Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA)

[Dirtbag59]

Originally Posted by FRPLG

If everything is free then no one will make anything, innovate anything, do anything.

It's impossible for everything to be free (roads come to mind). And it would be even more dangerous for physical objects to be downloaded. If you could replicate food you could also replicate drugs. If you could replicate precious metals then you could also replicate guns. Also regulation of food, air pollution, drugs, medicine. I don't know maybe we're in a time where we can't even think of something like that.

However lack of profit motive doesn't necessarily mean that innovation would stop. People need something do and what once would have been a job in this hypothetical scenario would become a hobby. Windows becomes Linux so to speak.

By the way I'm not totally endorsing it. It would be way to much for the world to handle. However it is interesting to think about.

[Dirtbag59]

So apparently we have to hold the old guys off until they croak.

Y Combinator’s Short-sighted and Irresponsible Declaration of War Against Hollywood

War is rarely the solution. Yes, Hollywood attacked us, but there better solutions that retaliation. Some execs in Hollywood are indeed trying to kill the web, but I have also met a new generation of rising execs that understand that embracing digital is the future. Attacking them will hurt the progress that has been made with products like Hulu and Vevo.

Also another example of how extravagant prices and restrictions (like reigon locking and unskipable PSA's and trailers) are the main factors that drive people to piracy. And how people are still more then willing to pay and support talent.

Louis CK’s digital distribution experiment clears $1M in 12 days | VentureBeat

https://buy.louisck.net/news

The show went on sale at noon on Saturday, December 10th. 12 hours later, we had over 50,000 purchases and had earned $250,000, breaking even on the cost of production and website. As of Today, we've sold over 110,000 copies for a total of over $500,000. Minus some money for PayPal charges etc, I have a profit around $200,000 (after taxes $75.58). This is less than I would have been paid by a large company to simply perform the show and let them sell it to you, but they would have charged you about $20 for the video. They would have given you an encrypted and regionally restricted video of limited value, and they would have owned your private information for their own use. They would have withheld international availability indefinitely. This way, you only paid $5, you can use the video any way you want, and you can watch it in Dublin, whatever the city is in Belgium, or Dubai. I got paid nice, and I still own the video (as do you). You never have to join anything, and you never have to hear from us again.

[Dirtbag59]

Do Pirate Sites Really Make That Much Money? Um... No | Techdirt

One of the key refrains from the supporters of PIPA and SOPA in pushing for those bills was about how "foreign pirates" were profiting off of American industry. However, as we've suggested plenty of times in the past, there's little evidence that there's really that much money to be made running such sites. Even more amusing, of course, is that the MPAA/RIAA folks have to both argue that "people just want stuff for free," and that these sites are raking in money from subscription fees at the same time -- an internal contradiction they never explain. I've asked MPAA officials directly (including on stage at the Filmmaker's Forum event last year) that if these lockers are really making so much money, why doesn't Hollywood just set up their own and rake in all that cash. The only answer they give, which doesn't actually answer the question, is that it's cheaper for cyberlockers since they don't pay royalties. But that's got nothing to do with why the Hollywood studios don't get this money for themselves. Of course, the real reason -- somewhat implicit from the MPAA's comments -- is that it knows these sites don't make that much money.

Meganomics | Media Piracy | The American Assembly

The Swedish trial of The Pirate Bay trial in 2009 became an occasion for all sorts of competing estimates of revenues. Record industry group IFPI estimated the site’s revenues at $3 million per year. The MPAA described $5 million in revenues. But prosecutors endorsed a much lower number: $170,000 from advertising (against what the defense characterized as $112,000/year in server/bandwidth costs and $100,000 per year in revenue). This is for a site that appears consistently among the top 100 visited sites in the world.

[mooby]

Originally Posted by Dirtbag59

"The Swedish trial of The Pirate Bay trial in 2009 became an occasion for all sorts of competing estimates of revenues. Record industry group IFPI estimated the site’s revenues at $3 million per year. The MPAA described $5 million in revenues. But prosecutors endorsed a much lower number: $170,000 from advertising (against what the defense characterized as $112,000/year in server/bandwidth costs and $100,000 per year in revenue). This is for a site that appears consistently among the top 100 visited sites in the world."

Meganomics | Media Piracy | The American Assembly

Hollywood: They're making almost 5 mil a year in revenue!
The Court: What are they selling?
Hollywood: Nothing! It's all free!

[FRPLG]

An entire industry built on dishonesty.

[NC_Skins]

BBC News - Thousands march in Poland over Acta internet treaty

[skinsguy]

Originally Posted by FRPLG

If everything is free then no one will make anything, innovate anything, do anything.

I will say this. I used file sharing programs in the past to download music, because I didn't think it was worth $15 to purchase an entire CD's worth of music for just three songs. This was pre iTunes days. Whatever I did think was worth a purchase of the entire album, I already had. Back in those days, I said that if they were willing to build a site in which I could purchase individual songs that were at a high CD quality for a low price, I'd support that! But, the site would have to provide everything I would ever want to find.

However, I will say this as well. Almost every single time I downloaded music, I wound up purchasing the CD on half.com or Amazon for like $ 0.75 to $3. I was a stickler for sound quality and I'm still that way today. MP3s that were at a 128 bit rate back then sounded horrible, and not many people ripped their songs at 320 back then. Anyways, it was more or less for me to preview the music and to see if it was something I'd listen to on a regular basis. Often times if it was something I had grown to really like, I'd just buy the CD (assuming I could get it cheaper on those above mentioned sites.) What I wound up not not listening to or just not liking, I deleted the files.

So basically, the point I'm making that in my experience, I wound up buying more music because I previewed it prior to purchasing it. I'm sure that's not true for everybody who has ever used a file sharing program to get music. Now since iTunes and other download stores have been established, pretty much anything I have ever downloaded without paying for first, I have either went back and purchased the CD (or vinyl since I'm into vinyl) or I have purchased the tracks off of iTunes. This is just an example of why these companies like the RIAA are missing the point with the technology.

[NC_Skins]

Polish members of Parliment wear makeshift Guy Fawkes to protest ACTA.


Poland signs copyright treaty that drew protests - KRLA 870

[Dirtbag59]

Originally Posted by NC_Skins

Polish members of Parliment wear makeshift Guy Fawkes to protest ACTA.


Poland signs copyright treaty that drew protests - KRLA 870

If I understand correctly ACTA has already been signed by the US. However it obviously hasn't been passed fully. I think June is when the stuff is going to start to hit the fan and the protest are going to come out in full force seeing as how thats when the EU parliament will vote on ratification.

The 14 Most Ridiculous Lawsuits Filed by the RIAA and the MPAA

[SirClintonPortis]

Originally Posted by Dirtbag59

Do Pirate Sites Really Make That Much Money? Um... No | Techdirt


Meganomics | Media Piracy | The American Assembly

Well duh, most illegal downloaders (and uploaders) are looking for free, not shelling out their personal income on a subscription, even if the free service is limited servicce. But the MPAA's culture doesn't care about such little details.

It's one thing to say that pirating can cut into sales thus profits. It's another to say that the sites themselves are profitable, especially those torrent sites of a smaller scale who use "Donate to PayPal" rather than charge their userbase for access.

[skinsguy]

83-year-old Gertrude Walton was sued for illegally sharing over 700 songs on peer-to-peer file-sharing networks in early 2005, under the username "smittenedkitten." The problem with the case, was that Gertrude Walton not only did not own a computer, or know how to use one, but had in fact died in December of 2004. The RIAA quickly dismissed the case, after the entire known world laughed them out of court.
The 14 Most Ridiculous Lawsuits Filed by the RIAA and the MPAA

This is just ridiculous! I remember hearing about this before, but stuff like this is idiotic. I think a company should be charged for some type of criminal offense for tying up the legal system with frivolous lawsuits such as suing a dead woman who has never owned a computer. I mean, really??

[mlmpetert]

Hawaii Legislators Considering Controversial Internet Tracking Proposal | TheBlaze.com

The legislature thankfully backed down from this bill pretty quick.

[mlmpetert]

Originally Posted by FRPLG

If everything is free then no one will make anything, innovate anything, do anything.

I didnt read all the stuff Dirtbag linked but im guessing the thought that if one day we can download physical objects is not that everything will be free, but that the cost of downloading something will be based only off of the material cost ie “printing” cost. So the difference in cost between, say, a Sony TV and a Coby TV would only be the difference in material costs. The intellectual property costs would be zero, and i completely agree with you in that that incentive to innovate would also be zero.

So whats really interesting about what you said is that it’s already very true for the industries affected by current downloadable content, ie digital media. A few months ago I read the Generation Y’s (born 1980’s-2000) wiki.

The 2000s produced no new, epoch-defining, music genres, unlike past decades (Rock and soul in the 1960s for baby boomers, grunge, techno/rave and hip hop in the 1990s for Generation X).[81][82] Instead genres such as hip hop and r&b built incrementally on where they were in the '90s. Autotune has been cited as the decade's sole musical innovation. Many have cited the spread of information technology, from YouTube to iTunes, to file sharing blogs, as having increased the presence of the past in individuals lives because of the range of content that can be accessed. As a result, Generation Y has revived styles of past decades without actually creating anything new[citation needed].

Now indie rock of the early 2000s has been attributed to Generation Y, though the genre has been described as "spent", and criticized for its lack of angst.[83][84][85]

So basically my generation hasn’t really produced any new music genres, but we are given credit for reviving past generation’s genres. Which is absolutely true; how many times have you heard someone say I only listen to “x style of music”? If you ask someone what kind of music they like the reply is normally “everything” or “everything but”.

I look at digital music I think the way many others on this thread have alluded to. If I download something its to test it out or decide if I like the band enough to buy their album. Having all sorts of genres, styles and renditions of music accessible has only allowed me to experience those different types of music. If the music wasn’t accessible for little effort and for free, I like many others would likely have never heard certain genres or purchased them through other means. However, as Wikipedia points out this may have been at the cost of Generation Y not having enough incentive to create anything new themselves with exception for the autotune…..

This seems to bleed into movies and tv shows too:

55 movie remakes currently in the works - Den of Geek

^ Those are just things that were in the works for 2008 (ps im looking forward to the They Live remake!). Digital media has allowed artists and creators to be inspired by all, and viewers to have cultural reference to everything. Maybe that’s the perfect mix for people to be resistant to original ideas?

Fueled by a class of hipsters, I would think that this is also the first generation that has caused the cost of many “vintage” or “retro” items and technology to cost more than many new comperable products:

Sony Walkman Pro wm-d6c cassette-corder VERY NICE CONDITION | eBay

Sony NWZ-S544 8GB MP3 Player - Black NEW (27242778849) | eBay

[skinsguy]

Interesting post Mlmpetert.

I think that wiki entry hit the nail on the head. Of course the movie industry got its start on "borrowing" ideas from stories already established. Heck, that's why they moved to Hollywood - they were not subjected under copyright laws of the areas where these stories were lifted. But anyways, it seems now more than ever, the movie industry just seems to be running out of ideas. Most of the big blockbuster movies are from stories already written. The three biggest movies (or movie packages I guess I should say) of this last decade have been Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, and Twilight. All, I think, came from stories which were already books for years prior to the movies.

Seems like I can go back and remember big time movies from the 80's. Top Gun, Beverly Hills Cop, National Lampoons Movies, Planes, Trains & Automobiles, Gremlins, E.T., Alien, Star Wars (technically started in the 70's), Indiana Jones movies, etc... a lot of great American Pop culture from the 80's that were all pretty much original stories for the big screen (at least from what I assume.) And even the 90's had a lot of really cool movies that defined that decade as well. But, seems like now, we're getting into an era where those movies are either being remade, or added on to. If not big screen movies being remade, it's TV shows being sent to the silver screen. For instance, I'm hearing a lot about a Top Gun II, more Batman movies, we've had the A-Team in cinema, 21 Jump Street on the big screen, etc...

To me, just seems like the movies that are defining this generation are ideas that defined generations prior. Not a lot that this generation can hang its hat on. The music industry and the movie industry has stopped being creative and has focused on trying to hold on to the ways of the past, and this goes against the very nature of those industries. Maybe it's just me, but when I think about my childhood from the 80's, it was great. My family wasn't wealthy at all. Actually, we barely got by, but it was the things in pop culture that I still hold onto in high regards today.

Which is funny about mentioning the retro equipment. I cannot believe that walkman is going for over $70 so far! My fiancee purchased a turntable (record player) a few months ago for me. It was one I have been wanting for awhile now. Getting back into records seems to bring me back to that time in my life where I could sit back and listen to an album from cover to cover. And listening to it on vinyl gives me a new appreciation for the music itself. Sure, vinyl is not nearly as convenient as CDs and espcially MP3s, but when the record is nice and clean, and you have a good quality turntable with a good head and needle, you actually make it a point to sit back and just lose yourself in the music.

Maybe that's what these industries should work on. If they're worried so much about mp3s, put music back on vinyl to where it's at least difficult to go through the process of dubbing the music onto your computer. Oh, and make laser turntables affordable!

[FRPLG]

The movie industry isn't "running out of ideas". Their wasn't some magical event that removed creativity from the individuals in the industry and potential creatives outside it. They are just reacting to the market. Why would they spend a certain amount of money to make and promote a film that will only make limited money? It's easier (cheaper and less risky) to retread stuff because they can better predict how the market will react. Perhpas the studios were run by more creatively focused individuals in the past and that steered them to try more creative ideas and take gambles...but today they're run by business people who don't care about artistic endeavor but rather making money.