MPAA CEO Dan Glickman on the Broadcast Flag

Thomas Hawk writes "Motion Picture Association of America head Dan Glickman has an opinion piece up at CNET explaining why, even after they and the FCC lost the legal case to force the Broadcast Flag on us, we should still as consumers be advocates for it. The gist of Glickman's argument boils down to the old 'we're taking our ball and going home' game as he tries to convince us that without this incentive good TV and movies won't get shown on broadcast television. 'Our companies want to continue to show their movies and television shows to viewers who don't or can't subscribe to cable or satellite systems. But without the broadcast flag, that option will look less and less appealing. In the end, it will be the consumers who suffer the most if the broadcast flag is not mandated for the digital era.'"

Comments

I personally want to call his bluff

[Anonymous Coward]

but that's just me

So predictable

[rjch]

I'd ask the question "when will these guys ever learn" except that if I got a reply of anything other than "never" I'd be totally shocked.

Unfortunately, I'd have to say that this "proposal" is most certainly not dead - as the article clearly stated, the ruling was against the FCC's authority to impose this measure, rather than against the measure itself.

Possibly it shouldn't worry me all that much, living in Australia. However with the FTA in force - and one of the provisions in the FTA relating to the respect of copyright protection, maybe it should. In the end though, I keep thinking of the quote I used to see when opening up MythWeb every now and again - consumers just won't buy devices that won't let them do what they want to.

Who needs who more ?

[EpsCylonB]

Do we really need their movies more than they need us to pay for them ?.

Bring it on, the broadcast prime time that was traditionally given to movies will be filled by new content. There are a lot of people who to be on TV and TV programs, not all of them are talented but this kind of subjective anyway.

Ultimately its the viewers that are in control, if they want big movie style television in the wake of the MPAA revoking its product, then someone else will make television programs to satisfy the audience.

It obvious to everyone on slashdot but the biggest mistake that the RIAA and MPAA made was to start attacking their customers. The truth is they are not really worried about being forced out of business, they worried about being undercut and having their dominant business model taken away.

They are powerful and the whole argument about digital media will take a long time to play out. But I am confident that even in the lobby controlled political climate of washington the customer will end up being right.

Re:Who needs who more ?

[slavemowgli]

Yes, in the end, the customer will end up being right - but what does the customer actually want? Or, rather, what will the customer(s) care about?

Several people have already made the argument that the industry needs the consumers more than vice versa, and concluded that thus, the consumers will ultimately prevail and that the industry will not be able to blackmail consumers by threatening to take away shows.

However, there seem to be a fundamental flaw in that argument - namely, the fact that unlike the industry, "the consumers" are not a well-defined entity that acts in a controlled, coherent, or even informed manner. Most people on Slashdot seem to understand why the broadcast flag is bad for them and (actively) oppose it; however, the same is not true for the general population. There really are three problems here:

1) The general population probably does not know about things like the broadcast flag at all. It's true that a significant number of people *do* know about it, but I'd be quite surprised if they'd outnumber the people who don't.

2) Of those who do know about it (after, say, reading about it in a newspaper etc.), the majority does not really care about it, as long as they'll still be able to watch tv like they did before.

3) Of those who do care, the majority are not realy informed enough to be able to reject the MPAA's arguments of why the broadcast flag ultimately would be beneficial to consumers.

That does not mean I believe that the MPAA has already won and that the broadcast flag will come in one form or another without their being a public uproar (even a minor one); but I also am not automatically confident that the general public will prevail, even though it clearly is more powerful than the MPAA.

As Terry Pratchett said, "...pulling together is the aim of despotism and tyranny. Free men pull in all kinds of directions. It's the only way to make progress." But unfortunately, that also means that a comparatively small dedicated group that *does* pull together can exert more influence than they should be able to.