Here’s the deal. In America it’s now a felony to record a movie in the theater because Prez. Bush always bows to the wishes of big business. It’s not illegal to buy recordable CD’s or TiVos that have a DVD burner but if you head to the theater and record something they are putting you away. You’re doing hard time.
Okay, whatever, that’s fine, I don’t know anyone who records movies and I don’t get a cut when they do so I’m fine with throwing those morons in jail. Hell, I’m fine with throwing people who talk during screenings in jail too. And people who drive mini-vans. But even I, rage filled as I am, can see that this law makes no difference. If someone wants to record a movie they are going to do it. Everytime. Head to a Tuesday screening at 10pm, find a nice quiet corner where you can see the doors, go to town. Send it to Taiwan. Rinse, repeat. That’s the downside of showing something on 10,000 screens seven times a day. The two DVD sniffing dogs were a way better idea than what one studio has now come up with. Ready for it?
Warner Brothers has banned promotional screenings in Canada. The reasoning? It’s not a felony to record a movie in Canada. This is their way of voicing their displeasure that the Canadian government hasn’t gotten it together to pass a pointless law. Promotional screenings are a bonus to the fans, they get to watch something early, the studio gets free word of mouth advertising.
Here’s the crazy part though: It’s pretty much impossible to bring even a phone into a promotional screening, much less a camcorder. Any early screening has security. The article pretty much admits as much:
“Within the first week of a film’s release, you can almost be certain that somewhere out there a Canadian copy will show up,” said Darcy Antonellis, Warner Bros. senior VP of worldwide antipiracy operations.
See that? Read it again, because it’s subtle. The recording doesn’t happen at a promotional screening, it happens during the first week. During the normal screenings. In fact, the best way to keep Canada from pirating movies would be to not show them at all there.
Here’s another quote:
“This is an important step towards curbing piracy on a global scale,” said Warner Bros. Intl. prexy of distribution Veronika Kwan-Rubinek.
Well, actually it’s an arbitrary punishment of the common fan so that the government bends to your will.
The good news for you studios: This will probably work. Once enough people complain about not getting to see Harry Potter early the government will pass the law just to stop the letters. Then, once the law is passed, no one will enforce it. Or need to enforce it because they won’t notice what’s going on.
And if they did enforce it, and no more leaked copies made it to Asia for a dollar a pop, then guess what would happen for the studios? Nothing. Movies aren’t released for poor audiences in third world countries. Piracy would be stopped and the studios would recoup zero dollars and zero cents.
Welcome to crazy world. Population: all of us.
