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MPAA Piracy Survey - Junk Research

Cpt_Corelli writes "Alwayson network claims that a recent survey conducted by Online Testing Exchange (OTX) and distributed by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) is crap. The MPAA's summary of the survey claims, among other hard-to-believe assertions, that 'about one in four Internet users have downloaded a movie.' (It turns out this isn't true, but this is the factoid that was heard around the world the following week.) When did you stop trusting sponsored 'research'?"

13 of 409 comments (clear)

  1. public domain movies by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    http://www.archive.org/movies/collection.php?colle ction=feature_films

  2. Re:just love statistics by throwaway18 · · Score: 4, Informative

    The book "How to lie with statistics" by Darrell Huff was published fifty years ago and just as true today.

  3. Re:When did you stop trusting sponsored 'research' by SpaceLifeForm · · Score: 3, Informative
    Apparently true for some courts.

    From here:

    Upholding a lower court decision issued in April of 2003, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled P2P technology is legal even if the software itself is used for illegal purposes.

    "The technology has numerous other uses, significantly reducing the distribution costs of public domain and permissively shared art and speech, as well as reducing the centralized control of that distribution," Judge Sidney R. Thomas wrote in a unanimous opinion.

    The three-judge panel acknowledged that copyright violations do occur on the decentralized P2P networks, but the companies owning and distributing the enabling software cannot be held liable for the infringements.

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    You are being MICROattacked, from various angles, in a SOFT manner.
  4. slashcode-friendly link by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative
  5. Shock therapy not used in movie downloading study by foobsr · · Score: 3, Informative
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    TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
  6. Trusting sponsored research by thephotoman · · Score: 2, Informative

    Well, in some fields, especially science, sponsored research is frequently the only research we can get. However, marketing research should usually be taken with a grain of salt. Same thing goes with usage/common practice research when people are wanting to hunt down everybody participating in a certain action, such as downloading movies.

    But 1 in 4 internet users download movies? Are we counting freely-distributed porn films or not? If so, that number is a lot higher. If not, it's a really low number.

    --
    Haec merda tauri est. Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.
  7. Thats hard to believe considering... by ricochet81 · · Score: 2, Informative
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    Error: Id10t detected
  8. Re:"Stop" trusting? by maxpublic · · Score: 4, Informative

    Actually yes. Unfortunately it isn't the original study, but a second which was done later during the same year. I cannot find a copy of the original study online.

    The second study was published in the August 1, 2001 edition of the American Journal of Epidemiology. The primary scientist of record is Dr. Ralitza V. Gueorguieva from Yale University.

    Here's an excerpt from the summary of this study, reported in an August 8, 2001 Yahoo news article:

    "The report notes that while children of teen moms are significantly more likely to have educational disabilities overall, they are no more likely to have problems when the mother's education, marital status, income and race are taken into account.

    In fact, these youngsters may be less likely to have physical handicaps and academic problems than children of older moms, the researchers report.

    ``Children of teenage mothers are at higher risk for disabilities in kindergarten, but this increased risk appears to be due not to a biological effect of the young age of the mother per se, but to the confounding influences of associated sociodemographic and/or environmental factors,'' according to Dr. Ralitza V. Gueorguieva from Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, and colleagues.

    To investigate whether young maternal age increased the risk of academic difficulties, the investigators examined the school records of more than 339,000 children who entered a kindergarten class in Florida between 1992 and 1994.

    Children of teenage mothers were significantly more likely to have lower IQ scores and more academic problems, the report indicates. But when social and economic factors were accounted for, teenage motherhood appeared to be protective in certain ways.

    For instance, children of mothers aged 11 to 17 had a significantly lower risk of academic problems and children of 18- and 19-year-old mothers also had a lower risk of learning disabilities. On the other hand, children whose mothers were age 36 or older were more likely to be physically impaired or have academic problems, when social and environmental factors were considered.

    According to the report, a mother's education had the greatest impact on a child's educational achievement. A mother's marital status, income and race also influenced the child's academic abilities.

    ``There is some evidence that a large number of children of teenage mothers show disabilities or academic problems not because of the effect of having a teenage mother per se but because of the confounding influences of other factors,'' Gueorguieva and colleagues write."

    Why do I call this the second study, supporting the first (which I can't find online)? Because:

    "The findings support previous research suggesting that some of the negative consequences of teen motherhood may be mediated by social and economic factors."

    The study here doesn't specifically address pre-natal care, whereas the original did. The authors of the original study had some trouble trying to account for a lack of control over prenatal care in the '80's study they disputed when it's been well known since the early 70's that prenatal care is one of THE most important factors in determining the health of a baby. You just don't 'forget' to account for prenatal care.

    Don't believe me? Type in "prenatal care" and "teen pregnancy" into Yahoo or Google and watch the web sites and papers pop up, all telling you just how vital prenatal care is and how critical it is to the health of your baby. A scientist doing research on the subject is about as likely to 'overlook' prenatal care as a mechanic looking to solve car trouble is going to miss the fact that the car has four flats.

    I wish I could find a link to the original study I was speaking of, but I can't, at least not in the 15 or so minutes I spent searching. I did find this, however, and this study was done just months after the one I was speaking of (which is why they refer to the study in their summary).

    Max

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    My god carries a hammer. Your god died nailed to a tree. Any questions?
  9. Re:Well... by RALE007 · · Score: 4, Informative

    It is most certainly not an oligopoly. Go back to your Econ 101 book and reread the chapter on oligopolies, then flip through the chapter about cartels. An oligopoly would be a market with a few big players competing against one another. A cartel controlled market would be a few big players in an alliance, setting prices and essentially making their cartel a confederated monopoly.

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    Beware blue cats moving at .99c
  10. Hmmm by tkrotchko · · Score: 2, Informative

    "Deciding if something is wrong or right should not depend on how it effects the economy"

    Isn't the whole justification for copyrights that its good for the economy?

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    You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
  11. Re:Well... by sejmeister · · Score: 2, Informative

    You have every right, if what I'm doing is to you or your property.

    I do a lot of fishing, catch and release. While catching fish from someone's pond does not hurt them or their fish, they have every right not to allow me to fish there.

    The point of the p2p argument is that regardless of what reason you try to back it up with, you are stealing other people's property. You can't steal the DVD from the store because you think it costs too much, and neither can you steal it on the internet.

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    http://sejje.net/
  12. Re:Well... by DustMagnet · · Score: 2, Informative
    The point of the p2p argument is that regardless of what reason you try to back it up with, you are stealing other people's property.

    But that's not stealing. Even the law doesn't call it stealing. It's not stealing. It's copyright violation. We were talking about law and ethics. I'd think you should at least understand what the law is. Once you understand it's not stealing, then we can talk about why we have copyright law and how it's been abused, but first, you need to understand that copyright violation isn't stealing. Never has been, never will be. That's important, because fixing the law isn't the same as legalizing theft.

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    'SBEMAIL!' is better than a goat!!
  13. Re:Well... by back_pages · · Score: 4, Informative
    This is nonsense. ALL law is ethics defined.

    This is refuted in any Philosophy 101 course. Why is it illegal to drive without using your seatbelt? Is it wrong to not use your seatbelt? No, but it unfairly burdens the emergency response units in the community when some dumbass splatters his face on a tree because he didn't wear his seatbelt. Therefore, it is illegal to drive without using your seatbelt.

    It is legal to lie to my mother but it is unethical. Why is this? Because laws do not and should not codify what is ethical. You cannot enforce morality. As the poster to which you respond accurately stated, laws reflect what is necessary to keep society from falling apart.

    We can all lie to our mothers incessantly and have a functioning society, even though lying is unethical. If we all drove around without seatbelts, which certainly is not unethical, we would quickly send our emergency care services into chaos, therefore seat belt use is mandated by law.

    Anyway, any Philosophy 101 course will give the very same argument, and it will very likely use the examples of lying to your mother and wearing a seatbelt.