The scene with them in bed after marrying because the district thought it too sexual (and yet we were required to read All Quiet on the Western Front in which Paul visited a prostitute and far more graphic in print as seeing a guy's butt in a film), and the one that ended with Mercutio being stabbed because it was too "violent" (but they had us watch all of Glory uncut).
It's quite true that giving Hamlet a happy ending is an abomination. With trying to keep up with all the replies to this stuff, I over-looked you mentioning that the endings to plays were drastically changed. These kinds of edits are to change the plays entirely, not to merely tone down sex or violence. These are the kinds of alterations that are wrong, alterations made simply because it's how someone else wanted it to be rather than toned down for the kids and too-easily-offended adults.
Funny that you mention dresses. When I was 18, I started a dress-making company specializing in movie gown reproduction, and later went into custom designing, and in the fashion industry, it's just accepted that this will happen, and that knock-offs will not always be the best quality, and people not familiar with each seamstress's/designer's work in person may assume an item is authentic when it's not. It's impossible to alter the world, so that leaves altering business practices.
Let's say I'm the company that scrubs the films. I can operate one of three ways.
Number 1: Someone buys a copy of a movie and sends it to me, I alter it for a fee for my time, and send it back.
Number 2: I buy a copy of a movie and alter it. Customer A sends me a new copy and I send the altered copy. The studio has been paid for both copies. With Customer A's copy, I make an editted one. Customer B send me a new copy and I send out Customer A's now-altered copy. The only difference between this and number one is that I already have a copy altered to save a bit of time. The studio is paid for each copy of the movie. There is no free distribution of copies, or me making ten copies and selling those. For each sold to a customer, a copy is bought from the studio, either retail or wholesale.
Number 3: I buy a copy of a movie, alter it, and a customer buys it from me for what I paid plus a little extra for my time in altering it. As I owned that copy, I was free to do with it as I wished. I chose to edit it and resell it to someone who wanted my editted version. It was not represented as being uncut, as being an original edition, or anything else, but as the editted version I made.
As I said regarding altering business practices, simply saying that editted versions shouldn't be made is like talking to a tree stump. Nothing's going to change. The studios and directors would be better off making and selling editted versions themselves so that they have the control over how an editted version ends up. It may not be exactly how they originally wanted, but it's better than letting someone else do it.
I am concerned about people who buy one work and alter it then represent it as being substantially the same work as they resell/distribute it.
When it's sold as being the same, this is a problem.
Shakespeare is in schools in editted forms. At my high school, we were shown the DeHaviland version of Romeo and Juliet with some scenes cut out by the teacher. She let us know what they were, but the school board felt we shouldn't see them. We could read it, but not see it. I'm not sure what the differnce was. We could picture it in our hears.
I really don't care what the end user does with a copy he has purchased.
This is basically what's happening. Someone is buying a copy and paying a company to hack it up for them.
Maybe someone could tell me why some Mormon kids a friend of mine knew would sing the words, "I'm a joker...(silence)...I'm a midnight toker." They left out the "I'm a sk=moker" in objection to smoking, but sang about toking without knowing what it meant.
Look, Option C isn't going to happen. Realistically, just t elling them not to watch is going to do nothing, they'll badly edit themselves, and districute it for free.
But are these versions of his plays being represented as the original versions or as the parodies that they had become? If the former, that's where it's wrong.
I'm not saying that meaning won't sometimes be lost. But I am going to repeat myself: What is the difference between someone buying a copy of Amelié and hacking it himself, or buying a copy through a third-party source and adding extra to have someone else hack it up? That person owns that copy and can do with it whatever he wishes, even if it's to pay someone else to screw it up for him, as long as the studio gets paid for that copy. Or should that person not be allowed to hack it at all?
If a hacked copy is represented as being an original, then that's false. If a copy is accurately represented as being cut up by someone else, then whoever watches it should have the brains to know that that means that the copy isn't the original messege, and if that person lacks the brains, he'd miss the messege anyway.
Taking out the word "not" is malicious alteration with the intent of altering what's actually being said.
Someone can buy a whole copy of a movie, skip the sex scenes or whatever themselves, and still bad-mouth a movie. Or they could bad-mouth it for the sex scenes.
What is the difference between my neighbor buying a movie and editting it at home and paying for the movie via a third-party source and paying extra to have that company hack it up? If the studio gets the same money either way.... Or would my neighbor not have the right to do it at home?
*sigh* We're talking about taking out sex and violence, not swears. If someone wants Carlin's "7 Dirty Words" and to clean it, they are an idiot because that is the WHOLE POINT of the piece. But if they buy a copy of the video and want to take out the swears, it's their right. I'm not saying that meaning won't sometimes be lost, but people have the right to watch videos how they want to watch them, and if they want to pay a company to hack it up for them rather than doing it themselves, as long as the studio gets paid, then that person owns that copy and can do as they wish. When buying from a scrub company, they are buying a copy and having it scrubbed for them.
I repeat what i've said: I believe that, if someone is offended, don't watch, and if they feel the kiddies are too young, wait until they're older. But they also have the right to do as they wish as long as it's not causing any monetary loss.
You can thank this guy for my photos being down. And thank you.:)
Regarding copyright law, some people think it should be illegal to even edit a DVD yourself because you could lose the "artistic vision" of the director. But the fact is that the film studio often has the final say in the vision. This is why there are "director's cuts" released of many films, so that the director can show (with the studio's permission) what his/her original vision was before the studio hacked it.
No one says the studio has to offer something family-friendly, and I get pissed at people who believe everything made has to be okay for Junior to see and do agree that is someone is offended to not watch, or wait until the kids are older. But see the options in that link.
We're not talking political messeges or a company trying to alter the artistic vision of a film or a piece of music. We're talking about cutting out some of the sex and violence in movies. These companies try to preserve messeges. Of course they will not be able to do so with the talent of the director. Books and music are editted frequently. When someone reads a book aloud and skips past parts, or a song put on the radio with expletives cut out or cut for length, it's being editted. It's not a happy thing that some people will take something and edit it to fit their own vision, and it would be wrong if that's what these companies are doing. But it's not.
Option A: A mom and dad (or mom, or dad, or mom and mom, whatever) like a film, but not all the sex in it. The parent(s) buy and copy the DVD to a tape or another DVD and cut what they don't want to see or their children to see. With no skill whatsoever, the quality suffers and the messege is completely hacked. Friends and family want copies. Do you really think that the original cutters are going to demand that friends and family go buy a DVD and bring it over to destroy so that the company gets their pay anyway? Not likely. So the hacked version is distributed for free. Not only is there now a hacked version circulating, but the film studio doesn't even get paid for it.
Option B: A scrubbing company buys the DVDs new, and doesn't sell more copies than they buy. With better equipment, someone who makes this his/her job cuts sex and violence while trying to keep the original messege. The quality is higher. People pay for the copies and don't need to tell family and friends to buy and destroy a copy. Those family and friends can buy their own copy from the scrubbing company. There is still a hacked version available, but it's a higher quality and the film studio gets paid for each one sold.
I still don't like it being done at all and believe that if someone's offended, then don't watch, and if the kiddies aren't old enough to see it uneditted, wait until their older. But it's going to happen. It's an issue not worth the legal fight and tax dollars to enforce when inner city school kids need school books and gang-infested areas need more cops to try to make it safer to the small children who live there. These are better uses of that tax money rather than to enforce something like this. Is this an issue that the film studios hold to so strongly that they'd be willing to pay the judges' salaries to enforce it instead of using our tax money? No. And if they were, then it'd be conflict of interest. It's not a fight worth picking with tax money, and the lesser of the two evils is to make sure the film studios get at least financial compensation.
See, if stores are trying to tell the film studios that they have no right to make movies with sex and violence or that they shouldn't make them at all is wrong. But to offer editted versions gives families options. To tell families that they must see the full version, complete with sex and violence, is doing the same thing, saying it's "My way or no way."
Now under no circumstance would it be right for a place to pass off an editted version as an un-editted version. To do so would be to imply that the editted version is the director's vision. Being told that a film is editted alerts one to it not being the original vision.
Editting to take an R-rated movie and making it family-friendly is one thing. Editting with the purpose of trying to change an author's/director's vision is something else. Editted films isn't done with the intent of changing the vision. It's done with the intent of taking out sex or violence, not to be malicious.
I'm sure that these companies do a better job of preserving the original vision much better than someone at home who would do so anyway. Those who do it at home would be more likely to make free copies for friends rather than to ask that the friends buy new ones to destroy so the studios still get paid. This ruling will just force people to do it themselves and distribute to their family and friends, and more likely at a monetary loss to the studios. At least with these scrubbing companies, the studios still get paid. It's the lesser of two evils.
There may be an "artistic vision," but is that not lost when someone at home fast-forwards past it at home when their children are still seeing it as it skips forward?
I still don't see where the studio is losing out. They're getting the full price for each editted version sold. Do you think that a family has the right to take a new DVD they paid full price for to a company to have them edit it so it's safe for their children is in the wrong? They are not advertising it and reselling it as their own version.
Do you think it should be legal for one movie studio to copy a currently-in-theatres blockbuster that cost some other studio $100M to produce and market, and then to sell a trivially edited version to theatres at a fraction of the normal price?
If the studio is getting the full fees per ticket that they'd get for an uneditted, and as long as the theater playing it is not claiming to be the original producer of the film, then yes. If anything, allowing this would increase their sales a bit because people who would otherwise bypass a film would be more inclined to see it. If it came at the cost of the studio losing money, such as a small theater somewhere playing it without paying the film company for playing it, then the film company would be losing money, and that is when it would be wrong.
The film companies are still getting their money. Someone who wants a "scrubbed" version still must buy one at retail. So how is this harming film companies? What right have they to say that someone can't take sex out of films so that children can see it, or so that people who would otherwise be offended can watch and enjoy? If someone buys a DVD, that person should have the right to do as he or she sees fit as long as it's not to make money at the espense of the film companies. True, it can be said that the scrubbing companies buy them and make money, but they aren't making copies for sale. They are selling the service of cleaning them, and for each one sold, the film companies are still getting the cost of a full sale.
An ex-fiancé of mine got the Shuffle. He loves it, I didn't care much for it. I have a 60gb Video and adore it to pieces.
This may sound hokey, but if you have a car that has a tape deck, you can get a tape that conencts to the jack of the iPod to play it. If you don't have a tape deck, I'm not sure what the options are.
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The scene with them in bed after marrying because the district thought it too sexual (and yet we were required to read All Quiet on the Western Front in which Paul visited a prostitute and far more graphic in print as seeing a guy's butt in a film), and the one that ended with Mercutio being stabbed because it was too "violent" (but they had us watch all of Glory uncut).
It's quite true that giving Hamlet a happy ending is an abomination. With trying to keep up with all the replies to this stuff, I over-looked you mentioning that the endings to plays were drastically changed. These kinds of edits are to change the plays entirely, not to merely tone down sex or violence. These are the kinds of alterations that are wrong, alterations made simply because it's how someone else wanted it to be rather than toned down for the kids and too-easily-offended adults.
Funny that you mention dresses. When I was 18, I started a dress-making company specializing in movie gown reproduction, and later went into custom designing, and in the fashion industry, it's just accepted that this will happen, and that knock-offs will not always be the best quality, and people not familiar with each seamstress's/designer's work in person may assume an item is authentic when it's not. It's impossible to alter the world, so that leaves altering business practices.
Let's say I'm the company that scrubs the films. I can operate one of three ways.
Number 1: Someone buys a copy of a movie and sends it to me, I alter it for a fee for my time, and send it back.
Number 2: I buy a copy of a movie and alter it. Customer A sends me a new copy and I send the altered copy. The studio has been paid for both copies. With Customer A's copy, I make an editted one. Customer B send me a new copy and I send out Customer A's now-altered copy. The only difference between this and number one is that I already have a copy altered to save a bit of time. The studio is paid for each copy of the movie. There is no free distribution of copies, or me making ten copies and selling those. For each sold to a customer, a copy is bought from the studio, either retail or wholesale.
Number 3: I buy a copy of a movie, alter it, and a customer buys it from me for what I paid plus a little extra for my time in altering it. As I owned that copy, I was free to do with it as I wished. I chose to edit it and resell it to someone who wanted my editted version. It was not represented as being uncut, as being an original edition, or anything else, but as the editted version I made.
As I said regarding altering business practices, simply saying that editted versions shouldn't be made is like talking to a tree stump. Nothing's going to change. The studios and directors would be better off making and selling editted versions themselves so that they have the control over how an editted version ends up. It may not be exactly how they originally wanted, but it's better than letting someone else do it.
So they were represented as being someone else's hack job, not as the Bard's original works.
I am concerned about people who buy one work and alter it then represent it as being substantially the same work as they resell/distribute it.
When it's sold as being the same, this is a problem.
Shakespeare is in schools in editted forms. At my high school, we were shown the DeHaviland version of Romeo and Juliet with some scenes cut out by the teacher. She let us know what they were, but the school board felt we shouldn't see them. We could read it, but not see it. I'm not sure what the differnce was. We could picture it in our hears.
I really don't care what the end user does with a copy he has purchased.
This is basically what's happening. Someone is buying a copy and paying a company to hack it up for them.
Maybe someone could tell me why some Mormon kids a friend of mine knew would sing the words, "I'm a joker...(silence)...I'm a midnight toker." They left out the "I'm a sk=moker" in objection to smoking, but sang about toking without knowing what it meant.
Look, Option C isn't going to happen. Realistically, just t elling them not to watch is going to do nothing, they'll badly edit themselves, and districute it for free.
But are these versions of his plays being represented as the original versions or as the parodies that they had become? If the former, that's where it's wrong.
I'm not saying that meaning won't sometimes be lost. But I am going to repeat myself: What is the difference between someone buying a copy of Amelié and hacking it himself, or buying a copy through a third-party source and adding extra to have someone else hack it up? That person owns that copy and can do with it whatever he wishes, even if it's to pay someone else to screw it up for him, as long as the studio gets paid for that copy. Or should that person not be allowed to hack it at all?
If a hacked copy is represented as being an original, then that's false. If a copy is accurately represented as being cut up by someone else, then whoever watches it should have the brains to know that that means that the copy isn't the original messege, and if that person lacks the brains, he'd miss the messege anyway.
Taking out the word "not" is malicious alteration with the intent of altering what's actually being said.
Someone can buy a whole copy of a movie, skip the sex scenes or whatever themselves, and still bad-mouth a movie. Or they could bad-mouth it for the sex scenes.
What is the difference between my neighbor buying a movie and editting it at home and paying for the movie via a third-party source and paying extra to have that company hack it up? If the studio gets the same money either way.... Or would my neighbor not have the right to do it at home?
*sigh* We're talking about taking out sex and violence, not swears. If someone wants Carlin's "7 Dirty Words" and to clean it, they are an idiot because that is the WHOLE POINT of the piece. But if they buy a copy of the video and want to take out the swears, it's their right. I'm not saying that meaning won't sometimes be lost, but people have the right to watch videos how they want to watch them, and if they want to pay a company to hack it up for them rather than doing it themselves, as long as the studio gets paid, then that person owns that copy and can do as they wish. When buying from a scrub company, they are buying a copy and having it scrubbed for them.
I repeat what i've said: I believe that, if someone is offended, don't watch, and if they feel the kiddies are too young, wait until they're older. But they also have the right to do as they wish as long as it's not causing any monetary loss.
You can thank this guy for my photos being down. And thank you. :)
Regarding copyright law, some people think it should be illegal to even edit a DVD yourself because you could lose the "artistic vision" of the director. But the fact is that the film studio often has the final say in the vision. This is why there are "director's cuts" released of many films, so that the director can show (with the studio's permission) what his/her original vision was before the studio hacked it.
Here
No one says the studio has to offer something family-friendly, and I get pissed at people who believe everything made has to be okay for Junior to see and do agree that is someone is offended to not watch, or wait until the kids are older. But see the options in that link.
Since I don't feel like copying this here....
We're not talking political messeges or a company trying to alter the artistic vision of a film or a piece of music. We're talking about cutting out some of the sex and violence in movies. These companies try to preserve messeges. Of course they will not be able to do so with the talent of the director. Books and music are editted frequently. When someone reads a book aloud and skips past parts, or a song put on the radio with expletives cut out or cut for length, it's being editted. It's not a happy thing that some people will take something and edit it to fit their own vision, and it would be wrong if that's what these companies are doing. But it's not.
Option A: A mom and dad (or mom, or dad, or mom and mom, whatever) like a film, but not all the sex in it. The parent(s) buy and copy the DVD to a tape or another DVD and cut what they don't want to see or their children to see. With no skill whatsoever, the quality suffers and the messege is completely hacked. Friends and family want copies. Do you really think that the original cutters are going to demand that friends and family go buy a DVD and bring it over to destroy so that the company gets their pay anyway? Not likely. So the hacked version is distributed for free. Not only is there now a hacked version circulating, but the film studio doesn't even get paid for it.
Option B: A scrubbing company buys the DVDs new, and doesn't sell more copies than they buy. With better equipment, someone who makes this his/her job cuts sex and violence while trying to keep the original messege. The quality is higher. People pay for the copies and don't need to tell family and friends to buy and destroy a copy. Those family and friends can buy their own copy from the scrubbing company. There is still a hacked version available, but it's a higher quality and the film studio gets paid for each one sold.
I still don't like it being done at all and believe that if someone's offended, then don't watch, and if the kiddies aren't old enough to see it uneditted, wait until their older. But it's going to happen. It's an issue not worth the legal fight and tax dollars to enforce when inner city school kids need school books and gang-infested areas need more cops to try to make it safer to the small children who live there. These are better uses of that tax money rather than to enforce something like this. Is this an issue that the film studios hold to so strongly that they'd be willing to pay the judges' salaries to enforce it instead of using our tax money? No. And if they were, then it'd be conflict of interest. It's not a fight worth picking with tax money, and the lesser of the two evils is to make sure the film studios get at least financial compensation.
See, if stores are trying to tell the film studios that they have no right to make movies with sex and violence or that they shouldn't make them at all is wrong. But to offer editted versions gives families options. To tell families that they must see the full version, complete with sex and violence, is doing the same thing, saying it's "My way or no way."
Now under no circumstance would it be right for a place to pass off an editted version as an un-editted version. To do so would be to imply that the editted version is the director's vision. Being told that a film is editted alerts one to it not being the original vision.
Editting to take an R-rated movie and making it family-friendly is one thing. Editting with the purpose of trying to change an author's/director's vision is something else. Editted films isn't done with the intent of changing the vision. It's done with the intent of taking out sex or violence, not to be malicious.
I'm sure that these companies do a better job of preserving the original vision much better than someone at home who would do so anyway. Those who do it at home would be more likely to make free copies for friends rather than to ask that the friends buy new ones to destroy so the studios still get paid. This ruling will just force people to do it themselves and distribute to their family and friends, and more likely at a monetary loss to the studios. At least with these scrubbing companies, the studios still get paid. It's the lesser of two evils.
There may be an "artistic vision," but is that not lost when someone at home fast-forwards past it at home when their children are still seeing it as it skips forward?
I still don't see where the studio is losing out. They're getting the full price for each editted version sold. Do you think that a family has the right to take a new DVD they paid full price for to a company to have them edit it so it's safe for their children is in the wrong? They are not advertising it and reselling it as their own version.
Do you think it should be legal for one movie studio to copy a currently-in-theatres blockbuster that cost some other studio $100M to produce and market, and then to sell a trivially edited version to theatres at a fraction of the normal price?
If the studio is getting the full fees per ticket that they'd get for an uneditted, and as long as the theater playing it is not claiming to be the original producer of the film, then yes. If anything, allowing this would increase their sales a bit because people who would otherwise bypass a film would be more inclined to see it. If it came at the cost of the studio losing money, such as a small theater somewhere playing it without paying the film company for playing it, then the film company would be losing money, and that is when it would be wrong.
The film companies are still getting their money. Someone who wants a "scrubbed" version still must buy one at retail. So how is this harming film companies? What right have they to say that someone can't take sex out of films so that children can see it, or so that people who would otherwise be offended can watch and enjoy? If someone buys a DVD, that person should have the right to do as he or she sees fit as long as it's not to make money at the espense of the film companies. True, it can be said that the scrubbing companies buy them and make money, but they aren't making copies for sale. They are selling the service of cleaning them, and for each one sold, the film companies are still getting the cost of a full sale.
That they are not makes one wonder what cut they get of the profits.
Well, now there are two. The second is more on an introductory post, the type I should have posted first! :)
I meant topic of the day for journaling. :)
LOL, perhaps I will start a journal here! Although I'm afraid the topic of the day will be MacBooks!
An ex-fiancé of mine got the Shuffle. He loves it, I didn't care much for it. I have a 60gb Video and adore it to pieces.
This may sound hokey, but if you have a car that has a tape deck, you can get a tape that conencts to the jack of the iPod to play it. If you don't have a tape deck, I'm not sure what the options are.
I couldn't live without my iPod!