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  • Film & TV Moderators: ghostfreak

Film Piracy - Does Anyone Care?

T

TheDeceased

Ex-Bluelighter
Joined
Mar 21, 2000
Messages
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I used to laugh at those commercials they play about film piracy and justify it as so many millions of people do by reminding myself how much money successful people who work in certain industries make. But I've had a change of heart recently and have drastically reconsidered my position on illegally pirated material. I used to see some distinction between stealing and downloading pirated films. But there isn't one really. If you download pirated films you're a theif.

Shoplifting something from a large corporation like a supermarket chain is the same thing essentially, except you're much more likely to be caught. You can justify it by saying that the store has so much money that they won't even notice and that they have insurance. Which is true to a certain extent. Not that many people steal things from supermarkets. But if it was as easy/safe to take things from a shop as it was to download copyrighted material from the internet, then the supermarkets would go out of business.

Piracy isn't going to end. The rapid growth of technology ensures that information is going to become much more accessible than it is at the moment. Eventually the film industry is going to have to rely on the honour system. In fact, it pretty much already does.

I'm curious as to how many of you (if any) are morally opposed to film piracy?

Hypothetically given the choice of watching a film (of the exact same quality print) for free or paying for it - who would chose to pay? and why?
 
it entirely depends on many things, local availablity for starters, i mean if it's my only option to see something. secondly, who's work it is. some people i would never consider paying for their products. thirdly, i do practice the try before i buy thing sometimes.

and chance is also a factor. every couple of weeks i find discs at my work desk with a whole bunch of random stuff, most of which i have never even heard of.

based on the above, i personally seldom download stuff, but i do come across a lot of pirate films and tv. despite this, i am morally opposed to film piracy, simply because i know that most others treat it like free money, and download everything and never go to the movies.
 
Morally, I'm opposed to film piracy, but practically I'm not. If I can't find a movie at half price books (where they sell good condition used DVD's for $2-$5) or in the $5-$10 dollar bin at Target, then I will most certainly use the ol' computer. Now that monitors and TV's have higher resolutions, though, you basically have to download bigger files if you want to plug your computer into your TV. But I wouldn't feel too bad for the film industry. Look at Hulu, for example. It looks like a solid way to make money and offer movies/shows for free to me, just more people need to hop on the bandwagon. Also, the industry has figured out that the "Red Boxes" you see outside of American pharamcies and McDonalds are really in tune with what people want: $1 for one movie for one night. No store, just return the movie or get charged a dollar per day. Totally fair and totally reasonable - and I would rather pay a dollar than wait three days for something to download. Production studios are also finding their roles when it comes to investing in something that people will actually go to theaters to see. They are raking in a lot of cash right now, actually, just like they did during the great depression, because people are want to go to theaters to escape reality. I think Hollywood producers (the squeakiest wheels) are adapting, they'll continue to make lots of money, and what is now known as "piracy" will eventually be turned into a revenue generator. I see P2P movie downloads going down in the future because producers will come up with something easier and quicker and just as free.
 
If I know the movie will be good I will go down the cinema and watch it. If it's an uncertain movie I will download it. The majority of the movies I end up downloading that are actually quite good don't even get shown in the cinema here. Like Max Manus which was supposedly released in the cinema here 10 days before the official dvd release yet no cinema within 50 miles showed it and trust me I searched. Downloading has opened the doors to a lot more interesting stuff.
 
Intellectual property law is a pox on humanity. Information and content want to be free.
 
TheDeceased said:
If you download pirated films you're a theif.
Click to expand...

By what definition?

Theft is the "taking and removing of personal property with intent to deprive the rightful owner of it". In no way does copying a file remove the personal property or deprive the owner of the property.
 
Your selective quotation from the dictionary proves nothing but your level of denial.

If you spent six months of your life working 15 hour days, seven days a week to make a film and then a large portion of the profits got lost to piracy, would you still be arguing that information 'wants to be free'?

You can say that you don't give a shit, which is fair enough - but to say that it isn't theft doesn't make any sense. If somebody printed copies of novels and sold them for next to nothing -without any proceeds going to the author, wouldn't that be theft?
 
So I download a movie which has been recorded from the tv. I pay for a tv licence.
Am I still a thief?
 
So I download a movie which has been recorded from the tv. I pay for a tv licence. Am I still a thief?
Click to expand...

I don't know. Good question. It isn't as black and white.

But still if you record a movie off your television and then uploads it to millions of people, you're making it available all over the world 24 hours a day rather than for the hour and half it was supposed to play on Tuesday or whatever... this will probably have some effect on the number of times the film is rented/bought on DVD - if people can get it for free then it won't be paid for as often, which in turn will lead to less money returning to the studios/investors/film-makers.

That's pretty flimsy, I know. But it kind of makes sense, doesn't it?

I guess if there was no way that you ever would have bought or rented the film in question that you were to download, then maybe it wouldn't be theft in the sense that you are taking profit from the artist, but it's still theft in the sense that it's their work and they don't want you to illegally download it.

Besides which how would you know if you were ever going to pay to see the movie?
 
OP, do you also think people borrowing actual copies of movies should be illegal too?
just because the downloader did not pay for it doesn't mean it was obtained illegitimately.
people on online torrent sites are part of SHARING communities.
 
Sony. They make movies. They make DVD burners.

Can anyone provide any statistics as to how much profit is lost due to burning/downloading?
 
TheDeceased said:
But still if you record a movie off your television and then uploads it to millions of people, you're making it available all over the world 24 hours a day rather than for the hour and half it was supposed to play on Tuesday or whatever... this will probably have some effect on the number of times the film is rented/bought on DVD - if people can get it for free then it won't be paid for as often, which in turn will lead to less money returning to the studios/investors/film-makers.

That's pretty flimsy, I know. But it kind of makes sense, doesn't it?
Click to expand...
Yes it does.
At the same time, each time a tv company shows a movie the same happens to.
There will be less people going out and renting/buying the dvd.
It's the way it goes.
If it's really good you go out and buy the dvd.

Hypothetically given the choice of watching a film (of the exact same quality print) for free or paying for it - who would chose to pay? and why?
Click to expand...
If they made movies available for download at say 5$ for new movies that have only just been released in the cinema then yes, I wouldn't mind paying.
It's money they probably wouldn't have gotten anyways.

Not interested in paying for older movies, got all the one's I want(ed) downloaded already =D.
 
It's not theft it's copyright infringment

They are different laws, one removes the original, one doesn't.

Its moral rightness or wrongness depends in personal perspectives, it's not absolutely immoral or moral, even if it is absolutely illegal

Should poor people be devoid of movies because they cannot afford to watch them, if their viewing of the movie doesn't impact the producers in any way? Most of the things I download, I never would have bought if I didn't. No one loses from my downloading, and compared to the alternative situation of not watching those things at all, or renting or buying them, at least I'm still churning the economy by spending money on internet, and I'm more likely to pay to watch a movie featuring directors/actors that I have discovered via free downloads than if I didn't
 
TheDeceased said:
Your selective quotation from the dictionary proves nothing but your level of denial.

If you spent six months of your life working 15 hour days, seven days a week to make a film and then a large portion of the profits got lost to piracy, would you still be arguing that information 'wants to be free'?

You can say that you don't give a shit, which is fair enough - but to say that it isn't theft doesn't make any sense. If somebody printed copies of novels and sold them for next to nothing -without any proceeds going to the author, wouldn't that be theft?
Click to expand...

I argue that a large portion of the profits from a movie will not be lost to piracy. Piracy isn't "stealing". There will always be enough people who do not know how to pirate/will go pay to see the movie in a theater anyway. The MPAA cannot magically predict how much any movie "should" make at the box office and how much they will "lose" to piracy. Inane.

If you do not want to pirate for your own reasons then fine. It won't change anything and the movies will still make millions or billions regardless of whether people continue to pirate or not. The movie studios are just greedy.
 
I enjoy going to the cinema and watching a really good movie. I have a sweet home cinema set up in my own home that allows me to watch movies naked and pause it while I take a leak but there are still times that the whole popcorn experience is a must. However I have watch more than my fare share of dud movies in my time. There are far more stinkers that are released each year and the movie goer has no recourse for a refund.

Add to that the tendancy for many movies to have their release delayed in Australia, particularly more obscure arthouse films. Fuck me if I'm waiting 6 months or more to watch a film. A recent example if Merchant of Venice (not a great film mind you) made and released in 2004(!!!) that has only just had an Australian release. Not good enough in my opinion.

Television I have no concerns downloading. A hell of a lot of great shows are shafted to close to midnight here and some are even pulled despite many more seasons still to go.
 
The lines between intellectual copyright and user rights are blurry and becoming more so every year. Some people have brought up some great points so far.

For example, how does me lending out my legally purchased movie differ from me making a legal digital copy of my purchased movie and lending it out (instead) in order to preserve the quality of the physical media?

The ability to copy media through technology is not something consumers need to concern themselves with. The problems of the entertainment industry belong to them, just as our consumer problems belong to us. As a consumer, it is my nature the best value for my dollar, and protect my right to do so. These are my concerns. Therefore, what I do as a consumer is an accurate reflection of the market and its realities.

The other is availability and circulation. If a movie is no longer circulating, then me buying a used copy off Amazon and downloading a copy off BitTorrent doesn't make a bit of difference. I recently downloaded a subtitled version of Christiane F. Yes, I could've bought an NTSC import off Amazon for $110.00, but what possible good would that do the original film creators?

I maintain the same thing for film as I do for music. Those with talent will have their pay day, but perhaps not through conventional channels. The demand for good art isn't going away, and putting pressure to raise the bar isn't a bad thing.

Last year I downloaded both seasons of Rome and watched them. Two weeks later I bought each season for $50 each because a.) I wanted to show my support -and- b.) I wanted to lend them to all of my friends.

I will not stop buying great film and television, just as I will not stop buying concert tickets, T-shirts, and art from musicians and producers I enjoy.
 
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