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UK Copyright Group Tells Cinemas to Ban Laptops

Sockatume writes "Cinema chain Cineworld now has a policy banning anyone from carrying a laptop into a theatre, even if it is not used. The management claims that this is an anti-piracy move on the advice of the Federation Against Copyright Theft, the much-mocked source of all kinds of dubious anti-piracy statements. When it was pointed out that the laptop had no camera, the management made a temporary exception. For customers, the message is clear: leave your laptop in the car. For pirates, the message is clear: there is more money to be made slinking around cinema car parks looking for laptop bags."

2 of 438 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Just "blind" the cameras by Animaether · · Score: 4, Informative

    Well they don't really need to send a blinding light at the camera.. they can just project (near-)IR light from the projection booth, make it vary randomly in intensity, and all but the most well-equipped cameras (with a *very* decent IR blocker that can at least block the frequency used by the theatre; no, the standard IR blocker does not cover this, as pointing a TV remote at your camera will show) record utter junk.

    It's even a relatively cheap solution; certainly cheaper than having personnel run around with nightvision goggles trying to catch people, or checking people's bags and banning cameras, etc.

    But in the end, it still only takes 1 person - a projectionist not adhering to policy, a print shop that has a mysterious 'leak', a review board member wanting some extra crash - to get a transfer to a format that distribution groups can use, and the whole world will have access in no time.

  2. Re:Bionic eyes by rufty_tufty · · Score: 4, Informative

    Not true, your eye doesn't look at the whole picture the whole time. And what someone else looks at at in a particular scene (the hero's face) might be very different from what i am looking at (the heroines breasts). So you'd be bound to reconstruct the image incorrectly

    --
    "The weirdest thing about a mind, is that every answer that you find, is the basis of a brand new cliche" -