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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.'''
I didn't think there was any way that this would work out, but it did. I remember the first time I bought a cd from wal-mart, only to return it later because it was missing a couple of tracks.
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What I'm interested to know is how this affects parents who use their DVR's to achieve the same purpose to sanitize movies for their children. Hollywood has expressed anger over THAT practice, too, which seems to me wholly unfair.
We are the fire that lights our world.. and we are the fire that consumes it.
Wow. Much as I approve of this slap to the boobies-are-icky types, this is really another example of the ways copyright is going crazy. Why SHOULD a director have this so-called right to dictate that others view the precise film he made? I buy a book or film and read / watch what I choose. If I want to be able to automatically skip certain types of content, and someone is willing to sell me a means to do so, why is it anyone else's business? I mean, am I at least allowed to manually fast-forward through the naughty bits, or would that offend the MPAA's sensitivities as well? Why shouldn't someone auto fastforward for me if I'm willing?
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.
Something tells me the MPAA has an ideal court case for extending their powers, here. I mean, 99% of the population would glance at this case and declare: "Cutting the naughty bits out of movies is bad!" or "Hur hur hur, take dat you stupid rednecks!"
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
And from the DGA President:
These are supposed to show the reason behind the decision. Following the logic of the first, censorship of any sort of art would be copyright infringement. The second quote isn't even relevant. The company clearly states that the DVDs are edited; that's the whole point of someone trading an unedited one for their version!
If the company is doing something else that's infringing, I could understand the suit, but that's not what the suers are talking about.
It's not OK to remove violence or obscenities from home movies, but airlines are free to remove anything they find commercially offensive from in-flight movies.
GrpA
Enjoy science fiction? "Turing Evolved" - AI, Mecha, Androids and rail-gun battles. What more could you want?
Timbits!
Al
I think I can see where the harm is. Think of Ayn Rand's novels, The Fountainhead or Atlas Shrugged. If those were edited for content by many of today's far-Left nitwits, they would not convey the same message. The problem is that they would (presumably) be sold as the same novels written by the same author, something I am sure she would disapprove of if she were still alive today.
A little editing can be a very dangerous thing. How hard would it be to edit a few sections out of Michael Moore's "Roger & Me" to make the unionized workers in Flint look like stupid, incompetent crybabies? That film is a wonderful piece of propaganda that would be horribly distorted if it was edited in a malicious manner.
Almost any non-trivial creative work contains/conveys some sort of message(s) that can easily be lost or damaged by clever (or simply bad) editing. I know I do not want a lot of things I write edited down and posted out of context as being written by me, even though that does happen all too often to people a lot more famous than I will ever be.
"You're young, you're drunk, you're in bed, you have knives; shit happens." -- Angelina Jolie
This actually might be good news over the next few years. A large and key bloc of Republican voters (the Christian right) is going to be very, very annoyed about this ruling. If they start supporting copyright reform in a big way because of this, substantial changes might be possible for once.
With reasonable men I will reason; with humane men I will plead; but to tyrants I will give no quarter. -- William Lloyd
I was curious to see if TFA mentioned ClearPlay, a company we heard about on /. a while ago that markets custom DVD players that read not only the DVD but also a database that categorizes the content on popular movies, allowing you to program the player to skip scenes of sex or violence or whatever bothers you. The company seems to still be in business, but apparently they're not popular enough to keep these custom DVDs out of the market. The effect is the same, but without the copyright concerns.
/. comments at the time being fairly negative, but to me it seemed like a pretty good idea. I don't really like censorship in any form, but it's hard to argue with something as voluntary as buying a whole separate DVD player to keep your kids from seeing the naughty bits, if that's what gets your goat.
I seem to recall the
High-speed Road Trip (18.000KPH)
...I happen to be a theatre major as well as a Computer Science Major (yes, and odd combination, I know)...but speaking as an artist, I would not want someone else to take something I've written and re-edit it, removing things they didn't like.
Believe it or not, every detail of every scene in the movie is very intentional. If someone were to delete anything, espically an entire scene, that could destroy the entire central image I was going for.
For this reason, I support the decision.
That said, I'm not a huge fan of "naughty bits" myself, particularly in front of children. As an artist, however, I would rather the parents say "we're not going to watch this movie" and not buy it than for them to re-edit it themselves.
Removal of a whole song on a CD is different... i would view that as "we're not going to listen to this song", rather than "We're going to change this persons art."
What somebody needs to do is to devise a DVD player that can read a file delineating where the objectionable parts are on the particular DVD.
Actually, I believe that all DVD players can do this, as this feature was built right into the DVD spec (and as the spec was being developed/marketed, there was a general belief that this feature would become commonplace.)
The problem is not the players, its the content makers who decline to take advantage of it.
If memory serves, when networks broadcast movies on television, they take out the naughty bits. Since Hollywood is anxious to preserve the artistic integrity of its product, they'll no doubt take this court ruling to the television networks and forbid them from censoring said naughty bits. Right?
I understand where the movie companies are coming from in terms of copyright... they don't want people taking a DVD, adding additional clips/features/menus/etc, and selling that for a profit. Then again, I don't really understand why they have an issue with that. They're getting just as much money from each DVD sale, so it's not like they're losing any business. In fact, they're probably gaining business from those people who wouldn't normally buy a certain movie due to violent/sexual/etc content, but will if they get an edited version of the movie.
;)
As for the directors and producers that claim their artistic vision was impeded upon, they sure don't have an issue with those movies being modified in the exact same way for broadcast on network tv. All they care about is the large amount of money the networks give them.
So, what this really comes down to is the movie studios wanting complete control over their works, which I'm surprised to see much of the Slashdot crowd backing up. Seems it's better to hate "the red states" than to hate the MPAA.
Now that that those are taken care of, where do Microsoft, the Kansas Board of Education, America, Republicans, sports, and current music stars fit in?
You have enemies? Good. That means you've stood up for something, sometime in your life. --Winston Churchill
I agree with what you stated about gay marriage, etc. My religion believes that in the premortal existence, two separate plans were presented. Satan's plan, which God did not choose, was to coerce people to be righteous so that everyone could receive exaltation. Jesus's plan was that people should be free to choose: there must be opposition in all things. Some people definitely go too far into pushing their beliefs on others; in my opinion this is following Satan's plan and it is unfortunate that most people of my faith act this way and are not more tolerant.
However, the line must be drawn somewhere. Your right to swing your fist ends where my nose begins, and many believe that abortion is included in this.
People tend to get *very* irate if they do not think they should be carded for something. And silly as it sounds, having someone screaming at you after you've been dealing with customers for 8 hours really can affect a decision to card someone. In addition, fewer people try to illegally purchase alcohol and ammunition than movies or games. Think about it: it's illegal to buy beer if you're under 21, but it's only illegal to sell restricted movies to minors. See the difference?
Allright, here's a question, which is more detrimental to society, lots of kids in foster homes, or a few gay couples that might take in one or two, instead of adding to our (already growing) population? Producing kids is not really what's best when there are a lot of kids out there that are never getting good jobs and end up sucking on welfare for the rest of their lives.
The right to protest the State is more sacred than the State.
One of the "clean movie" companies does exactly this (forgot the name, saw it on a news story of DVD editing). They sell special web-connected DVD players that download edit lists for the movies. Though more expensive to set up, they feel they are more legally in the clear. I think this model is actually quite nice, as you could tag each missing part, and then set up a menu for what things are ok to show (language, nudity, violence, etc) as checklists or even allowable levels. That would give the consumer complete control.
Personally I like to watch un-edited movies, but I defend the rights of others to watch whatever edit they want of something they bought. "Bounty" does not tell me what I am allowed and not allowed to do with their paper towels, magazines do not prevent me from skipping through stories, so why is a plastic disc treated differently?
The "reform" they'd most likely call for is to ban "naughty" movies or at the very least "naughty" parts in normal movies. Instead of fighting the copyright issue, they'd tackle the subject much more directly.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Have you ever been to Wal-mart?
I have been carded for buying 5 minute expoxy and other household cleaners because they (this Wal-mart) maintains that I have to be at least 18 to buy such stuff. Never mind that I can go to any supermarket here and buy the same items no problem without hassle because my state has no such laws on such items. It is Wal-mart themselves that are doing this on their own initiative.
If they didn't add even "one minute" to the transaction, they wouldn't do this, but they do anyhow. And they have been doing this for years.
Same thing with other items.
The thing Wal-mart is doing with music is censorship, plain and simple. Why not sell the explicit lyrics? Well, we have no problem establishing that they don't mind carding for frivolous items, my thinking is that they KNOW they can sell a few more CDs while keeping to their silly code. You can't change the nature of 5-minute expoxy or drain cleaner, these items are what they are, but if you can make a CD "kid friendly", in their view, why not do it.
I think it's a load of shit, but that may be just me.
> Moral issues aside, willfully engaging in behavior contrary to basic biological drives
> (reproduction) indicates something seriously wrong with an individual.
Strange...I always thought being able to do that was well, kind of, what made humans...not animals?
I mean, I have a strong biological urge to chase away or kill every male and attempt to inseminate every female of my species that I meet.
As a man of God, do you really want to be suggesting that I shouldn't at least attempt to act in a manner contrary to those fairly biological urges of mine?
I wonder what my wife would think of that? If I had one. Which of course, I don't, this being Slashdot and all.
No, no, no. You can't actually edit his post, just like Cleanfix can't edit the original. What Cleanfix can do is what you actually did. You provided an edited copy, that everyone can clearly see is not the original, without altering the original. Some people may prefer your version, but they will never be confused as to who wrote what.
It comes down to fair use. It saddens me that anyone would be such a prissy little prude as to want such a thing, but I support the rights of prissy little prudes to be prissy little prudes, just as I support the rights of other 'artists' to take a copy of the Bible and alter it by smearing it with shit. You buy it, you can do whatever the fuck you want with it.
I may be a socialist, but I'm no communist and I'd hope that in this country private property still means exactly that. In the end, this means commercial skipping is just as illegal.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Hey, neighbor ... I live in Glendale, AZ and I assure everyone that the streets are LOADED with Mormon missionaries on bikes just as this guy says.
:)
Now, my problem with this crap is when privately-owned-yet-public-facilities like Blockbuster, Hollywood Video, and apparently Wal-mart (I don't buy movies from Wal-mart; full screen can kiss my ass) start removing my ability to choose. It is one thing for Blockbuster not to carry "unrated" versions (one of the reasons I stopped going to Blockbuster to begin with) - but to carry the SANITIZED flicks (well-marked or not) instead of the actual versions (or carrying both with more copies of the sanitized version than the other) is just plain wrong to me.
Is it their right to do so? I suppose so. Then again, if you want to get technical, it's Lucas' right to alter every edition of Star Wars and never let the originals out, right?
I like to akin this to celebrity-ism. When you become a famous celebrity or well-known to the public, you lose some of your rights. As a public figure, you can be lampooned, ridiculed, and in many cases those looking to expose you for profit are protected. When you become a celebrity, you lose some of your rights - and every single one of them know this going in.
When you become Wal-mart, Lucas, or Blockbuster - you should also lose some of your rights because you have that much influence on the public. If and when a company controls 40%+ of sales in a town, they have an obligation to serve the public trust. Before you say "censorship serves the public trust", I want to point out that no one came and surveyed me to ask me if I wanted sanitized CDs in my local Wal-mart before they built it. No one polled me and said "would carrying unrated movies cause you problems?" Censorship is almost ALWAYS catering to the needs of the FEW, not the needs of the MANY as I feel they should do. Look at the FCC as a prime example.
Of course, Wal-mart WAS willing to call me at 8pm at night and ask me to come support the building of a new store in my community. I told them there were enough Wal-marts per capita in this town, and they could go and fornicate themselves
It isn't Wal-mart's job to protect the people and perform real-time censorship. It should be up to the people to take care of themselves and their children.
Uhh... actually, it *is* illegal to modify a DVD for personal viewing, and was so long before this judge's ruling. This act would be referred to as creating a "derivative work", and is explicitely listed as one of the exlusive rights granted to the copyright holder (unless they grant that right via a licensing agreement) in section 106 of the United Stated Copyright Code. The difference, of course, is that this company was making a profit from creating derivative works (under the guise of a service), while an individual in their home is not, and thus is of little concern to copyright holders.
Very helpful link.
From reading the material on derivative works, it looks like the Ninth Circuit would consider adding stickers to an existing photograph to be an inappropriate creation of a derivative work, whereas the Seventh Circuit might decide the exact opposite.
If limited to splicing of purchased VHS tapes, the two courts might each decide the case differently, making even VHS splicing a murky legal choice, at best.
I would really like to see the full text of the Judge's ruling in this case, as that is the only way to know on what grounds he made the decision. From the little bit we get from the article, he seems more likely to mimic the Ninth Circuit ruling.