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WB Took Pains To "Delay" Pirating of Dark Knight
Jay writes "The L.A. Times is reporting on a new studio tactic — not to prevent piracy, but to delay it, as was the case with special tactics used with Dark Knight. 'Warner Bros. executives said the extra vigilance paid off, helping to prevent camcorded copies of the reported $180-million film from reaching Internet file-sharing sites for about 38 hours. Although that doesn't sound like much progress, it was enough time to keep bootleg DVDs off the streets as the film racked up a record-breaking $158.4 million on opening weekend. The movie has now taken in more than $300 million. The success of an anti-piracy campaign is measured in the number of hours it buys before the digital dam breaks.'" You know what else helps to have a big opening weekend? Making a good movie.
Here in Spain what you call piracy is LEGAL if you don't earn money with it. And so it was on your countries not so long ago. We just preserved our rights.
It's a pretty well known tactic for games. (Basically, making the copy protection tedious to crack rather than simply hard.)
Big budget games make the bulk of their sales during the first month, so if you can avoid getting cracked while the hype is still going, it can have a big impact.
So, my point here is, that this is not without precedent, and I'm sure it has some kind of impact on movies too.
You seem to be mixing the terms. Screeners are not cam jobs.
That nitpick besides, I totally agree. I'd never ruin a movie by watching a cam. These days I don't bother with anything below DVD quality and 5.1 sound.
Since I loath going to the cinema, this usually means having to wait a bit. But I don't mind.
This is priceless: "If the movie's a stiff, and word gets out too early that it's a stiff, it's devastating to the business model," Garland said."
In another words, if we can keep the movie audience quiet for several days, we will rip off enough people to cover our costs and make some extra dough.
That is the business model. Screwing the customer.
I'm unwilling to pay box office prices for crappo movies - I often watch bootlegs instead.
When movies are supposed to be good, however, I'm happy to give the theatre way too much money for tickets, popcorn, etc. I love going to movies and all of my fellow "pirates" do too.
I drove 40 minutes and waited in line for over an hour to see The Dark Knight at an IMAX theatre ... and it was *AWESOME*
I was happy to pay for WALL-E too.
Keep making movies that *DON'T SUCK* and people will pay to see them ... keep making pieces of sh*t and people will download them or wait for DVD.
All of the movies that I've watched bootlegs for ... either: ... I simply wouldn't have watched it, had the bootleg not existed ... *maybe* I would pay to rent the DVD
1) the movie rocked, so I went to see it in the theatre after watching the bootleg
2) the movie sucked
^ all hypothetical, ofcourse ... i've never _actually_ seen one of these so-called 'bootlegs' ...
You laugh, but it worked for Spiderman 3!
I like to think of online DRM as something akin to a college -- you pay for lessons until you learn something.
You're probably, unfortunately, on to something here.
Besides, if you're willing to pony up the cost of a crappy camcorded DVD/VCD of a Huge Action Movie, instead of the $10 to see it on the big screen with professional surround-sound... well, you probably wouldn't have gone to see the movie anyway.
Returned Peace Corps IT Volunteer
Cam: recorded with a camcorder with indirect audio (using the camcorder's built in mic)
Telesync (TS): recorded with a camcorder (although TS's are often recorded with a higher quality camera) with direct audio (audio typically from a headphone jack for the hard of hearing)
Telecine (TC): A telecine machine copies the film digitally from the reels. Sound and video should be very good, but these are fairly uncommon (expensive machines)
Screener: A DVD or VHS copy sent to various places for promotional use. Many times they have timers and/or serials numbers. Quality varies, but DVD screeners should be excellent if the person ripping it isn't an idiot.
R5: Usually made with a telecine machine from an analog source. Unlike a TC the digitization is performed by the studio itself with very professional (and expensive) equipment. The purpose is to beat the pirates to the market in 3rd world-ish areas (Russia, Africa, etc).
Actually, anyone can get in on an advanced screening. Many movies have unadvertised advanced screenings the Friday or Saturday prior to their opening; you sometimes have to hunt around for them, but they're often listed online or over the phone. You can buy tickets to them just like any other movie.
You're quite right, this story had passed me by. Although it is Europe-wide, not just UK.
I saw some coverage on the BBC some months back when a group of bloggers were making a point of exposing misleading promos, but at the time there were only faint rumblings of a possible law being introduced.
This comment is for entertainment purposes only. Any similarity to real insight or information is purely coincidental.
A quote that always comes to mind when I see a super-expensive turkey...
"If Coca-Cola accidentally created 100 million cans of faulty Coke, you know for sure the entire 100 million cans would be dropped in the Atlantic or Pacific Ocean, without a second thought and irrespective of what that did to the year's profits. What do we do with a crappy movie? We double its advertising budget and hope for a big opening weekend. What have we done for the audience as they walk out of the cinema? We've alienated them. We've sold audiences a piece of junk; we just took twelve dollars away from a couple and we think we've done ourselves no long-term damage." -- David Puttnam, GQ magazine, April 1987
Good thing Dark Knight was worth the money. Best movie I've seen in quite a while!
Circumcision is child abuse.
Telesync'd cams for Dark Knight were available on private trackers within 4 hours of the midnight screenings. At least one tracker had the East coast midnight screening up before the West coast screenings even started.
As long as there is money to be made off cams, people will keep using them. Expect to see theaters in the US start searching patrons in the name of "terrorist" threats.
They just raised it to $10 in my area, finally. I quit going to theaters when they did that and also cut the matinee hours beyond the times I was willing to go. They also cut the discounts out for those associated with universities. Combined with Gestapo-like surveillance tactics in which customers are treated like potential criminals, they've succeeeded in driving me to waiting for the blu-ray, which I can watch as I like without big brother watching me to make sure I'm not doing something they don't like.
I'm not a pirate, nor do I use camcorders in theaters, but I DO get offended at the assumption that I am.
i am a soviet space shuttle