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Homeland Security Running NBC-Owned PSAs
An anonymous reader writes "A few months ago, Homeland Security's ICE (Immigration & Customs Enforcement) group started placing an anti-piracy video PSA on various domains that it had seized. What it didn't say was who created the PSA. A Freedom of Information Act request by Techdirt has revealed that the videos are actually created & owned by NBC Universal, but nowhere does Homeland Security publicly admit this. As Techdirt writes: 'Could you imagine how the press would react if, say, the FDA ran PSAs that were created and owned by McDonald's without making that clear to the public? How about if the Treasury Department ran a PSA created and owned by Goldman Sachs? So, shouldn't we be asking serious questions about why Homeland Security and ICE are running a one-sided, misleading corporate propaganda video, created and owned by a private company, without mentioning the rather pertinent information of who made it?'"
It's called a Congressional hearing, they hold 'em every day!
That's "Must See" as in "you are legally required to watch and learn, citizens."
The press wouldn't care, because they do it too. They happily run videos produced by corporations and present them as news. It makes them a little money and helps them be lazy.
Besides, who's going to report than NBC produced the videos? NBC?
So, shouldn't we be asking serious questions about why Homeland Security and ICE are running a one-sided, misleading corporate propaganda video, created and owned by a private company, without mentioning the rather pertinent information of who made it?
Yes, we should, but I'll be happy to wait until after they've answered the more pressing question about what the hell Homeland Security are doing enforcing copyright claims in the first place.
What was 'Homeland Security' created for? What is its charter?
Have gnu, will travel.
In the UK we call this the public-private partnership (PPP - no, not that PPP), private finance initiative, introducing competitiveness into service provision, blah, blah, blah. What it actually means is a hegemony of large corporations selected by government cronies which siphon money off the tax payer to provide a service you either didn't want in the first place or which was once provided much more effectively at cost.
When finding out that a government is paying money to a corporation for a service, there is only one necessary question: what compensation will be paid to the men in government who made the decision by the executives of the firm which just won the multi-million-currency contract?
"why Homeland Security and ICE are running a one-sided, misleading corporate propaganda video, created and owned by a private company, without mentioning the rather pertinent information of who made it?"
Corporate Security has the ring of authenticity to it.
Could you imagine how the press would react if, say, the FDA ran PSAs that were created and owned by McDonald's without making that clear to the public? How about if the Treasury Department ran a PSA created and owned by Goldman Sachs?
US Agricultural policy is written by lobbyists for the likes of Monsanto and ADM. And are there any high-ranking officials in Treasury who don't have strong ties to Goldman or Bear Stearns?
The question isn't how the press would react, it's how the citizens react. And the answer is, they don't.
There have been many documentaries, exposes, and so forth about the incestuous relationships between industry and US regulators and law makers. The response has been a collective yawn.
Everyone (other than W.) in the White House or Congress who had any major role in getting the prescription drug plan passed went on to work for the drug industry. You don't need to imagine the reaction; just look around.
There's no need to ask.
Laws in the US are written at the behest of large corporations, to serve large corporations, with the people who enact those laws being paid by those large corporations.
The fact that the Department of Homeland Security is performing raids to protect the intellectual property of corporations is pretty much proof of that. Why is an agency tasked with the physical security of a nation responsible for seizing domain names suspect of copyright infringement? Because pretty much all US law and policy is in service to the wishes of the owners of this intellectual property.
When Goldman Sachs writes your economic policy, you seriously need to ask these questions?
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
"So, shouldn't we be asking serious questions about why Homeland Security and ICE are running a one-sided, misleading corporate propaganda video, created and owned by a private company, without mentioning the rather pertinent information of who made it?'"
Um, no. Let the Government do what they damned well please.
Or start firing your representatives, and hiring new ones. THEY are the ones not doing their jobs. It's called an election, and they happen every 2 years. Fire your Representatives, and your Senators, and your President, until they get it right. Then they will have to look over the other branch (judiciary) and get them re-oriented as well. This will take decades, my friends. It's ok, BTW, for the Congress to instruct the Judiciary, by law and by appointment. We have influence on that, if we choose to exercise it. Even the SCOTUS answers occasionally to Congress, in the form of nomination confirmations, and in new law to address disagreements. Not instantanous, not perfect, but it can work.
You know how at work, if the boss isn't paying attention, then the staff gets into trouble screwing around and failing to even try for goals, much less achieving them? Same problem with government. We are lax in our management of our own government. This must stop.
Gotta steer the boat, or it will end up on the rocks. Rock beats sailboat.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
DHS is funded by our tax dollars. There are procedures in place to make sure that government contracts are issued to companies in a fair manner. Do we know if this was done correctly? Of course, since Comcast NBC Universal is staffed by a former FCC board member, I guess things like due diligence don't matter anymore. Not to mention the fact that Jeff Immelt (CEO of GE who used to own NBC Universal) is the jobs czar. This just reeks of conflict of interest.
Next there is the issue of ownership. If our tax dollars paid for this PSA, we damn well better own it. When Northrop Grumman makes a bomber, they don't retain ownership of it. This is just ridiculous. I'll bet NBC already had the PSA's ready to go, maybe thinking they'd run their own war on piracy. But then they realized, "Hey, we could pitch this to the DHS and make millions!"
Maybe I need to get my tinfoil hat adjusted.
No. However, if I could just get a copy of your car....
Alternative IF NBC wrote the script and the government found it to be accurate(*), then fine.
No, maybe not fine.
Fine is: Government wants to produce a message. Government writes the message. Government puts production services out for bid, NBC is best by fair assessment (not just on price but possibly quality services). Video is made.
NOT fine is: Message is essentially a corporate message from NBC following NBC interests, so they give/donate/underbid their services in such a way that their corporate message is being sent and endorsed using the government as a mouthpiece.
Seems like worrying that the pit bull coming for your neck has a tick.
Hmmm... I can't quite put my finger on it, but for some reason I think it has something to do with the current administration...
...and just the other day...
For those of you that voted for Obama, apparently you didn't notice that he choose Mr. Joe Biden as his Vice President running mate. Mr. Joe is bought and paid for by the RIAA and MPAA. Now you get to see what all that campaign money bought. Congratulations!
The real Sig captains the Northwestern. This one captains
Is this the message of the short film? Buy our movies, they might be crap, but they also might be good, and they cost a lot because we can't be bothered to keep up with new technology. Otherwise this working woman looses her job, because, you know, we won't cut it from the salaries of people choosing to produce bad movies, and we won't cut our HUGE winnings when make a blockbuster. We like it as it is, and you the consumer must support our funny ways or we'll fire the poor women.
Whose the pirate there? "Give us your money or we cut this woman here! Aaargh!"
Watched the video.
Message: Take these pirated movies, and this woman (Sound stage tech) loses her job.
Sub-message: The people that still take the movies are heartless scum.
As article points out, shameless PSA produced by NBC; proffered by HSA.
That over with--
1) This assertion (Take pirate DVD, woman loses job) makes a series of fundamentally broken assumptions:
i) Content production companies (like studios-- like the one which made the PSA) live so hand-to-mouth that the failure to monopoly dominate sales/transfers of the content they create will cause them to lay off workers.
Reality: The phase 'hollywood accounting' exists for a reason. Any such 'Hand-to-mouth' type economics exists exclusively on paper, to avoid paying actors, authors and film crew while simultaneously generating huge profits for the production company. It exists exclusively as a contrived mechanism to avoid paying royalty money on the very sales the video harps about. This makes the video a hypocritical, bold faced lie from the get-go.
ii) The act of taking the pirated DVD would cause the person to lose her job, because you are not paying-- EG-- the lost sale angle.
Reality: Multiple redundant studies have shown that consummate media pirates on average BUY MORE products than their 'legitimate purchases only' counterparts.
Additionally, the pirate is only interested in the product to begin with because he does not have to invest anything; EG, the appropriation of the pirated DVDs are NOT lost sales.
Without the piracy option, the consumer would simply not have consumed, reducing media penetration, and realistically doing far worse than what piracy allegedly would have done. At least when the product gets pirated, the pirate gets a direct assessment of the quality of the product, and if it is any good, would now have direct motivation to buy additional products. Eg- Pirate downloads first matrix movie-- likes it, orders the trilogy box set. The subsequent sale would never have taken place if the initial piracy had never occurred. The notion that the pirate would have just sunk down 50$ for the box set of movies he has never seen and is dubious about, is pure insanity.
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What I personally took away from the video PSA:
'See this poor token production worker? See her frazzled hair!? Doesnt she look pathetic?'
See me? I am in my fancy suit, and have perfect teeth-- Isn't it terrible that you would cause me to take money away from this poor frazzled worker because you would dare upset the apple cart?
Never-mind that I am obviously not hurting for money (As seen by my quarterly finance reports), or that I am a lieing shyster who personally is responsible for this poor token floor worker's plight because I care about my corporate bonuses more than her and her welfare---OR that I am being a hypocritical bastard by passing that blame on to you...
Just Pretend that simply isn't the case and embrace the fantasy we spin for you about how it is YOUR fault she suffers, and it's all because you don't impulse blanket-buy everything we shit out on store shelves blindly! (In fact, she probably isnt even a real sound boom operator to begin with, and is probably some poor soul we conned into thinking might get an acting career if she did this humiliation gig, whom we will probably never call on again.)
That you would take these DVDs for free and 'force' me to fire this woman (Again, because I value my own bonus more than her or her employment-- but never-mind that) whom I barely pay purely out of my own greed and do legal gymnastics to get out of responsibility for; Why that makes you a disgusting person! You should be ashamed of yourself!'
Message brought to you by the federal Homeland Security Administration.
As Techdirt writes: 'Could you imagine how the press would react if, say, the FDA ran PSAs that were created and owned by McDonald's without making that clear to the public?
As opposed to the FACT that the heads of the FDA are always major industry players who have or will work for the same companies that they're overseeing? Like Monstanto people working in the FDA?
How about if the Treasury Department ran a PSA created and owned by Goldman Sachs?
As opposed to the FACT that the department itself is run by Goldman Sachs people (such as Henry Paulson) who pushed through to give Goldman Sachs billions of dollars during the whole manufactured "the world is going to end!" financial problems?
Well, chances are, NOBODY WOULD GIVE A SHIT. They didn't give a shit bout these facts. Nothing is being burned down and nobody is being chased with pitchforks. Nobody gives a shit and nobody will give a shit about the actions of the DHS until it is too late to legally voice your giving a shit about the actions of the DHS.
If the government didn't pay for it, then it should be broadcast as an NBC PSA, not as an ICE PSA.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
what you dont seem to understand is that boosting something you deem as a 'human nature problem' by institutionalizing and encouraging that problem is not the way to solve that problem.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Z9WVZddH9w
there is no difference in between feudalism and capitalism. latter is just a 'free for all' version of the former, until an established hierarchy totally settles.
Read radical news here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALZZx1xmAzg
It's You and I against the World... When do we attack?