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Cutting out the Naughty Bits Ruled Illegal
An anonymous reader writes "Some of you may recall the lawsuit brought by several Hollywood directors against companies which edit movies for sex, language, and violence. The companies would trade consumers an off-the-shelf DVD for an edited one. Well, the CBC is reporting that Judge Richard P. Matsch has found that this practice violates U.S. copyright law, and 'decreed on Thursday in Denver, Colo., that sanitizing movies to delete content that may offend some people is an "illegitimate business." [...] The judge also praised the motives of the Hollywood studios and directors behind the suit, ordering the companies that provide the service to hand over their inventories.'''
From what I understand from this ruling, it would be illegal for me to buy a book, tear out every other page, and sell it to someone else. That's a pretty close analogy, seeing as both my actions and Cleanflicks' third-party video cutting are not authorized by the copyright holder.
Not quite. You own the physical book. You can do what you want with it... including tearing out pages, burning it, or blacking out all instances of the word "the" if you choose. What you can't do is type the contents of the book into a word processor, remove certain sections of it, reprint the modified book, and then sell that bound inside the original cover. That's the difference.
Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
The rights to the movie belong to the guy (company) that made it. If the airlines pay for a license to show an edited version then that is cool. The company in question here did NOT have permission to distributed edited versions of the movies.
No, I don't think it means that authors can ensure that only their authorized versions are sold. I think it means that third parties can only distribute "patches", but they can't include the original material with their patch, nor can they directly distribute the post-patch version. And I think that's been the case in the US for a long, long time.
Oh, yeah, http://www.clearplay.com/
Remember, open source is free as in speech, not free as in bear.
> they are buying a license to Gladiator, which doesn't include the right to make derivative works.
F(*#$@ NO! They are *NOT* buying a license. They are buying a copyrighted work. You don't have to sign a EULA when you buy a DVD. You are, however, correct about derivative works (excepting works of parody) not being allowed under copyright.
"Build a man a fire warm him for a day, set a man on fire and warm him for the rest of his life."
Wal-mart only censors music, not movies. And it's not Wal-mart doing the censorship; the tracks on a CD you'd buy at Wal-mart are the ones you'd hear on the radio. They are made by the record companies. And I don't know for sure, but I'd guess that one of the big reasons Wal-mart doesn't carry 'explicit lyrics' versions of CDs is because of liability. Selling one of those to a minor will get you fired just as quickly as selling them beer.
As others have already stated, this has absolutely nothing to do with Walmart. This applies to services such as CleanFlix, which are very popular in Utah and Idaho. I am a Mormon, and I frequent Cleanflix often. Some movies are very enjoyable, but contain bits that I don't wish to see. If the mainstream want to see those bits, fine, go ahead; these services are not for them. If I don't want to see it, how does it affect you? Cleanflix allows me to rent movies that I would not otherwise rent, they are now turning away a potential customer. This does not hurt the copyright holder, they still receive the full purchase price for all the movies that Cleanflix uses. Their revenue is not altered in any way by this editing.
A condensation, especially one made along definite editorial lines that differ from the original creator's, is certainly a derivative work, by 17 U.S.C. 101:
Back to OP: It certainly does. Newspapers pay for the license to create derivative works as well as redistribute. As part of that license, they are required to not edit it in such a way that will distort the "essential meaning" of the piece.
"It is our blasphemy which has made us great, and will sustain us, and which the gods secretly admire in us." - Zelazny
That's bullshit. You are not buying a copyrighted work. That would entail that you are buying all the rights associated with the copyright. You are buying a copy of a copyrighted work. You don't become the owner of any of the rights associiated with the copyright, and you really only have the right to use the work privately and sell your authorised copy.
Certainly, my right to punch ends at my nose. But, how does getting an abortion physically harm you? How does it "punch you in the nose" so to speak?
To pro-lifers, abortion isn't about how it effects them -- they honestly believe that a child in a womb is a child non-the-less, and that this child has a right to live. They believe that having an abortion is taking a child's life.
Is it your business if one man kills another? Why are there laws against it? This is simply the view of the pro-life crowd. It's not that complicated.
A good alternative for those who don't want their young children to see "bad" stuff is clearplay. We've had it for a while, here is how it works.
1. Buy a normal DVD with all the "naughty bits"
2. Get the filter from the clearplay website for that DVD
3. Transfer the filter via USB or CD to the clearplay DVD player
4. Watch your DVD - the filter tells the DVD player where to skip the naughty bits - no editing, just timecodes to be skipped.
I thought it'd be jumpy but it really isn't. Most of the time I can't even figure out what has been skipped. Plus you can set the level of each "naughty bit" - violence, profanity and sex - from low to high. Pretty neat stuff I'd say.