces
Your expensive computer
to a simple stone.
go to any inner city grocery store and ask if they have "Shrek2" on VHS or maybe even DVD and it probably will magically appear despite not being officially released. Studios lose big money on this. You may not consider the quality very good, but to a great many people it doesnt matter. This underground film distribution is very profitable for the pirate and for the stores. I use the word pirate here because it is not someone who has is sharing a mpg file this is a person making money off selling illegally obtained goods. You can say the corporations have lots of money, but these loses mean higher ticket prices at the box office and for movie rental and purchase for us.
Ha, funny to think about this, because I actually work for a Movie Theater. We never really have any problems with that though, and I'm sure we'd handle it pretty good (ass beating with broom sticks) if we ever caught someone doing that. But yes, I am an usher and I do download movies via IRC and P2P. Who's to stop me? Other ushers. Not everyone is corrupt... at least we hope not.
"Instant gratification takes too long." - Carrie Fisher
Ah, but you can if you so choose. Try to rewatch a movie in a theater using your used ticket stub.
Plus, you can resell your used book and recoup some of that initial investment. Try to resell your used ticket stub to someone else wanting to watch the movie.
You have a point... but it's quite weak.