Slashdot Mirror
Night Goggles Capture Spider-Man Movie Bootlegger
linuxwrangler writes "According to SFGate.com/AP, a teen has been arrested for attempting to bootleg the Spider-Man 2 movie, after a projectionist using night-vision goggles spotted him. The teen was escorted from the theater by security guards and turned over to police. This may be the first arrest stemming from the use of NV goggles that were previously mentioned on Slashdot."
It's encouraging to see movie studios go after the actual perpetrators, rather than raise a blanket assumption that everybody is guilty and everybody deserves restrictions to their activity. I remember Roger Ebert complaining that a year or so ago critics were being patted down before being allowed into movie screenings.
Slashdot: providing anti-social weirdos a soapbox, since 1997.
It's hard to believe the movie industry is getting so excited over wretchedly poor quality bootlegs. This strikes me as being more of a propaganda war than anything else. Every time an arrest is made some movie exec gets to come out and use the words "steal" and "movie" in the same sentence, as if making copies is at all the same thing as theft. They can jump up and down and say it's theft as many times as they want but that doesn't make it so.
The night vision thing creeps me out. I imagine theater security goons walking around with those goggles on like Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs. And if the film is political, for example Fahrenheit 911, the idea that they are watching your every move even in the dark is scary. At some F911 showings in rightwing areas, they have cops in the theater, supposedly to quell possible disturbances but in reality apparently just to intimidate people. The night vision stuff really adds to the creep factor.
I'm glad that I almost never go to the movies any more.
"The teen could be charged under a law that went into effect Jan. 1 and makes taking a recording device into a movie theater a crime punishable by up to one year in jail and a maximum fine of $2,500."
Potentially a year in jail for videotaping a movie? He didn't distribute it yet so they can't punish him for more broad piracy issues. A year in jail for a single instance of copyright violation? Could this be argued as a violation of 8th ammendment rights?
It is about time theatres have taken it under their mandate to try and help the studios out on this one. Although, from various news sources and from /., I realize most recordings are inside jobs. Who knows it may go up to the top. If a manager knows it is happening or is actually in on it, I am sure there is a tidy bit of cash for him to make or at least favours to get by handing out copies to friends.
I gave up going to the theatre due to high costs and lack of value. Now I just wait the three to 6 months and watch it at home on the wide screen. At least I won't get busted for making out with my fiancee if things get to heavy.
I am just waiting for the guy who works in the theatre, donning these new fangled night vision goggles, to sue the theatre because they didn't give him proper training . I am sure someone, somewhere will forget to take them off when the lights go on.
Barring human stupidity, I just wonder what effect on your vision wearing these things for, lets say 6 hrs a day, three days a week, for the average teen kid working at a theatre part time. I also wonder how the bright flashes of light comming from the screen effect your vision over time. Whenever you see a movie where some guy is hunting down some other guy, or girl for that matter, and is wearing night vision goggles, inevitably the hunted use some bright light to blind the hunter... Does anyone have any first hand knowlege of the damage to the eyes, or if the pain and squinting you see in the movies during these scenes is true to fact?
flinging poop since 1969
In high school I worked at a movie theatre. We had to watch this incredibly gay training film in which we learned two powerful upselling techniques. See, the medium was only a quarter more than the small, and the large was only a quarter more than the medium.
First was "the eclipse." In The Eclipse, I would hold up the medium cup the customer asked for and then, say, "for only a quarter more, you can have a large!" as I moved the large cup in front of the medium cup, "eclipsing" it.
The second was "the vanishing." "for only a quarter more, you can have a large!" and I drop the medium cup into the large cup. Isn't that worth it!
These days I make my living as a photographer. Recently meeting with a bride whose wedding we had photographed, I upsold her from a 10x10 album to an 11x14 buy moving it in front of the 10x10. It worked, but I felt so dirty. I still have nightmares about "the vanishing."
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
It sounds crazy, but that's what happens. Go Google for the article with the Israeli Mossad torture expert. You have deep subconsious shit that goes off to make you a martyr. It doesn't work for everybody, but for a lot of people it becomes just so satisfying to piss off the assholes trying to fuck with you at some point that you don't really care about the little nagging prison time and everything anymore.
Actually...
On the internet, I don't belive that 92% of the files copied are cams. No way. That statistic is BOGUS.
But for the street vendors, pushing VCDs and crappy VHS dupes to idiots, it might even be true. Or might have been a few years back - nowdays with pirate DVDs of unreleased-to-DVD movies are more common, and with those the customers already demand a bit more quality than a cammed copy.
Lots of pirate _sales_ are made on the very first days the movie is out - and at that point the cammed version might be the only thing that's out there. The dumb pirate *buyers* do not know any better, and I could belive a hefty chunk of the sales are cammed copies. Tho I still think that 92% number must include telesyncs, which are made with a tripod, in an empty theater with the cooperation of the staff. And THAT problem is fixable by securing the handling and showing of the prints. Of course THAT would cost money. Probably more than what it costs to buy off new laws to toss camming kids to jail.
If I remember right, when you look at a videocamera with something IR-sensitive, you can see the focus light that it uses to put a strong known pattern on the scene in front of it.
I wonder if they just need to glance in there, with the camera sticking out like a sore thumb, or if they actually need to see the camera itself?
I for one welcome this move to stop the distribution of movies filmed by the audience in theathers.
:)
This will homefully deter people from spreading poor quality bootlegs.
However, this means that the average movie spread on the internet will be of higher quality. I wonder if the MPAA really has thought this one through...
A CAM version of a movie is not a replacement for buying it. But if the only copies spread on the internet are DVD-rips, this could have a negative impact on VHS/DVD rentals and sales
So if people were encurraged to bring cameras to the theatre and shoot crappy bootlegs, the internet would be flooded by a lot of different versions of low quality files. And anyone downloading stuff would get dissapointed.
A personal note: I once watched a downloaded movie "filmed in Tilt-o-vision(tm) in front of a live theatre audience" and I woved to myself never to do that again because of the poor quality. I guess the MPAA feels the same way
Before this degenerates into another "The MPAA suxx0rz" argument (oops! too late!), I'm going to field a question here:
Is there be a way to defeat these goggles by emitting light in a wavelength invisible to the human eye? And if there is, since creating a blind spot where you're sitting would immediately call attention to your evildoing antics (bwahahaha), would it be possible to use a beam, directed at the little window and the dude with the night goggles, effectively blinding them?
This is merely for the sake of curiosity, of course, since (a) I'm not about to go set up a camcorder in my local cinema, (b) The attendants where I live wouldn't know night vision goggles from ViewMaster ones and (c) Creating such an effect would immediately draw attention to yourself anyway.
So long, and thanks for all the fish
Ignoring the actual issues involving the supposed 'crime', I find public monitoring a little uncomfortable.. esp in a darkened theatre. I guess they should just stick up a sign above the screen titled 'big brother is watching you'.
A little creepy for my tastes, freedoms are lost one inch at a time.... remember that folks!
They are doing this simply to make it a public spectacle and sensationalize it.
we did some tests and a pair of IR floods pointed at the audience at the sides of the screen makes it impossible for a camcorder to record the film without being massively washed out and looking like hell.
the movie companies are just trying to make examples and generate public fear.
if they pulled their heads out of their asses long enough to use simple solutions like I gave above it would be "solved". but they know that most bootlegs do not come from kids in a theatre but from staff at that theatre or in their own company.
that said, I have almost finised my head mounted high intensity IR strobe made from lots of Ir led's and I cant wait to use it at a theatre to see if I get the attention of a movie police.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Fred
"A fool and his freedom are soon parted"
-RMS