MTV Bleeps Filesharing Software Names In Weird Al Video
An anonymous reader writes "We've all heard Weird Al Yankovic's 'Don't Download This Song,' which came out a couple years ago, but did you know that MTV is apparently so afraid that kids listening to the song will discover for the first time that file sharing offerings exist that in its video of the song, MTV bleeps out their names? There's a line in the song that lists out Morpheus, Grokster, Kazaa and Limewire (most of whom don't really exist any more), but for some reason MTV considers those names to be bleep worthy." Unless this is all one grand inside joke from Weird Al.
Well, I bleep bleep welcome bleep new bleeps!
Moved to http://soylentnews.org/. You are invited to join us too!
But we can watch scantily clad ladies dancing around and gangstas promoting the dirty life?
Need an automatic screenshot taker? Try here.
From Canada, I can't even watch the bleeped video in the article. "Copyrights restrict us from playing this video outside the U.S." Pfft! Pfft, I say!
MTV plays music videos?
I was watching MTV several years ago and remember hearing the words "Burger King" getting bleeped out in the "Humpty Dance" song in the verse "I once got busy in a Burger King bathroom".
So, IMHO, I think this is probably part of a general policy to not allow product placement in song lyrics.
And watch Youtube instead.
Any time you give corporations power, they try to take even more away from you.
I don't know the meaning of the word 'don't' - J
The Who, The the
Damn clumsy search systems.
Any life is made up of a single moment, the moment in which a man finds out, once and for all, who he is.
Why would *bleep* do this? It really disrupts the flow of the song.
Still, this doesn't look as one of *bleep*-*bleep*'s best so I'm not going to look the uncensored version up on *bleep*.
Good night everyone here on *bleep*...
As long as there are slaughterhouses, there will be battlefields.
A local radio station (northern NH) bleeps out the the words "white boy" after "Play that funky music...."
That's when I turn the dial to NPR.
hi!
If MTV left the names of the file-sharing programs intact in the song, they could theoretically be a target for a contributory liability suit.
-- In the beginning was the WORD, and the WORD was UNSIGNED, and the main(){} was without form and void...
File sharing should totally be censored... songs about rape, one night stands, drugs, money bitches, hoes, sluts... etc is perfectly fine though.. Thank God for such brilliant minds.
Maybe just a hunch, but I think the scenario I proposed is just a bit more likely.
You're right, I wouldn't steal a car. But if it were possible, I sure as hell would download one!
Not MTV1. They just keep moving the actual videos up to higher-numbered channels to keep the costs down as the lower-numbered channels end up on more cable lineups. Last I checked, the videos are on MTV35 or something. :-D
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Don't bleep me, bro!
Have gnu, will travel.
The 12 words you can't say on TV:
Shit, piss, tits, fuck, cocksucker, motherfucker, cunt, Morpheus, Grokster, Kazaa, Limewire and (*inhale*) bittorrent.
I can't wait for the "clean" version of the Matrix now.
MTV's bullshit censorship changes with the times. Back in the early-mid '90's, they'd censor the word "ass" and other lame stuff from Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg videos(remember how half the screen was blurred out for some reason or other?).
Now the shit they play could be construed as child porn in some states! It all went downhill for them after they stopped showing the Beavis and Butthead episode where they make a hairspray torch because some dumbass kid copycatted and done burned his house down.
Fuck MTV. I'd rather my kids watch Cinemax.
What more can I say?
But doesn't he explicitly mention "MySpace" in White and Nerdy? Does that get bleeped out?
I dunno what to think. Radio has gotten bad too. I'm listening to the classic rock station (ok, I'm old, it wasn't 'classic' when I first heard this stuff). I was listening to Pink Floyd playing "Money". They bleeped out "do goody good bullshit". What the hell?
After that, they played a lame censored version of Jet Airliner, with the words "funky shit" changed to "funky Stuff". And on the song Who are You...the twice bleeped out the part where it says "Who the fuck are You?". That last one...is so buried in the song, you have to pretty much know when it is said.
When did all this start? I mean, I grew up listening to these songs...and for nearly 30 years, they happily played these songs without editing them. Why start now all of a sudden?
I thought society was getting more permissive....yet NOW they start to censor classic songs that have been perfectly fine to play on radio?
Lord...I used to think it was funny when I could get a DJ to play the Stones song "Star Star"...but, c'mon...the other stuff was always played normally.
What happened?
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
There, fixed that for you ;)
Do they bleep "you make a dead man come" from "Start Me Up" as well?
Momentarily, the need for the construction of new light will no longer exist.
Wow, I'm shocked! Last I checked MTV had gone to 7x24x365 of uncensored reality trash TV. I had no idea they were still showing videos. I am even more shocked to learn that MTV has censors. This channel spews so much vulgar garbage and stupidity that I don't even have it programmed on the channel list to prevent it lowering my IQ if I should happen to pause while channel surfing.
Hey Kids! It's acceptable to have sex, do drugs, and abuse alcohol, but by golly we here at MTV have to draw the line at filesharing. Sorry.
Usually, they just fade the song out before that line, since it's so close to the end.
But, yes, it's censored. ISTR that the Stones sang that song at the Super Bowl halftime and that line was bleeped or muted.
The Dead Kennedy's had it right.
M.T.V.-Get Off The Air"
Fun Fun Fun in the fluffy chair
Flame up the herb
Woof down the beer
[click!]
Hi
I'm your video DJ
I always talk like I'm wigged out on Quaalude's
I wear a satin baseball jacket everywhere I go
My job is to help destroy
What's left of your imagination
By feeding you endless doses
Of sugar-coated mindless garbage
So don't create
Be sedate
Be a vegetable at home
And thwack on that dial
If we have our way even you will believe
This is the future of rock and roll
How far will you go
How low will you stoop
To tranquilize our minds with your sugar-coated swill
You've turned rock and roll rebellion
Into Pat Boone sedation
Making sure nothing's left to the imagination
M.T.V. Get off the
M.T.V. Get off the
M.T.V. Get off the air
Get off the air
See the latest rejects from the muppet show
Wag their tits and their dicks
As they lip-sync on screen
There's something I don't like
About a band who always smiles
Another tax write-off
For some schmuck who doesn't care
M.T.V. Get off the air
And so it was
Our beloved corporate gods
Claimed they created rock video
Allowing it to sink as low in one year
As commercial TV has in 25
"It's the new frontier," they say
It's wide open, anything can happen
But you've got a lot of nerve
To call yourself a pioneer
When you're too god-damn conservative
To take real chances.
Tin-eared
Graph-paper brained accountants
Instead of music fans
Call all the shots at giant record companies now
The lowest common denominator rules
Forget honesty
Forget creativity
The dumbest buy the mostest
That's the name of the game
But sales are slumping
And no one will say why
Could it be they put out one too many lousy records?!?
M.T.V.-Get off the air!
NOW
If you have something that you dont want anyone to know, maybe you shouldnt be doing it in the first place -Eric Schmidt
"The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers. "
I actually am more interested in whats bleeped out than the rest of the song. It's like the kid that finds out the bad word, and repeats it like crazy. Or when children learn another language the first thing they want to learn is the "bad" words.
We always test and want to push through our boundaries.
Most people aren't thought about after they're gone. "I wonder where Rob got the plutonium" is better than most get.
I dunno what to think. Radio has gotten bad too. I'm listening to the classic rock station (ok, I'm old, it wasn't 'classic' when I first heard this stuff). I was listening to Pink Floyd playing "Money". They bleeped out "do goody good bullshit". What the hell?
At least broadcast radio has an excuse - FCC.
There are many opinions as to why the FCC is cracking down today. Mostly involving a web site and soccer moms.
Back in the 80's radio could play anything, in the Boston area the UHF TV stations played uncut R rated movies for a while. The college radio stations would even play The Ballad of Jerry Curlan!
Not sure what the problem is with MTV, the FCC doesn't have the same control over cable.
You know, promoting music that encourages people to break the law might also encourage them to download music. After all, those 'rap guys' are always stealing shit, and downloading music isn't exactly breaking into a store and grabbing all the CD's you can before the cops get there, right?
I think the record industry may be figuring out that all that moral ambiguity they promoted in the past is now going to bite them in the ass - big time.
See, to paraphrase the great Reverend Wright... The chickens... Have come home... To ROOST! :)
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
MTV will not bleep out swear words in Gansta Rap videos, but they will bleep out the names of popular file sharing applications?
Ok now we know that the MAAFIA (RIAA/MPAA) is in bed with MTV and Time/Warner/AOL/Turner House of Pancakes running MTV are looney ultra-left-wing Liberals working for Hollywood and Record Companies who bribe them to play the same 12 videos over and over again each day to promote their sales.
Kids today are smart, all they need do is use Google with the words "file sharing programs" and they'll get millions of hits and find out not only the names of file sharing programs, but also how to download and install them and even poke a hole in Windows Firewall to get faster downloads.
"Weird" Al Yankovic was making fun of the MAAFIA in his "Don't Download This Song" video because of their totalitarian tactics of suing everyone that are fans of the music and videos. In fact, "Weird" Al Yankovic got even more popular when pirates downloaded his MP3 files and then went out to buy the "Straight Out Of Lindwood" CD that also doubles on the back as a DVD full of videos because "Weird" Al knows that pirates love to try before they buy, so they don't buy a CD for $35 only to find out when they get home to play it that most of the song suck and they only like 1 or 2 of the songs on the whole CD. That is why, unlike Metalica and Prince, "Wierd" Al doesn't sue his fans for downloading his songs in MP3 format, because he knows most of them will go out and buy his CD because "Weird" Al is too white and nerdy like his fans and is computer savvy enough to know that piracy actually helps him become more popular and sell more CDs, and more concert tickets.
Remember, Slashdot does not have a -1 disagree moderation, and no, troll, flamebait, and overrated are not substitutes.
MTV playing music? Wow. I'm impressed.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
I think it's more a shock that MTV is playing music videos.
upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
What's to wonder about? You stayed tuned in all the way to number one, didn't you? To see if they played it? Seems to me like not playing the song would get more people talking about and listening to their broadcast.
Here it is 10 or so years later and you're still talking about it.
yes, Viacom is parent of CBS and MTV. The FCC has been trying to regulate Cable for a while and MTV has been the prime target, they cave on censoring to keep the FCC from actually having grounds to get permission.
I want my P2P!
-
- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
I viewed this video on *BLEEP* core 9 with *BLEEP* 9.61,running *BLEEP* 2.6.25 and did not hear anything bleeped.
It just plain does not work or somebody is lying.
I think I've even heard it as *bleep* damn.
I'll never make that mistake again, reading the experts' opinions. - Feynman
Whether they wear a turbine,...
I for one WELCOME our new engine-part-clad overlords!
PS Perhaps you were referring to this slightly more conventional bit of headgear?
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
This is a step in the right direction. But, please, let's not stop there. With a little more effort we can remove the scourge of "Weird" Al's lame parody songs from our airwaves. Even if it means bleeping out a word at a time, it's still worth doing.
There is a music channel for Latin countries called Sol MÃsica. Years ago, when the Lenny Kravitz song "Fly away" was a hit, the clip showed all the time on TV. There was a girl in the clip showing her boobs. In Sol MÃsica we could see the boobies, but on MTV they were blurred.
What's the problem with boobies? Here in Europe, it's not such a big deal. We have statues of naked men and women in every square. You can see full frontal nudes in most European films. It's just naked people. Not that big of a problem. And I like boobies ;-)
if you are learning about filesharing (ancient concept)
in its defunct formats (morpheus? limewire? are we going to learn about doom? microsoft bob?)
from MTV (dead network)
on a music video (dead form of art)
by wierd al yankovic (is he still alive?)
you are really really off the map, on some deserted island or in prisoner camp
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Back in the 80's radio could play anything, in the Boston area the UHF TV stations played uncut R rated movies for a while.
Ah yes, WSBK. They're motto at the time could have been "All Three Stooges, All The Time." Good times. Good times.
I remember seeing "The Deer Hunter" uncut on that channel. Great googly-moogly but did that freak me out. Almost as bad as "Scared Straight."
He took a duck to the face at 250 knots.
Has it been confirmed that MTV did the bleeping?
I don't know how videos get distributed, but it could have been the artist or label that censored it or even some legal reason that forced MTV to do it.
"What happened?"
The Baby Boomers, who simultaneously led the way for greater freedoms for youth and acted like spoiled children, had children. They looked back on their youth and, while having "no regrets", still didn't want their kids to do what they did. ESPECIALLY the sex part - a girl in the sixties may have burned her bra and fucked in the mud at Woodstock, but subconsciously she viewed herself negatively and wants to "protect" her daughters.
I worked with a woman who was pregnant, and one time she confessed to me that she was having a real ethical crisis. She had partied - hard - in her youth. Coke, meth, sex, whatever. And she enjoyed it, and didn't have any negative consequences. So how was she supposed to tell her little darling not to do the things she did, when she has no regrets?
"As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." A. Carlson
Welcome to the new United Socialist States of America. Its happening more and more on all fronts. Now that the Govt. has an ownership in private banks the media and your mind are next. :) :0
I can't use my sig - my computer can't read my handwriting.
What really _should_ be censored is any reference to Slashdot posters' taste in music from this article...I really don't need to see the lyrics to horrible songs typed out as a post, then getting moderated "+5 Insightful" to give me any more reminders of how badly socially adjusted so many people on this site are.