Hollywood Sees Illegal Streaming Devices as 'Piracy 3.0' (torrentfreak.com)

After hunting down torrent sites for more than a decade, Hollywood now has a more complex piracy threat to deal with. From a report: Piracy remains a major threat for the movie industry, MPA Stan McCoy said yesterday during a panel session at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. Much like Hollywood, copyright infringers are innovators who constantly change their "business models" and means of obtaining content. Where torrents were dominant a few years ago, illegal streaming devices are now the main threat, with McCoy describing their rise as Piracy 3.0. "Piracy is not a static challenge. The pirates are great innovators in their own right. So even as we innovate in trying to pursue these issues, and pursue novel ways of fighting piracy, the pirates are out there coming up with new business models of their own," McCoy said. "If you think of old-fashioned peer-to-peer piracy as 1.0, and then online illegal streaming websites as 2.0, in the audio-visual sector, in particular, we now face challenge number 3.0, which is what I'll call the challenge of illegal streaming devices."

Comments

shitty content

[epyT-R]

Shitty content is the main threat these days. High prices too.

Re:shitty content

[Anonymous Coward]

Shitty content is the main threat these days.

If the content is so shitty, why do people pirate?

High prices too.

Probably to offset the pirates

Re:shitty content

[Anonymous Coward]

Conversely, they'd be much more profitable if they didn't waste so much money on useless DRM and fighting piracy.

Then perhaps they could reinvest those profits in quality programming.

Re:shitty content

[cjjjer]

Conversely, they'd be much more profitable if they didn't waste so much money on useless DRM and fighting piracy.

Then perhaps they could reinvest those profits in quality programming.

Like you'd stop pirating content if that happened... lol

Re:shitty content

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, it's not like those pigs are ever going to fly, so it's immaterial.

Re:shitty content

[Anonymous Coward]

High prices too.

Probably to offset the pirates

The whole debate (or rather, the mostly one-sided whining, paid "studies" full of "scientific fact" not supported by any other study, and lobbying for yet more laws and rights for the rights holding mafia) is full of this sort of assumption, when practical evidence shows otherwise.

Such as this Kenian film maker who didn't even try to sell his film in his dirt poor country for the prices the hollywood idiots demand world-wide, only to see the expensive DVDs undercut by widespread and easy availability of much cheaper copies. Instead he picked a price point his fellow countrymen were willing and able to pay. Thus he ensured he got paid at least something for the originals sold, instead of nothing at all.

Of course, "the west" is full of disposable income so the rights holding mafia has much more room to demand "their money!" and not consider what the customer might actually want.

It's just like the complaint also heard from the same direction that unless piracy was eradicated entirely there'd be no possible way to make money ever for the poor starving rights holders. That's like claiming no supermarket could possibly ever make any profit at all unless first all theft was eradicated. I'm sure supermarket managers would love that latter bit but they know full well that it's not realistic and that theft is something to keep a lid on but otherwise just another cost of doing business. They typically don't go around hating the customer away, either, demanding they only buy approved products in approved ways on approved days. They'll sell anything they think will sell for a price their customers will pay, and they'll sell it any way their customers want on any day of the week. In that way rights holders can learn a thing or two from regular retail.

Shitty content is the main threat these days.

If the content is so shitty, why do people pirate?

Perhaps because there's nothing better to be had. This isn't quite surprising since hollywood has this habit of massively overvaluing itself.

Relatedly, why would anyone still go to the theatre if all they get is shitty content? Because good quality content is a nice bonus but the object is an enjoyable evening out, and if all you get is shitty content then you go with that.

Anyway, this whining of being robbed blind by pirates when in fact they are robbing the population blind by in effect holding their culture for ransom, is a recurring theme with the rights holding mafia, and goes back to at least the pianola already. So there's absolutely nothing new going on here. It's not even "piracy 3.0", it's more like "rights holding mafia whining session #5832375982739".

Re: shitty content

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, Odumba should have issued an executive order to crack down on these illegal streaming devices. That would have stopped these devices from getting out of control and further reducing revenue for the movie industry. Piracy is costing jobs and putting people out of work, especially all of those people who work behind the scenes. And it's all because people want to take stuff they didn't pay for. Piracy is wrong and it needs to stop.

Re:shitty content

[magarity]

If the content is so shitty, why do people pirate?

Quality combined with price will define demand. Low quality does not mean no demand, just slap a low price on it. See the 99 cent DVD bin at the supermarket.

Re:shitty content

[dgatwood]

Like you'd stop pirating content if that happened... lol

Statistically, people steal for one of two reasons: For the thrill or because they feel the price is more than they can afford to spend on the product.

The latter of those two groups would pirate a lot less if the quality were better, because they wouldn't have to go through so much crap to find something worth watching. But even if they didn't, there's no evidence that the industry's spending on DRM has done anything to reduce their piracy, so even in the worst case, eliminating the DRM and using the money to improve content quality will still make people who don't pirate more likely to spend money on the content.

The former group is going to pirate no matter what, but more to the point, won't be significantly hampered by DRM anyway, making DRM nothing more than a giant broken window fallacy—a task that wastes the time of a lot of programmers on both sides of the DRM war, with neither side having any meaningful effect on piracy, while wasting a tremendous amount of resources in the process.

Re:shitty content

[Merk42]

Like you'd stop pirating content if that happened... lol

Statistically, people steal for one of two reasons: For the thrill or because they feel the price is more than they can afford to spend on the product.

The latter of those two groups would pirate a lot less if the quality were better, because they wouldn't have to go through so much crap to find something worth watching.

But like, AC said, if the content is so bad, why are they pirating it in the first place?
If the content is good, but too expensive, why does that entitle them to the content on their own terms (free)?

Re:shitty content

[dgatwood]

The problem is, if you sell a legally licensed copy for a fraction of the price in countries that don't have money, it suddenly becomes very profitable to do grey-market imports back into the U.S. and undercut your sales there.

It is typically more reasonable to sell them at a high price everywhere, knowing that poorer countries will exhibit rampant piracy, and then just write off the rampant piracy as a cost of doing business.

Re:shitty content

[Dunbal]

And lack of availability. There's absolutely nothing stopping content providers/publishers from streaming their own content for a small monthly fee - after all Netflix, Amazon and Hulu have proven there's a market and the setup is not a billion dollar investment. But these fuckers are too lazy to adapt their business, thinking they'll get away with charging inflated prices for their "scarce" crap forever.

Re:shitty content

[Dunbal]

If the content is so shitty, why do people pirate?

Because it's less shitty that what's actually on TV.

Re:shitty content

[Dunbal]

Because getting it free and reimporting it to the US encourages less of a grey market than getting it cheap. Logic fail.

Re: shitty content

[Anonymous Coward]

You missed a third reason - content I want to see is not legally available my region.
Netflix and iTunes limit what I can watch and barring vpns just makes it harder to access content that arguably I have paid for.

Also - I don't get the demonising of the outfits selling preloaded Kodi hardware. The illegal content still has to streamed from somewhere - these devices just make it easier to find. It feels like the hardware vendors are a nice soft target...

Re:shitty content

[__aadota8673]

Wrong. When I was a search engine tester at Google my job was to type in words into the search page and click "I'm feeling lucky." Every time a torrent site would show up, I would create a ticket to notify the database people. I created 300k tickets over my time there - a tough job not many are willing to do. This gave me great insite into the DRM industry. People stopped pirating with each ticket I submitted. If you can't see it, you cannot pirate it.

Re:shitty content

[suutar]

He didn't say it was bad as in unpleasant to watch, he said it was low quality with (I presume) the meaning that it is cumbersome to watch - unskippable ads/banners/previews, not (typically) playable with easily portable gear so it's locked to one location, etc. Increasing the convenience would increase the value and hence the probability that they'd pay instead of pirating. Lowering the price would also do so, as it would again bring the price and the value closer together. Reducing the DRM would allow the convenience to rise and the price to lower (some... not sure how much), which would be a significant boost to purchase probability.

As to entitlement... assume they're not entitled. Does this fact actually reduce their probability of pirating? Does it make it easier for Hollywood to stop them? Does it, in fact, affect the situation measurably at all, other than being the sole justification Hollywood has for all the DRM they're using?

Re:shitty content

[Anonymous Coward]

Back in the early `00's some media exec said that cell phones and social media were the bane of movies. People who telling their friends not to go see this shitty movie or that one. I know many people who would go see a crap movie if it was cheaper. I took my 14yo to see GoTGV2. Cost 30$ and all we got were tickets and 2 sodas. That is just to much to go sit in a shitty theater more then once or twice a year.

Re:shitty content

[Anonymous Coward]

He, and you, are just making up excuses for being greedy assholes.

Re:shitty content

[K. S. Kyosuke]

And that's "a problem"? That's how the world equalized in the long term!

Re: shitty content

[c6gunner]

You're joking, right? Go to Google right now and type in "Logan torrent" or "Logan download". See what comes up.

I mean if your entire job was to stop only those people who are too stupid to add the word " torrent" or "download" to the end of a movie name, then congrats, I guess ... you must have stopped at least 2 people with those 300,000 tickets ...

Re:shitty content

[Anonymous Coward]

Please stop conflating copying with stealing.

Copying IS NOT THEFT. It CANNOT be theft. There is literally nothing stolen when something is copied.

Re: shitty content

[fortfive]

I don't pirate these days, but many days i really want to.

The reason is that there is no legal way-at any price-to get content in an form where i can watch whatever, whenever, wherever.

Streaming services of course all require an internet connection. Downloadable content is tied to a platform. Physical media is not legally transferrable, and even if it were, takes time and other resources to get there.

Quite disappointing, really.

Note the above applies to video content only. Plenty of legal audio options.

Re:shitty content

[Anonymous Coward]

Shitty content is the main threat these days. High prices too.

Especially shitty content that's meant to push a civil rights agenda.

Re:shitty content

[dgatwood]

Because getting it free and reimporting it to the US encourages less of a grey market than getting it cheap. Logic fail.

Getting it free (pirated copies) and reimporting it is illegal, and various agencies actively go after people who do that. No legitimate business would do that, and the ones that try it tend to get into a lot of trouble and don't remain in business for very long.

By contrast, if those copies overseas are legal copies, then reimporting them is legal, and those agencies can't do a thing to people who do that. More to the point, there's nothing preventing, oh, say Amazon from mass-reimporting those overseas copies and selling them legally, completely devastating the movie company's U.S. income.

No, my logic is sound. You just missed the point. Ensuring that cheap overseas copies are all unlicensed is critical to limiting the damage that those copies can do in the U.S.

Re:shitty content

[dgatwood]

But in the short term, it would bankrupt the industry, resulting in long-term equal availability of nothing. Yes, that's a bad thing. You don't get to free trade overnight; attempting to go down that path too quickly will result in complete economic collapse.

Re:shitty content

[dgatwood]

But like, AC said, if the content is so bad, why are they pirating it in the first place?

Because it isn't all bad. The reason I stopped bothering with watching movies in theaters is because over the course of about five years, I went from enjoying about 80% of the movies I watched to enjoying about one in every six while the price crept up from about four bucks to about seven bucks per movie. So the effective price per good movie went up from $3.20 to about $42. And the median quality has only decreased since then.

After that, I switched to watching TV for a while, then as the median quality there decreased, I started watching movies on DVD (and later Blu-Ray), before eventually getting a subscription to Amazon Prime, followed by Netflix. Each of those inflection points was caused by me running out of new, good-quality content through a particular channel. At each of those inflection points, I made the decision to continue getting content legally, but some percentage of people go the other way.

If the content is good, but too expensive, why does that entitle them to the content on their own terms (free)?

It doesn't give them the right to do so, but it does make people feel much more justified in doing so, which means they're much more likely to do so.

Re:shitty content

[Anonymous Coward]

See the 99 cent DVD bin at the supermarket.

So why don't more people wait for these low quality movies that they're currently pirating to show up in the 99 cent bin where they can be purchased cheaply and honestly? If people can't wait to see these "low quality movies" perhaps they're not so low quality afterall.

Re:shitty content

[Wycliffe]

Statistically, people steal for one of two reasons: For the thrill or because they feel the price is more than they can afford to spend on the product.

What about the 3rd reason: convenience. I can subscribe to amazon, hulu, hbo, and netflix and maybe a few others and then go search all 4+ engines in hopes that it has the movie I want to watch. Chances are it doesn't. I can search redbox, drive to redbox, pick up the movie, and then have to remember to return it. If I wait too long on a new release, it disappears from redbox too. Or I can do a quick google search, click on 3 or 4 links and find the movie I want. I do regularly pay for redbox even with the inconvenience of having to pick up and return a movie but if someone like amazon offered their entire collection for the same price as redbox, I would gladly just use them. Instead if there is a legal option it is usually at least 3 to 4 times more expensive than redbox if it is available at all. And hulu, netflix, and amazon prime are almost worthless if you actually want a specific movie. Online TV is also awful. That's one place where cable still has the advantage. With cable I still have the ability to quickly flip thru 100 channels and find something to watch without having to search a dozen places. Devices like Roku try to integrate the individual services but it's still a kludge. If distributors actually started working with each other and companies like roku, they could easily come up with a system that could blow the current online offerings (including piracy) out of the water.

Re:shitty content

[dgatwood]

From a legal perspective, you are correct. Piracy is different from theft of a physical item because:

• Not all sales lost due to piracy would have otherwise resulted in a purchase in a theoretical world where piracy is impossible.
• People who pirate content tend to buy more content, too, either because of broader exposure or because they're digital hoarders (or both).
• The victim of piracy loses only the profit on the sale, not the cost of the physical good itself.
• In all but the most extreme circumstances, penalties for infringement under Title 17 are civil, rather than criminal.

However, those differences do not in any way negate my point, which is that psychologically, the motivation is essentially the same, whether you're stealing something from a store or pirating movies over the Internet, and that those motivations are primarily the ones listed in my original post.

Re: shitty content

[dgatwood]

You missed a third reason - content I want to see is not legally available my region. Netflix and iTunes limit what I can watch and barring vpns just makes it harder to access content that arguably I have paid for.

I would argue that if you've paid for it, that isn't piracy. It might be a contractual violation, but it isn't piracy. If you haven't paid for it, that's a bit more problematic, and you're right that the content providers need to fix this. The notion of the world as a bunch of independent markets pretty much stopped working after the Internet revolution, and anybody still treating it that way is just begging to fail.

Re: shitty content

[Anonymous Coward]

A pirated video is not a lost sale. Why do they think we'd pay for that crap? We pay for the few good ones. The others should be happy someones even wasting their time on it for free.

Re:shitty content

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do people buy tools at Harbor Freight? We all know most of them are pretty terrible.

Oh, that's right, $9 angle grinders that last a week.

At the right price you can sell anything. Even shit that won't last through one job.

That's why 25 cent movie theatres existed when most people didn't have VCRs. They went away once VCRs could provide the re-run experience for free or maybe a cheap VHS rental.

Re:shitty content

[TheRaven64]

I can't speak for the grandparent, but the biggest dent to online music piracy came when the big four started letting online music stores sell DRM-free audio files. Suddenly, you could but a product that you wanted and guarantee that it would work on every device. The big four did this for a couple of reasons, but the main one was that they'd realised that DRM takes negotiating power from them and gives it to the DRM author or the channel. If you wanted DRM'd music to play on the large installed base of iPods, you needed to accept Apple's terms. If you didn't, then your potential customers would feel justified in piracy because you weren't offering the product in a form that worked with their hardware.

Eventually the movie companies will work this out. Amazon, Netflix, and Google spend a lot of money ensuring that set-top boxes and so on can play their DRM'd streams. Want to reach these potential customers? Either provide DRM-free content, or accept whatever terms these companies offer.

Re:shitty content

[SuricouRaven]

I can speak for the pirates, and we've seen the same thing. The most potent tools in the fight against piracy have been iTunes, Netflix and Steam. Most people don't pirate because they can't afford to buy a blu-ray. They pirate because it's quick, and convenient. Once legitimate purchasing became even faster and more convenient, a lot of people went back to doing that.

People are basically lazy. They don't want to have to go out of the house and walk to a store, or end up trapped in a cinema next to Baby Cries-A-Lot. They just want to be able to spend a few minutes picking out their entertainment and then start enjoying it.

Re:shitty content

[SuricouRaven]

There is another option: You just create barriers to trade. A little underhanded, but it works. That might mean laws prohibiting unauthorised imports, or technological restrictions such as DVD region coding, or something as simple as making sure that the DVDs you sell in low-income countries do not include English or other European language audio tracks.

Re:shitty content

[K. S. Kyosuke]

That's a pretty bold statement that lack of Hollywood films would effect some global catastrophe. :)

Re:shitty content

[Anonymous Coward]

People try really hard to rationalize their illegal behavior but guess what? Most people are cheap bastards and their behavior supports that theory.

Netflix has no ads, it's available in most platforms and it's around $10 a month yet lots of people still use someone else's account or just view that same content somewhere else.

It could be $1 a month and then the excuse would be "I mean it's basically free so I might as well not even pay for it, right?"

Re:shitty content

[Anonymous Coward]

But like, AC said, if the content is so bad, why are they pirating it in the first place?

Because there's a whole range of quality like "That doesn't look good enough to pay for theatre tickets, I'll wait for the DVD to come out and torrent it."

If it's good and I want to see it in theatres, I'm not going to torrent a copy from a guy with a camera in the theatre. I'll pay for my ticket.

And for what it's worth, the last movie I saw in theatres with King Arthur a couple of weeks ago. After that piece of shit Hollywood owes me a couple of movies downloads At least I have the satisfaction of knowing it has ended Guy Ritchie's career after taking a $100 Million+ loss.

Re:shitty content

[BLKMGK]

I don't think I know a single soul who uses Google to find a torrent for a movie they want. That seems like one of the stupidest ways to find pirated content. If someone is looking for it they already know where to go and skip Google. Your post is pretty amusing honestly, were you serious?

Re: shitty content

[BLKMGK]

Obvious troll is obvious...

Re:shitty content

[__aadota8673]

Everyone I work with uses google to find a torrent. Into the firefox search bar, type in "movie" year "torrent" "resolution[720p|1080p] - the first 2-3 results give you the file you want. You can say that's stupid, I'll enjoy watching the movie. If my posts are amusing, visit my blog where I discuss my slashdot posts at length, and don't forget the heavy cream in your morning coffee! https://www.kickingthebitbucke...

Re:shitty content

[dgatwood]

If you only jump headfirst into free trade for a single industry, then the catastrophe would obviously be industry-specific. :-)

Re:shitty content

[dgatwood]

Eliminating the English track doesn't work very well, because a lot of countries with relatively low income and/or relatively high poverty rates have English as a common language across a wide range of ethnic groups. If you don't provide content in English, you'll either have to have many, many more translations ($$$$) or you'll miss out on most of your potential audience.

Other artificial barriers to trade are of limited effectiveness, in practice. They appear to work so long as only a few movies are released at a low cost in relatively poor countries. If that percentage were to change drastically so that a high enough percentage of movies were released at a low cost in some country, we would quickly reach a tipping point beyond which it would make sense to have a second Blu-Ray player or whatever with a different region. (Many anime fans already do this, precisely because of inflated U.S. prices coupled with inadequate availability.) And in the network-based movie realm, it is even more hopeless, because VPNs are relatively easy and cheap.

Re:shitty content

[torkus]

Actually, I think a large portion is #3: because piracy (arrrr!) is actually easier and works better.

To wit: you have multiple streaming platforms with some intersection of content and lots of 'exclusives'. It's a pain to go through 4 or 5 different services to find one movie you want to watch (not to mention paying for them or signing up for yet another if that's all that has your content). Compare that to using torrents where the only exclusivity is private trackers, but virtually any reasonably popular content is readily available.

And...then you have it to do with as you wish. Time-shift. Device-shift. Cut clips for amusement or making gifs. Loading up a huge playlist because you're going to be stuck on a plane for 18 hours and the in-flight music service is horrible.

The cost driver is more relevant when you're talking about recent releases that want $5-10 to download/stream, not content that's part of a $10/month service.

The thrill? That's only a very small number of people - the ones who 'produce' the bulk of the pirated content mainly.

FTFY

[Anonymous Coward]

Unlike Hollywood, copyright infringers are innovators who constantly change their "business models"

Re:FTFY

[Voyager529]

Unlike Hollywood, copyright infringers are innovators who constantly change their "business models"

I can't believe I'm about to (kinda sorta) go to bat for the MPAA - I've got *no* love for them, their accountants, their lawyers, or their DRM, so I feel just a little bit dirty posing this question. The argument above is an easy +5 Insightful when the topic of the MPAA is brouht up, but I've yet to hear a viable business model that isn't either 1) already implemented, 2) impractical, 3) deemed 'obsolete', or 4) worked around in some manner. Here's the list that I could come up with...

-Physical sales. This has been deemed 'obsolete'.
-Broadcast. This has been deemed 'obsolete', because 'cord cutting'.
-Movie theaters, the closest analog to the 'live performance' argument on the RIAA side - limited number of titles available at a time, and everyone complains about rowdy teens and $26 popcorn...so largely 'obsolete'.
-Direct Downloading. This is sorta the jackpot of fitting all four categories - already implemented, format compatibility and storage space makes it largely impractical to widely take hold, so torrents have become a bit of a workaround for those who are interested in this method.
-Ad-supported streaming. This has been implemented, but everyone hates ads and runs ad blockers.
-Subscription streaming. This has been implemented, but no one can agree on a standard platform. Netflix is obviously the closest, but basically every network owner has their own silo of exclusive content, along with region blocking, licensing fees, and royalty minefields. Even with those somehow solved, try subscribing to more than two or three without it starting to look like your cable bill. Moreover, if there was somehow 'one streaming service to control them all' that had virtually all the content with no regional stipulations, congratulations...you've reinvented Comcast on a global scale.

So yes, the MPAA's obsession with lawsuits, DRM, and regional release blocking needs to go, no argument there whatsoever. At the same time, what sort of business model allows for movies to be funded while also not being deemed a 'failed business model'? I'm genuinely interested in how those two can coexist in a way that isn't already implemented.

half-true

[Anonymous Coward]

'Much like Hollywood, copyright infringers are innovators who constantly change their "business models"'

The pirates are innovative and change their business models.

Hollywood?
Not so much.....

What the hell...

[MachineShedFred]

Just what the hell is an "illegal streaming device" ? Are there manufacturers out there making illegal devices that people are using? If so, how are these getting imported without the FTC stepping in?

Or is this just another case of Hollywood idiocy using terms they barely understand to talk about a technology they absolutely don't understand and want to squeeze back into the metaphorical toothpaste tube instead of embracing?

Is this some hyperbolic way of saying that my PLEX server is somehow illegal, because apparently format-shifting isn't allowed anymore under fair-use rules in their minds? Was the Betamax decision reversed when nobody was looking?

Re:What the hell...

[darkain]

The devices themselves are not illegal. They're referring to the abundant amount of Android set top boxes available on Amazon and eBay. The thing with these though is that they come pre-loaded with Kodi, plus plugins for Kodi for easy access to illegal streaming services. This is just another example of a tool which can be used for either side being slandered just because it COULD be used for illegal activities. I, however, have one of these boxes and love it. I use it to stream from a root-top mounted digital OTA TV receiver that streams the TV channels over LAN. I get nearly perfect reception on 56 TV stations now, vs questionable reception from about 20 before. Without the Android box, I wound't have a way to watch this legit content otherwise!

Re:What the hell...

[Anonymous Coward]

Without saying Kodi, they're talking about Kodi...or at least, hardware pre-loaded with Kodi and hacks for it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kodi_(software)

read the very last section, "use in third party products".

Re:What the hell...

[Anonymous Coward]

Typically this is referring to devices running Kodi with the illegal plugins. There are vendors at my local weekend swap meet selling pre-loaded Amazon fire sticks and marketing it as a way to watch free movies and NFL games.

Re:What the hell...

[the_skywise]

"Illegal streaming device" = "any box Hollywood doesn't control" - this includes YouTube to a certain extent until Google played ball. From a more prophetic standpoint I think the various devices are turning into de-facto cable boxes and I think Hollywood is looking into making their content available only to exclusive devices - let alone services as they do now. (Although it'll probably end up looking like the DVD consortium where only approved device makers that agree to monopolistic conditions get licensed to stream content) Besides, your format-shifting causes children to starve because you're not paying your fair share to the artists who labor long and hard to bring you quality entertainment. Same thing when you skip over ads you thief! (The making and authorized distribution of this comment supported over 15,000 jobs)

Re:What the hell...

[jedidiah]

In other words these are the equivalent of bog standard HTPC devices that have been around for years and years already. It's just now that there are cheap Android versions and they're on sale at Amazon.

Most of what gets played on my "illegal streaming devices" are shows and movies that should be out of copyright by now.

They were bought and paid for long ago.

So there's no more blood to be squeezed from that particular turnip ever.

Re:What the hell...

[Anonymous Coward]

You know, a plex server for one.

Re:What the hell...

[drinkypoo]

In other words these are the equivalent of bog standard HTPC devices that have been around for years and years already. It's just now that there are cheap Android versions and they're on sale at Amazon.

And they come preloaded with addons, some of which are legal because they have substantial non-infringing use, all of which are preconfigured to grab stuff you're not authorized to watch. It's this very last part that makes them illegal. If they're not preconfigured to or advertised for the purpose of copyright infringement, then they are legal.

Re:What the hell...

[MachineShedFred]

Or even better, I'm using Kodi as a front-end to MythTV, which is recording crap that they are broadcasting over-the-air without any encryption or expectation that someone isn't 'time-shifting' it, as everyone has been doing since the 1980s.

Re:What the hell...

[foradoxium]

I believe they are implying the pre-configured "kodi boxes" that you can buy that are pretty much plug-n-play preconfigured to give you access to the illegal stuffs...

They even state in the article that the software itself is not illegal.

Re:What the hell...

[foradoxium]

not really.

The summary on ./ is paraphrasing to skew the outrage. The representative actually said in the interview that the software (Kodi) isn't illegal.

Re:What the hell...

[swillden]

From a more prophetic standpoint I think the various devices are turning into de-facto cable boxes and I think Hollywood is looking into making their content available only to exclusive devices - let alone services as they do now.

Where do these devices get content?

Re:What the hell...

[Anonymous Coward]

I have several relatives using "cracked" fire sticks that stream illegal content. They're stupid enough to brag on Facebook about watching new movies, still in theaters, from the couch. That's certainly one type of device eluded to. When I warn them that all that content is streamed from somewhere, and traceable, I get laughed at.

Re:What the hell...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, they are talking about devices sold on the premise that they can illegally gain access to content.

A lot of these are simply set top boxes or plug in sticks that tie in to a number of different streaming sites to get their content, with no care on if the site pays for the work or not.

Whilst I'm not a fan of the copyright cartels, these things are literally sold as "plug and play" piracy tools. Most ship with limited legal sources, but have the facility to one-click-add in the illegal ones with a warning such as "Before watching any video from these services, please ensure you have the appropriate license if applicable in your country." - one click later, you can get any movie or TV show you want (often in crappy quality for recent cinema releases, but hey, it's free).

These devices are advertised as being able to watch any movie and TV show free of charge, and actually mostly deliver that promise. Of course the cartels have a problem with them, and under current law they have a good case.

Re:What the hell...

[rsmith-mac]

And they come preloaded with addons, some of which are legal because they have substantial non-infringing use, all of which are preconfigured to grab stuff you're not authorized to watch. It's this very last part that makes them illegal. If they're not preconfigured to or advertised for the purpose of copyright infringement, then they are legal.

And to add to that, there are vendors out there explicitly advertising/selling these as piracy boxes. They're not even trying to hide behind plausible deniability, they're outright trying to sell hardware to people for the purposes of committing copyright infringement.

In fact I just got an ad on RevContent today for one of these: https://www.freeseetv.com/prei...

"But how can you watch for free? The secret to that is an app called KODI. TVFrog has completely reprogrammed and redesigned it so it works even easier. The TVFrog technology searches the internet where it will locate and stream, virtually any television show, hollywood movie, or live sports event you want to watch without having to worry about paying rental fees or monthly subscriptions."

Re:What the hell...

[SuricouRaven]

Not illegal yet. I'm sure their lawyers and lobbyists are already trying to figure out how to change that. Ideally within the next two or four years, before the political pendulum might swing and they lose their current advantage.

Re:What the hell...

[swimboy]

No, the actual quote was

"McCoy stressed that the devices themselves, and software such as Kodi, are ‘probably’ not illegal."

They used typical weasel-wording so that they could pretend that the software *is* illegal, even though they 'probably' said the opposite.

Re:What the hell...

[Anonymous Coward]

Fuck you, Plex is not "illegal" any more than your fucking CD player becomes illegal if you put a burned CD into it.

Go fuck your face, MPAA / RIAA shill

boo hoo

[Anonymous Coward]

If the mpaa and riaa don't like it then come up with a new business model that work for everyone and stop cheating people out of there hard earned money. Invest in new tech and be a leader say like netflex hulu or the others that are out there. They are quick to use tech terminology for this but then that doesn't cost money.

Re: boo hoo

[Anonymous Coward]

The movie industry shouldn't have to change their business model just because people have decided it's okay to steal things they want and not pay for them. Piracy is wrong and it needs to stop. People know that piracy is wrong and they keep finding new ways to do it anyway. This says a lot about the character of people these days.

Re: boo hoo

[Anonymous Coward]

The movie industry shouldn't have to change their business model just because people have decided it's okay to steal things they want and not pay for them.

The sustained assault against the public domain and ridiculous extensions to copyright are stealing from the public. I'll worry about their feelings about thieves once they stop stealing en masse. Just because you decided to put something out doesn't give you the right to eternally control what is done or not done with it. Copyright is a time-limited public burden made to incentivise people to make new works, not to have control in perpetuity over them. The current "time limitation" is an utter mockery of the intentions of the Constitution; I can guarantee you that "time limited" does not mean "extended 20 years every 20 years until Disney decides to fold." I think a lot of people have entirely forgotten that, or never knew it in the first place, since their screeching about "stealing movies," though of course that aspect of it is entirely intentional.

Technically, considering OSS (which you are almost certainly using whether you realize it or not), and the rapidly increasing capabilities of automated music and video production, it's arguable that even that role is coming to a close, since people can and do put out content for free. They certainly didn't avoid making them before copyright even existed, or when copyright was much, much shorter. Heck, some of our most well-known cultural contributions fall into this category. But thanks to this bullshit the days of anything entering the public domain are over, and as such anything they don't profit off will die, and they will control those things they do profit off of forever, if things go their way, all the while pushing for more restrictions and invasive measures to control computers to do their bidding for copyright enforcement and attempting to slowly force everyone into a permanent "rent-per-view' model..

At this point, considering the massive amounts of damage done by the media corporations, piracy is arguably an act of justified civil disobedience. I am aware that you and people like you will rationalize this as "an excuse for stealing," but that's to be expected of people who either do not think of the larger ramifications of this, or have some vested interest in perpetuating control of content, and ultimately control over computers and people in general.

Re: boo hoo

[Anonymous Coward]

Get back to me when they reimberse me for the millions of dollars worth of material they stole from me when they bribed policitians to retroactively extend copyright terms for pre-existing works.

Re: boo hoo

[Anonymous Coward]

Please. They've been stealing for decades, only now we have direct media revealing the truth. Hollywood Accounting. Look it up.

Re: boo hoo

[SuricouRaven]

I, for one, would feel a lot more sympathy for the copyright-based industries had they not lobbied for the repeated term extensions. There is absolutely no way anyone can argue that ninety-five years is in the public interest. Here in the UK it's seventy years for music now - an extension passed with some urgency to keep the Beatles from going public domain. Because it's really important they maintain their incentive to publish more music.

I have no objection to companies having the ability to profit from content creation - this does result in the production of a lot of really good content, both for entertainment and for practical use. But when a whole industry is acting like some sort of mustache-twirling cartoon villain, well... steal from the rich, and give to yourself.

I still pay for independent studio games. The only big corporation involved there is Valve, and so far their ethical record has been pretty good by my judgment.

huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

How is Kodi, etc different. It is a box that takes you to an illegal streaming website, no?
It simply 'plays' the illegal file instead of 'downloading'. So it adds the big step of pressing 'play' :O

Really not up on how it works (at least since 1.0...) but isn't it more like Piracy 2.1 ?!?

So Piracy 2.0 was Internet Explorer then :O

Major threat?

[Anonymous Coward]

Piracy remains a major threat for the movie industry

No, the major threat is the constant reboots, rehashes, and remakes which are worse than the originals. Who would pirate this?

Re:Major threat?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not to mention the movie industry keeps posting record profits year after year. If anything, piracy has been a boon to their business, providing free word of mouth advertising across the internet.

A song for a meal...

[Zurkeyon3733]

Thats how it used to be... You entertained, and were well fed and regularly boarded. Now, we adorn you with gold and diamonds, and allow you rob us blind for every song, every movie, and every music video. Every second off the night and day. All while greater Men and Women do the actual WORK of society. Many of whom do jobs FAR more important than the task of entertaining the masses. (Maintaining a power reactor, monitoring the environment, servicing a commercial airplane...) Though these people all make FAR LESS than you all do. Though we continually hear you all whine and complain about how poor you all are... Its pathetic. Seriously. To the point that I have boycotted the movies entirely, and have not purchased any music in about 20 years. As I am certain others have. Get a Grip Hollywood... You cannot fly around in a private jet that drinks $10,000 an hour in fuel, and tell us all to be more frugal, friendly to the envirnment and not to clip your overpriced "auto-tune fabricated", over/under acted, CRAP from the interwebs... Yours Truly, the People who Feed and Clothed you for the past 3500+ years...

Re:A song for a meal...

[DiscountBorg(TM)]

I have nothing particularly against piracy, but if you think that making entertainment isn't work, then I cordially invite you to enter the industry and pay your dues. You will enjoy not having a family life anymore, when you're pulling 12+shifts sitting in front of a screen doing repetitive tasks without any glamour whatsoever. Just because it's fun to watch movies doesn't mean it isn't real work to make them. The vast majority of people who work in entertainment don't make millions. For every wealthy actor there's thousands of people you never see behind the scenes.

My reasons against hating piracy are that 1: I think it's gone too far, it stifles innovation and breaks with thousands of years of history where humans could freely share ideas 2. If you are a student and want to break into a field, the cost of educational materials can be kind of shocking---you may have no other means to be competitive other than to pirate software, or the hundreds of movies you might need to watch to become knowledgeable in your field. 3. broke people can't afford to buy the movie anyway

Re:A song for a meal...

[LeftCoastThinker]

Importance != popularity. Civilization would completely collapse in about a week if all the engineers, technicians and operators that work to deliver clean water to your tap magically vanished along with their knowledge. Clean, potable water is 100% critical to civilization and without it millions die in a week or two and civilization collapses.

OTOH, you could nuke Hollywood from orbit and life for most of the planet, even in the US would continue uninterrupted...

Re:A song for a meal...

[Zurkeyon3733]

Minus the facts that cattle don't butcher themselves, nor cook themselves, nor serve themselves... Nor do Chickens, or Pigs, or Lambs.... Trees don't cut themselves down, nor do they mill themselves into boards, or drive nails into themselves and stack themselves into neat geometric piles for us to live in. The Steel in the earth does not make itself into a car. The Iron does not magically mold itself into an engine block... WORK IS LIFE. Or you starve or freeze... Fact. If these entertainers didn't have the little guy, they would have no food, no homes to live in, no shiny stones to wear, no pretty cars to drive, no shoes on their feet. These people are about as important to the earth as global warming itself. They are the WORST of consumers in 99% of cases. With very few giving a rosy fuk about the average person, other than how many albums or tickets they buy per year. The whole natural man BS is just that. Your kind of Utopia is currently a fantasy. As production of food, clothing, medicine, housing, plumbing, sanitation and etc, are not automatic to such a degree to allow for this yet. Far from it actually. Hundreds of years or more.

Re:A song for a meal...

[Zurkeyon3733]

At the end of the day... Can you eat an Album or movie ticket? Can you Live in them? Can you Drive them to work? Can you Power a home with them? Then they are functionally useless. They are WANT items. Not NEED items. Try swinging a pickaxe for 12 hours a day, or doing body work in a metal box in the heat all day, or picking fruit. Fact is that these entertainers are WAAAAAAAAY overpaid. And there are MANY more people in the world working FAR harder, making MORE impact on the earth (Farmers Feeding us, Engineers building our world, Doctors Keeping us Alive...) and STILL the entertainers now make more then all of them COMBINED. This is truly backwards from how it should be. Natural selection being sidelined, was the worst thing that ever happened to mankind.

Re:A song for a meal...

[spire3661]

There is no reason films have to cost what they do now. The ENTIRE INDUSTRY is inflated and needs a serious knock back down to reality. There is literally no reason to spend $200 million to make one movie, ever. Dont even get me started on Hollywood accounting. look jack, because of your industry, copyright is absurdly long. We have NO LOVE FOR YOU. I hate copyright more than you hate piracy. Piracy is a check on your industry's rampant and abusive greed. The movie industry has done more damage to general computing than computing has done to Hollywood. You ROB THE PUBLIC DOMAIN.

Re:A song for a meal...

[DiscountBorg(TM)]

"I have nothing particularly against piracy"
"My reasons against hating piracy"

Where did I say I hated piracy? Where did I say I worked in film?

AAA video games also have budgets now approaching and sometimes exceeding a hundred million, because they have to employ hundreds to thousands of people for years---and supply specialized IT infrastructure for all of them as well. None of these people are millionaires. You do the math. Do you want to have fun? Get a job and work 80 hours a week making eyeballs for several years.

  I kan haz comprehension cheezburger.

Re:A song for a meal...

[DiscountBorg(TM)]

I worked as a physical laborer in a mill for many years. At the end of the day, most people need more than physical labor to survive. That's because most people aren't soulless automatons who live to push objects around and drop dead and even in hunter-gatherer societies you find arts and entertainment.

I highly doubt your living environment consists of blank white walls and zero movies. If you consume movies then clearly they have some value to you. If you didn't find it useful, you wouldn't even bother to pirate (if you do). If you think art has no value, then I challenge you to throw out anything in your environment that was designed, and live like a robot.

Lots of physical labor is involved in making a film or a game. You have to build the infrastructure. You have to build sets. Haul gear around. It's long hours and bloody hard work. Those film sets built themselves, the clothing made itself, the gear moved around by itself, the IT infrastructure required to make the visuals made themselves? Consumers are sheep who think the grass magically appears in front of them.

Natural selection is not about physical strength. The most well-adapted organism tends to survive. This includes socially adaptive behaviors.

Re:A song for a meal...

[Zurkeyon3733]

You entire argument, still does not excuse the fact that far more important people to the every day real life needs of human beings, get paid peanuts compared to these entertainers. they have become GREEDY. To the extreme. Until they can do what they do and expect a normal living wage, we see them as cry babies that earn far too much money. No amount of opinion posting will change that :-)

Re:A song for a meal...

[DiscountBorg(TM)]

It wasn't intended to. Actors get paid way too much. For every actor there can be a team in the thousands working on the film for several years, so take out the actor's wages and material costs and do the math. The vast majority of people who work in entertainment make average to below average wages, frequently work ridiculous hours, and for every one of them there's a hundred more who go broke trying.

Re:A song for a meal...

[Zurkeyon3733]

Ok, so now that you have clarified, it appears that I am mis-speaking. I intended to state that the "Stars" should go back to the times of a "song for a meal" I completely understand the stage hand, and the sound guy, and the makeup peoples plight, and that those are hard jobs. But for some goon to sit in a contract negotiation and state that you can't have his "face" or his "name" attached to your project unless you fork over this many millions.... That IS pathetic. Ok, so does that clarify my point a bit?

Re:A song for a meal...

[aaarrrgggh]

For the actors, maybe... for the Teamsters, not so much.

Re:A song for a meal...

[Zurkeyon3733]

After the first time I had a "Teamster" tell me that I had to pay them or I couldn't use the wheels on the dolly to load my equipment into the convention center, I stopped giving a Sh|t about the "Teamsters" LoL

Re:A song for a meal...

[drinkypoo]

Actors get paid way too much.

If putting an actor in a film is what puts asses in seats, then the actor's value is based on how many asses they can put in seats, and not on how many hours they work, or how many calories they burn. Imagining that all work is equal is ridiculous.

Re:A song for a meal...

[DiscountBorg(TM)]

Oh ok, yeah I agree. My bad, I'm just quite used to having to explain this all the time... haha.

The market value of actors (to bring in the paying audiences) is already so high that it's ridiculous when they're asking for more.

Re:A song for a meal...

[DiscountBorg(TM)]

Oh yes, I quite get that their value is determined by the market, and the value is pretty high if you are sinking $200 million into a film. Hence Ghost in the Shell stars Scarlett Johansson instead of an unfamiliar actor to the target audience. But this is only an explanation of why that most of us already know--if you turn that into a normative instead of a descriptive claim (turning an is into an ought), it won't do much to convince anyone who thinks that one is insufficient for the other.. or further along those lines, that this degree of wage disparity is unethical.

Re:A song for a meal...

[drinkypoo]

WORK IS LIFE. Or you starve or freeze... Fact.

There is less work to go around for the life that is here, and if we keep doing all the work we can do, we destroy our biosphere. Far more of a fact than your crap. Work is what we do so that we can be alive to do stuff we want to do. Absent a positive motivation we rapidly go batshit and kill ourselves, kill others, whatever. Without art, without recreation, there is no point to being alive except to just squirt out more people just like you to spend through our natural capital more rapidly than it can be replenished. If we are not more than the work we do, we are effectively a bacteria, a virus, a pathogen, mindlessly churning away regardless of consequences for the host.

All people can be fed and clothed with a tiny percentage of our current output. But all people can be fed, clothed, housed, their health care needs met, and the like for a larger but still small percentage, if we put the kibosh on unnecessary economic activity. Cars are designed to fail, not to be retrofit with new equipment which extends their life, because they want to sell us more cars. Most personal electronics are garbage with short engineered lifespans. And then there's the endless war needed to prop up the fossil fuel system... the economic and environmental costs of which are unsustainable. We're wasting our output so that a few already-rich fucks can get richer, while republican cucks vote for more of the same while complaining about how bad it is.

Re:A song for a meal...

[Zurkeyon3733]

Wow, you need some help with primary logic amigo... Your is mucho bad. :-)

Everything is a threat to these organizations

[Anonymous Coward]

Given their druthers the RIAA and MPAA would own exclusive rights to any and all content, there would be mandatory, legislation-backed surveillance anywhere that any and all content is viewed or heard, there would be head-counting, and everyone in the viewing/audible area would be charged a 'rental fee'. They'd either make it illegal to discuss the content viewed or heard, or charge you a fee for discussing what you saw or heard. There would be no such thing as 'owning a copy' of any content, it would all be 'rental' in one form or another (Think: the original DivX 'rental' system, which never got off the ground because it was so ridiculous). Hell, given the technology, they'd probably make it mandatory to have your memory of the content degraded or wiped completely after a short time, so you couldn't 'infringe on their intellectual property' in your own mind by merely thinking about it. There would never have been VCRs, there would be no DVRs now, or any other recording devices of any kind available to the general public, they'd all be licensed professional use only, incredibly expensive, and you'd be thrown in jail for YEARS if you created one. That's what the MPAA and RIAA would, in their deepest, darkest fantasies, would want: total control over EVERYTHING you see and hear, and not just for decades or a hundred years, FOREVER. You write a song? They own it and sue you for performing it. You hum a song you remember? You get charged a fee for the privilege. Extrapolate from what I've given you, the extent of the dystopia they'd create. That's the greedy mindset we're dealing with.

Re:Everything is a threat to these organizations

[Anonymous Coward]

You forgot the part where they have a back door into every computing device produced, and it is a felony to build, sell or possess one without that back door, and where the operating system will automatically delete and report any "potentially infringing" files.

That said, I exaggerate... they may just make it illegal to own your own computing device at all, and require everyone to rent everything. Either that, or the devices will be set up so you have to save all your data to the cloud, where it is much cheaper for them to control.

News at 11

[Anonymous Coward]

Greedy, corpulent lazy Hollywood execs summon new bogieman to explain slightly less filthy riches than they'd like and obscure dodgy accounting practises rather than recognise the poor quality of their tired artless warmovers of old franchises.

as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[rogoshen1]

You know, if these hollywood types were to be believed; the feds should encourage people to pirate CP, since that would put them out of business.

But really the average pirate fits into a few categories

1. they weren't going to buy it anyways. revenue lost: 0.
2. they want to buy it, but you refuse to sell to them. revenue lost.
3. they did buy it, but you make it more convenient to use a pirated copy (unskippable bullshit menus, insistence on optical media) revenue lost: 0 (unless you truly expect people to buy it more than once?)
4. they would buy it, but it's priced too high. revenue lost: debateable. it's just as much the industries fault for not pricing their product appropriately. But easier to blame the pirates.

Piracy makes for an excellent boogeyman, since anytime revenue numbers don't meet expectations they can blame pirates. Anytime congress needs to be pestered to get more favorable laws and such for your industry, pirates can be blamed.

side note: piracy is not the right word, nor is theft. if i download something from TPB, i'm not *stealing* from anyone. I'm not depriving anyone of their copy of said item.

Side note 2: how much innovation has been the direct result of 'piracy' over the years? How many times have we heard of some start up that started out using less than legit software, only to become billion dollar companies (and then immediately turn around join the BSA or similar?)

Re: as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[LocalH]

The day you can lossless copy a physical object without harming the original, your analogy will be apt.

Re:as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[Anonymous Coward]

YOU ARE SPOT ON!!
Especially points 1-4 Hehheh.

> ...since anytime revenue numbers don't meet expectations...

Yeah this is Sales 101. Anytime, (and I mean ANY time), projections don't match reality- heads roll. That's fucked up right there.
Hence the term for consumer spending is Consumer Confidence, (as if purchasing things is an act of 'faith & loyalty'?). They'd never say Consumer Priorities, and they'll even shame consumers for not spending enough.

>...it's just as much the industries fault for not pricing their product appropriately. But easier to blame the pirates.
'nuff said you captured it. And god have mercy on the soul who created unskippable previews. I can stomach the piracy warning- it's thirty seconds or whatever... but AUTO-F'ing MENUS? NO! I will go back to VHS just to ensure that I press play & skip that shit.

Re: as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[DiscountBorg(TM)]

Piracy would be if I looked at the car, took detailed notes and photos and then made a copy of it. Theft is depriving you of your property--hopping in the car and driving away. They have entirely different consequences, and as far as I know most legal systems rightly distinguish between them, which is why p2p is charged under civil, not criminal law (so far).

If someone steals my music, that means they've come into my studio and stolen the multitrack files off my hard drive, or claimed my work as their own, for profit.

Just because two things might be (debatably) bad doesn't mean they are equivalent, and just because Hollywood makes videos about piracy equaling theft doesn't mean they are true.

Re:as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[uCallHimDrJ0NES]

Side note 2: how much innovation has been the direct result of 'piracy' over the years? How many times have we heard of some start up that started out using less than legit software, only to become billion dollar companies (and then immediately turn around join the BSA or similar?)

I disagree with the implication that Google/YouTube has become legitimate. They are simply too ubiquitous and large to sue. Besides, how would lawyers planning to sue Google communicate or make their lawsuit known without Google being able to see and subvert the effort?

Re: as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[Anonymous Coward]

Equating theft of a PHYSICAL OBJECT to copying a VIRTUAL OBJECT, and the copying does not degrade the original in the least

You're a fucking moron.

Re:as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[Anonymous Coward]

They would communicate through email, phone, and fax, same as they do now.
Or do you think Google has some magical ability to spy on a law firm?

Re: as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[whitlocktj]

No, you've failed to account for theft of intellectual property. This is just as much as a heinous crime, if not worse.Ask Philo Farnsworth, or the Wright Brothers vs Curtiss, or Eduardo Saverin. If I take 2-3 years bringing a story to live production before having someone release it to the world for free, my rewards are diminished. And before you use the argument that movie producers are rich, thousands of people involved in the project aren't, and even if they are, they are rich because supply meets demand, and they've created something that people would pay money for.

Re:as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[whitlocktj]

Oddly enough, the movies pirated the most are movies that many people would pay full price to watch. Don't think any of those arguments hold up.

Re:as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[Kjella]

5. they would buy it, but since they can get it for free they do.

I mean seriously, how many of us have too much money? If I can spend less on something, I can spend more on something else. If I'm not particularly bothered with it being wrong because I don't believe so or I don't care and/or I'm not particularly bothered with it being illegal because the risk so so low, then of course I won't spend money on it. Well okay maybe exceptionally, for a small sum because that's what most people who put up tip jars discover. You don't really get much money freely, not even when you're doing them a service. Particularly not large corporations, you're more likely to get $10 from a hundred people for a $1000 project than $10 from 100.000 people for a million dollar project because the smaller your contribution is of the total the easier it is to let "everybody else" pay for it.

Re: as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[Travelsonic]

No, you've failed to account for theft of intellectual property.

You mean a crime that doesn't yet, to my knowledge, actually exist, and seems to only be used by the misinformed, and the intellectually lazy instead of copyright infringement? Where are the people who have been prosecuted for this "theft of IP" law that supposedly exists, versus copyright/patent/trademark infringement, etc? Surely, you can demonstrate it, since you're so sure it exists as a legal tort and/or crime, and is more appropriate than the IP laws that exist in application.
That "law?"
Ha. When people are prosecuted for that exact crime, and not another being mislabeled, OK, but until then, IMO this is BS.

Re:as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[Anonymous Coward]

5. they would buy it, but since they can get it for free they do.

In a world where there is way too much good content and absolutely no hope of seeing it all to claim people would even bother going out of their way to get illegal content is silly.

Most piracy is geopolitical, primarily a billion Chinese thumbing their noses at the US/Hollywood cartel with the Chinese government's complicity.

Hollywood and all content "producers" (actually, usually just middlemen) could disappear in a puff of magic smoke tomorrow and most people would hardly even notice with all the content that already exists.

Re:as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[Altrag]

side note: piracy is not the right word, nor is theft.

Give it up already. Words change. Your mouse isn't a rodent. Your keyboard has buttons rather than keys and your desktop has nothing to do with a desk, so why aren't you complaining about those word redefinitions?

Piracy and copyright infringement, in 2017, are synonymous phrases (and have been for a few years now) in the context of intellectual property. Just learn to live with it and go spend your time fighting a battle that actually matters.

Re:as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[Wycliffe]

5. they would buy it, but since they can get it for free they do.

I mean seriously, how many of us have too much money? If I can spend less on something, I can spend more on something else.

My general strategy is that if the movie I want to watch is at redbox, I pay for it, otherwise, I search for it on google and generally find a pirated copy. I don't pirate because I'm not willing to pay for it. I pirate because I'm not willing to pay $4 to rent a movie that I can buy on amazon for the same price. They aren't even trying. Do a search for the movie "Mrs Doubtfire" on amazon. You can own the DVD with free prime shipping for $4. So guess how much the digital version is? $14 to buy or $4 to rent. Now look at "The Matrix". Like most series, the first one is free on prime but the 2nd one costs $13 to own even though I can buy the entire trilogy on DVD for $10. It costs considerably more to buy the digital movie than buy the physical version and in some cases more to rent the digital version than to buy the physical version. In what world does this make sense?

Re:as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[jarkus4]

costs considerably more to buy the digital movie than buy the physical version and in some cases more to rent the digital version than to buy the physical version. In what world does this make sense?

In a world where physical version has already became liability.

I dont watch movies, but when I buy computer games I want them to be on steam. I actively AVOID buying the physical copies as I find them inconvenient. I do have some of them for old games, but honestly I should just throw them away as I haven't even touched them for the last 6 years (since I moved into my current place). I have even bought some of those games again on steam or gog so that I can actually play them in convenient way.

For movies there is likely also the time factor: I want to watch it on Saturday afternoon with my GF and not on Monday when the delivery will happen. If you plan for this you can save money, but last minute decision costs you extra.

Re: as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[Anonymous Coward]

So, if I think a new car is too expensive, should I also be able to go and take one without paying for it?

Of course not. That would make that car no longer available to anyone else. That is stealing. Actual theft.

Piracy is exactly the same sort of thing.

Piracy is exactly not the same sort of thing. A copy made of a movie does nothing to the original. It is still available to whomever held it in the first place. Unlike the car you stole, which isn't.

Are you really that stupid?

It is wrong and needs to stop.

Highly debatable on both accounts.

Have you been living under a rock for the last 15 years?

Re:as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[SuricouRaven]

It's hardly even an in insult. The world's most popular piracy website is called The Pirate Bay. Pirates have their own culture, adorned in treasure chests, flags, and stylish swords. They wear the label of pirate with pride now, and embrace it.

Re:as usual, piracy fears are nonsense.

[uCallHimDrJ0NES]

They would communicate through email, phone, and fax, same as they do now.
Or do you think Google has some magical ability to spy on a law firm?

It's not magic, but yes. Can you figure out how? Try not to get their attention as you figure it out. Good luck!

I think we're probably on v. 7 or 8...

[91degrees]

Piracy existed before Peer to peer... and there are a few other means of getting content that they haven't mentioned.

Re:I think we're probably on v. 7 or 8...

[DiscountBorg(TM)]

I'm an analog piracy purist. I only pirate my movies on Beta tapes.

BurryTheFuture

[sdinfoserv]

“Horseless carriages remain a major threat to the farrier industry” - decried Gideon McTrotnstink .

Re:BurryTheFuture

[Anonymous Coward]

I understand the sarcasm, but that has more to do with increased urbanization and "anti horse slaughter" legislation. The latter actually led to a record number of horses being left to die from neglect and starvation (because their value dropped to zero), leading to an increase in care costs and a reduction of the North American horse population by 25% in 10 years. The politicians who came up with the law did not understand the horse industry let alone horses. Very sad that a law intended to prevent cruelty indirectly led to it.

Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

This makes no sense to me. Doesn't the streaming service validate the credentials of the stream client? I sure as hell can't stream Netflix without logging in. And sharing logins is not really an "illegal streaming device." WTF are they talking about? *ignore*

Solution

[Anonymous Coward]

Offer a compelling product that allow people to watch stuff online, easily and quickly, at a reasonable price.
Piracy is a distribution problem. You try can fight it all you want, if you're not providing a platform that's good and available in more than just 1 country (USA), you're asking for it.

Re: Solution

[jedidiah]

It is a moot point. All you're doing with all of your screeching and fighting is simply altering the time table. The same mooch will still avoid paying even if you invent the perfect anti-piracy measures. They will just catch content at the other end of the pricing cycle.

Meanwhile, you could potentially do great harm in terms of personal rights and sabotage of technology if you're allowed your copyright maximalists dream.

Also, it's not stealing if what you are "pirating" should rightfully be in the public domain now. That is the result of an equally "greedy and entitled" corporate mindset you would probably happily give a free pass to.

Re:Solution

[Anonymous Coward]

Offer a compelling product that allow people to watch stuff online, easily and quickly, at a reasonable price.
Piracy is a distribution problem. You try can fight it all you want, if you're not providing a platform that's good and available in more than just 1 country (USA), you're asking for it.

Mod parent up. I am absolutely WILLING to give money for content, but I CANNOT in about 2 of every 5 cases.

Here's a Slashdot Challenge: Find me an online site where I can rent (not buy, but rent) Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Now, tell me where I can stream it for free as an alternative. Counterexample - Prometheus - rewatched it before seeing the new Alien movie in theatres. Amazon had it available for a $4 rental, I paid for it.

Don't get me started on eBooks. Why an eBook costs $15 and the physical copy is $12 is something I will never fathom.

Please make it easier to spend money on your products in a sane manner - I am absolutely willing.

Re: Solution

[Anonymous Coward]

Fair enough.

You don't have a right to demand someone else will by your product. This is incredibly vain, narcissistic and entitled, though not surprising coming from a baby boomer out of touch executive. Pass away.

Re: Solution

[Altrag]

You don't have a right to demand that someone else sell their products for less

Yes I do. Its an indirect right in the form of "I don't purchase your product if you don't lower the price."

Its their problem if they refuse to compete with someone offering the same product for a lower price (and more convenient to boot.)

This is, very literally, a monopoly complaining that they can't survive when competition enters the market. In any other industry, if you make a $100m investment and can't recoup the costs due to competitive pressure, we wish you good luck with your bankruptcy. But when it comes to the media industries, we instead create laws to eliminate the competition for you.

Re: Solution

[Anonymous Coward]

You don't have a right to demand that someone else sell their products for less. This is incredibly greedy and entitled, though not surprising coming from a millennial crybaby snowflake. Grow up.

What are you smoking? If nothing, then you should grow up. (And how the hell did you drag the millennial/snowflake meme bullshit into this.)

AFAICS, the GP wasn't demanding anything. They were making the point that if something is overpriced, there will be resistance. Good. There should be. In my own (old fart) case it takes the form for cord-cutting & reading a book instead.

How did they arrive at 3.0?

[DiscountBorg(TM)]

Sorry to rain on the buzzword parade,but I'm pretty sure version 1.0 was copying sheet music and forging paintings, and 2.0 was copying cassette and VCR tapes. If I've missed a step there please feel free to fill me in.

Re:How did they arrive at 3.0?

[Anonymous Coward]

And Privateering 1.0 was extending copyright duration. Privateering 2.0 was insane statutory damages, but only for registered works. Privateering 3.0 was criminalizing noncommercial copyright violations (instead of it being a civil offense, your tax dollars as enforcement for MAFIAA).

Re:How did they arrive at 3.0?

[Altrag]

Yeah. They rebooted the series in the early aughts.

And Owning Physical Media = Piracy 4.0!

[Anonymous Coward]

Owning your own physical media with movies on it will soon be Piracy 4.0, because it prevents the companies from charging you per view.

Advertise legit methods on pirate sites?

[TuckerBag]

This has probably been mentioned before, but here goes anyway,.. I think if I was a producer of "digitally transportable entertainment", then I would at least TRY working WITH the pirates to some degree. This is because it seems to me that trying to "beat" the pirates is possibly impossible and therefore futile? ("possibly impossible",.. I like that) [BEGIN LIST] [0] I would make the assumption that people are by default,... nice, fair minded, and not of the typical mentality of the modern day Slashdotter. :-) [1] I would make the product easily and legitimately available at a low cost and at high quality. [2] I would then pay the pirates to advertise this legal option on their sites,.. yes, right next to the porn/malware ads. [3] I would place info on the cost of production on the legit download site to help with guilt-tripping the customer into wanting to pay SOMETHING for the product [4] I would see how that goes in terms of revenue before trying anything else. [END LIST] Of course this means that the producer is making a high quality version of the product available to the pirates, but isn't this a business model that is at least worth trying? I am guessing that I am about to be told that it has already been tried many times and failed, or only had moderate success compared to more ubiquitous marketing options. Also, this is a kind of inadvertent semi-troll I guess. So, sorry about that.

Somebody is bad at math

[ArhcAngel]

The MPAA spends far more money fighting copyright infringement than they lose in actual infringement.

POSTS ARE BEING CENSORED

[Anonymous Coward]

As usual, anyone who criticizes piracy or other illegal activity is promptly being modded down to -1. Anyone who presents an opposing views and disagreed with breaking the law is promptly censored by the moderators. Piracy is wrong and you have no right to take things that you didn't pay for. Slashdot readers oppose any effort to enforce the law, whether those efforts are trying to stop terrorism or stop piracy. It's a shame and really says something about the character of people here.

Re: POSTS ARE BEING CENSORED

[Anonymous Coward]

Why shouldn't we be able to down vote content we disagree with?

Re: POSTS ARE BEING CENSORED

[Type44Q]

Piracy is wrong and you have no right to take things that you didn't pay for.

There're people who're smarter than you who don't agree with the "morals" you're attempting - not very successfully - to push.

Re: POSTS ARE BEING CENSORED

[Cryacin]

You wouldn't steal a car, you wouldn't steal a handbag, you wouldn't steal your best friend's kidney. Piracy is organ theft! Don't do it!

Re: POSTS ARE BEING CENSORED

[Anonymous Coward]

The premise of the article I defy anyone to name an illegal streaming device.

Re: POSTS ARE BEING CENSORED

[Anonymous Coward]

I wouldn't steal any of my best friends organs, because they're ruined from years of drug and alcohol abuse. Now, I would steal your childs organs if i needed them to live.

Re: POSTS ARE BEING CENSORED

[Anonymous Coward]

The devices are legal, what is done with them is (still currently) illegal. A baseball bat is legal to own, if I break someone's windshield with it, that would be illegal.

Morally speaking, I possess mp3s I didn't pay for, I mentally whip myself for it constantly. Currently doing that while enjoying the hell out of the Allman Brothers Live at the Fillmore East (1971). Someone, please stop me before society falls apart completely!

Re:POSTS ARE BEING CENSORED

[AutodidactLabrat]

Piracy is wrong
Control over the monitization channels is wrong
Monopoly ISP services is wrong
Network preferences based on income is wrong
Inherited wealth exacerbating wealth centralization is wrong
Fake News Alt-right fascists are wrong.
There is a world full of wrong
Start with the WMD liars escape from justice for the million murdered innocent Iraqis and THEN tell me you are righteous, and not before.

Re:POSTS ARE BEING CENSORED

[Applehu Akbar]

Of course piracy is a bad thing to do, but the problem is how Hollywood chooses to define the term. Is it piracy if you view content you normally have rights to that is geofenced off where you happen to be right now? Is it piracy if you Kodi a video channel that is in your cable package because the company's streaming app can't be bothered to include your carrier in its signon list? Is it piracy if you have to torrent a movie you want to rent that is not available in your country from any online store?

Re: POSTS ARE BEING CENSORED

[Anonymous Coward]

Storytelling is not sustainable business model. Storytelling incorporates film, novel and music. We are being forced to subsidize industries who turn storytelling into a product that needs special security to prevent its natural state, communal. Yet we are the criminals. Never mind how much money the film industry has made countless retelling of public domain stories. How many bands show similar traits because they are stealing from their fore fathers. How many authors/screenwriters write homage scenes but never paid a dime to the original inspiration. Without the previous incarnations of Storytelling we do not have the new works. If the previous Storytelling "products" have no value to the current creators then theirs has no value to me. As with security, if I can exploit the system the system is inherently exploitable to all... on both sides of the argument. At least the "pirates" are honest. The Storytelling corporations on the other hand act as they are innocent even while suing each other over copyright infringement. John Fogerty was sued for plagiarizing himself. When you approve of a system that encourages this mentality then you are no better than the "pirates"

Re: POSTS ARE BEING CENSORED

[Anonymous Coward]

On here? Sure you can. You're not supposed to, though.

You're supposed to vote down content that doesn't contribute to the discussion and vote up content that does, regardless of whether you agree with it.

If you disagree with something, argue why you disagree with it. Different thing, doesn't require mod points.

Re:POSTS ARE BEING CENSORED

[SuricouRaven]

Or, much more universally applicable, is it piracy if you torrent a movie which, absent the possibility of torrrenting, you would not bother to watch?

Re: POSTS ARE BEING CENSORED

[Anonymous Coward]

....and how much did the MAFIAA pay you?

Capitalism 101

[Anonymous Coward]

The consumer sets the prices.
I would use Netflix if I could pay 5 cents per show. I watch so rarely it's not worth it to get subscription . But some people watch 8 hours a day, and I would subsidize them.

On the other hand buying individual episodes costs dollars.

Piracy is my choice.

Re:Capitalism 101

[sims 2]

Please explain why you can have a subscription that allows you to watch over 1000 tv shows for under $15/mo but a single season of a tv show may cost $25+ a single movie may cost $20 and I've yet to find a service that allows the rental of tv shows.

How about this you can buy shows by the episode for $1 but you can rent them for $0.25 an episode. Still higher than you would like but way more reasonable for something you will very likely never watch again.

Re:Capitalism 101

[Altrag]

Mostly because Netflix amortizes the subscription fee across all of their licenses and across time, whereas movies (especially in theater) and tv shows are generally expected to individually pay for themselves.

Then of course you want to have all ticket/dvd/etc prices to be equal (give or take. All movies are usually equal, while tv show boxes are usually equated by #seasons.)

Combine those two and you end up with all
movies/shows being priced to the highest (per-show cost + desired profit) / (per-show #sales) value. Its somewhat more complicated due to the two- or three-phase sales that the studios have to deal with (theater->dvd->tv for movies, tv->dvd for shows) but within each phase, the same basic equation holds -- you just subtract the profit from previous phases from the per-show cost on the next phase.

There will of course be dozens of details hidden in each step of the way, but that should be a pretty good first approximation if you can actually get a legitimate set of values for things like the cost of production (which the studios will have but its well known that the numbers they release are.. questionable. "Hollywood accounting" and all that.)

Re:Capitalism 101

[sims 2]

The prices for a digital copy shouldn't be equal to the price of a physical copy there is a huge diffrence in what you get.

With a digital copy you get convienence but you lose
the right of resale, you can't sell it to someone else or give it away.

It destroys any chance of their being a second hand market further fixing prices.

Some shows now aren't even available on disc they are online only.

Assuming the show or movie is say 10 years old and they only made the one movie or season why should it still be $25? I'm sure that netflix isn't paying $25 shouldn't we get more reasonable pricing too?

So it really is just all about $$$

[timlyg]

Spare me to self-righteous moral talk. As if these big shots really value copyright. What the main dispute is is just money. If there's no money in it, would they really care about such things? So don't twist justice for your own gain. Ultimately, is it really your right? You are merely borrowing rights from others and ultimately in turn, someone is giving things away for free at the top of the source. You brood of vipers.

hee's a novel idea

[Anonymous Coward]

how about the **AA make an effort to make it worthwhile to watch their content?

Illegal streaming devices

[Anonymous Coward]

It's kind of adorable the way they think "Illegal streaming devices" are a separate issue from "illegal streaming sites". They don't understand that these mysterious devices are just small general purpose computers running android with streaming apps or linux and Kodi with plugins that just use the same streaming websites - their 2.0 and 3.0 threats are the same thing.

I know just how to fight this!

[sims 2]

We can create a commercial subscription service for like $15/mo and let people watch most anything they want and just divvy up the money based on what people like.

In the same service we will allow purchase and rental of other shows for a reasonable charge.
(if netflix is only $12/mo for FOUR people no show should ever cost more than half that for a single season $25/season is ridiculous esp for a 12/yr old tv show)

Of course this service will have all the ease of use of existing pirate services such as the notoriously popular pirate site Netflix you will be able to download content to watch later and if you purchase a video you will have rights to download and copy to other devices. (not distribution rights but backup and format shifting) There will be no ads and you can easily filter what is included in your plan and what you can pay extra for.

Of course the response from the industry is going to be:
Are you CRAZY?! Why in the hell would we ever give customers what they actually want!

Re:I know just how to fight this!

[drinkypoo]

Are you CRAZY?! Why in the hell would we ever give customers what they actually want!

Every media mogul is convinced that they can get people to pay them more than their media is actually worth if they don't have to compete in a fair and open marketplace. At least most of them are wrong, but that doesn't stop them making things shittier for other people on their way to failuretown.

Re:I know just how to fight this!

[Wycliffe]

(if netflix is only $12/mo for FOUR people no show should ever cost more than half that for a single season $25/season is ridiculous esp for a 12/yr old tv show)

They could start by reducing the price of the digital to the same price you can buy the physical. Amazon has a pretty broad selection of digital movies but many of the older titles are considerably cheaper to buy on DVD (with free 2 day shipping) than it is to buy the digital. In some cases you can buy the physical DVD on amazon for the same price or cheaper than you can rent it on amazon. This is ridiculous.

Re:I know just how to fight this!

[sims 2]

Not just that but a DVD with a digital copy is often cheaper than a digital copy.

It would be nice if amazon offered autorip for DVDs like they do for music.

A Long Time Ago...

[Anonymous Coward]

When Napster lost their lawsuit with the music industry, I recall an expert saying, "They won the battle, but they have lost the war." That was many years ago, but still holds true today.

Before you post your outrage..

[foradoxium]

the summary is poorly paraphrasing what the media rep stated, not sure if that's intentional or not, probably is. He stated clearly that he does not believe that Kodi is illegal. He talks about the plugins that you use to gain access to illegal streams.

Also, by Kodi Box I believe he is talking about the pre-configured boxes that you can purchase that will have everything you need to access the illegal streams. Kind of like those iPods that were pre-filled with albums on ebay and craigslist. heh

Here, let me fix that headline for you...

[sconeu]

Hollywood sees EVERYTHING as 'Piracy 3.0'

What?

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought Rotten Tomato was killing Hollywood ðY

I can barely wait

[Anonymous Coward]

I can barely wait for the new gadget Piracy 5.0. I heard for a wide world distribution they will skip the 4 which is considered bad luck in Asia.

Re: I can barely wait

[Flavianoep]

You don't need to wait: Piracy 5 is on the theaters right now. It's called, *Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales*.

This is not Piracy 3.0.

[Anonymous Coward]

This is at least Piracy 4.0. Remember home based VCR? Remember how Hollywood tried to outlaw home based recording devices in fear of home piracy, how Mr. Rogers himself had to testify to the Supreme Court for Betamax recording devices in the early 80s? How many VHS movies were sold in the years that followed, and then DVD and Bluray Discs after that?

This is Hollywood protecting a system that they're comfortable with, and not wanting to change. The reality is, technology is evolving. We have new methods of consuming media. Either adapt and embrace it, or get wiped out.

go suck it mpa

[Anonymous Coward]

If they stop releasing such shitty movies people might actually buy them or goto the movies. Here another thought get rid of the unions then you can make the goddamn content affordable and maybe people will be willing to pay. How about $5 tickets to the theater instead of $15 for a damn standard showing. Go cry us a fucking river come back when you actually got to work for your POS fiat dollars and pay to feed yourself.

Martyr Complex 3.0

[XSportSeeker]

Someone remind me how many times Hollywood has ended...

Re:Martyr Complex 3.0

[SuricouRaven]

Yet they routinely break their own records for movie revenues.

A warning about terminology...

[Anonymous Coward]

In the feminist-controlled domain of WA state, an "illegal streaming device" is colloquially known as a "willy".

How did your reception improve?

[GPS Pilot]

I get nearly perfect reception on 56 TV stations now, vs questionable reception from about 20 before.

I'm an over-the-air enthusiast too, but I'm missing something here.

How does a set-top box that runs Kodi improve the quantity or quality of OTA stations that you can receive?

Re:How did your reception improve?

[darkain]

https://www.silicondust.com/

I use a HDHomeRun sitting about 15ft cable length from the antenna to minimize OTA signal loss. The stations are then transmitted from that box over LAN to the Android KODI box (or any other device on the network I happen to be using at the time). With this, I was able to position an external roof mounted antenna in the optimum location for reception without having to worry about signal degradation over a length of coax.

Re:How did your reception improve?

[GPS Pilot]

Oh, got it. I'm surprised a long cable run had that profound of an impact on the number of stations you can receive. One time I experimented with swapping a 100-ft piece of coax for a short piece, and the attenuation was not too bad.

Anyway, I have a mast-mounted high gain amp, which more than overcomes all the splitters and long cable runs in my setup. You might want to try one too. Maybe you can get yourself up to 70 channels.

becuause until

[Anonymous Coward]

Every one if forced to buy our shit mulitple times if they want to or not piracy is costting us 10 squarillion dolars more than then the worlds economy produces every year,

Troll? What the fuck?

[drinkypoo]

Who let the "information wants to be free" crowd have mod points today? That was a perfectly accurate description of the situation.

Sounds like a lot of inflated justification...

[Evil Kerek]

So....the entertainment isn't compelling, but you feel the need to buy a box to steal it? Lost me on that one. I'm pretty sure 'I don't think Dodge makes a good car so I'm going to steal one' isn't much of an excuse. This sort of inane justification is used all the time by people doing things they know are wrong.

While you can argue 'they weren't going to buy it anyway, $0 lost'...that simply doesn't make it ok...and if it sucks so much, why are you watching/playing/.listening? I keep going back to my main point - the constant ranting that the movies & music suck and that some how makes it ok to steal it and that you _want_ to then steal it. If it was THAT bad...are you some sort of movie masochist? You're consuming and you didn't pay for it - that's theft people. You can twist it anyway you like but you'll never justify it.

Let me sum it up: 'I don't agree with how they produce something, I think it sucks, but I still want to consume it, so I'm going to steal it'. Huh?

If you feel THAT strongly about it...stop paying for cable, stop going to the movies, stop buying DVDs, stop listening to music,, etc. Vote with your money. Trouble is...90% of the people posting here aren't willing to do that - I'm certainly not. I'm sure a bunch of them claim they are dong this...but I simply don't buy it.

I agree with a lot of the points here but for the solution to be 'I'll steal it and pretend I'm righteous for it' is delusional.

My 0.02
EK

Avoiding ads about malfunctioning wankers

[Anonymous Coward]

Is a good motivator.