How Far is “Too Far” for the MPAA
We’re all guilty. You, me, your next-door-neighbors and even their overseas relatives. Piracy is something we’ve all dealt with one way or another, for better or for worse. Probably the very first time you borrowed a copy of There’s Something About Mary just so you could burn a personal copy for yourself or likely when you first established loyalty with KaZaa or Limewire to indulge in long-term Peer-2-Peer music file-sharing did you come to terms with your own online ethical boundaries.
From burning a copy of their favorite DVDs to seeing a movie before it hits theaters, web pirates come in many forms. Most can pirate from the convenience of their own home.
For some of us, burning a copy of a DVD for a friend is considered ethically-sound so long as we purchased that DVD. These people can argue, “Well, it’s a product that I purchased. Therefore it’s mine and I can do as I please.” Others can contend that such practices deny potential royalties to the companies who own the rights to the DVD. Regardless of which side you’re on, there’s no denying that piracy allows certain people to save money and others to lose out on money they may rightfully deserve.
Recently, in an effort to impress studio execs and refocus their heralded anti-piracy campaign, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) decided to shake things up a bit and fire three executive forerunners of their anti-piracy program on grounds that they were simply too soft on piracy. In the matter of a single day, the MPAA refocused its mission from “anti-piracy” to “content protection.” Their pledge: Target individuals who download movies from Bit Torrents and sue their asses.
Now, I’d hate to joke about this situation, really. But indulge. The MPAA’s new marketing strategy likens to that of Wendy’s Restaurants who, one day out of the blue, arbitrarily decided that they weren’t a fast food company. “It’s way better than fast food. It’s Wendy’s!” Now you and I know that Wendy’s has no business marketing themselves as anything but fast food.
Listen, I am all for the MPAA slapping on a new badass sticker and spearheading a “my way or the highway” proverbial witch-hunt. But can they at least wear costumes, carry silencers, and stand under streetlights to project monstrous noir silhouettes on brick buildings? Or how about they recruit a motley crew of wiseguys and sharpshooters like Eliot Ness did in The Untouchables. Seriously. Because if the MPAA means business, they better damn well prove that they can walk-the-walk. And that means walking a tightrope.
The new look of the MPAA?
We’ve all heard about the notoriously hopeless efforts of the music industry in combating piracy. Though the cause may have been worthy, it hasn’t stopped any of us from downloading our favorite hits from the Billboard’s Top 100 songs chart.
And yet it doesn’t seem like there is another organization worthier than the American-bred MPAA to champion the preservation of creative rights. Preserving the creative rights of intellectual property is a noble and worthy cause. The MPAA has been defiantly pressing the international community to enact anti-piracy legislation for quite some time now. But such aggressive efforts may have unintended consequences; 1) Countries may get turned off by the MPAA’s whistle-blowing and resort to strict protectionism in their respective film industries, and, more alarming, 2) The content-protection campaign will set a bad precedent by greatly reducing internet freedom for millions of users.
France recently passed a “three-strikes” law that punishes those who share unauthorized music or movies over the internet. The penalty: one full year without web access. That’s right fellow Westerners, internet censorship is already upon us. Such draconian measures will undoubtedly breed more reforms aimed at censoring internet freedom.
A fascinating discovery was made by the British government in its anti-piracy studies. Web pirates in Britain who illegally download music are actually likely to spend more on music than anyone else. The British Phonographic Industry (BPI) fears that targeting such individuals may result in additional losses totaling as much as 200m pounds! Certain artists like Shakira contend that pirating even allows them to become closer with their fans. Can the same be true for the film industry? And if so, would such findings impact the MPAA’s approach?
What the MPAA needs to do is address piracy with reason, calculation and tact. No one ever told Robin Hood that nothing good would ever come from stealing from the rich because the poor believed the wealthy were living at their expense. Similarly, consumers often feel like they are being cheated and overcharged at the theater for disappointing products.
But in this situation, it’s millions of people stealing from the rich (or mostly rich). This era of internet users is most certainly a generation of thieves bred by a deregulated world-wide-web with limitless freedom. Such users show no signs of slowing down anytime soon. And while the trendy position may be to point the finger at the wealthy CEOs and studio-heads who sell shitty movies and benefit from overpriced Blu-Ray DVDs by labeling them as the real thieves, retaliatory pirates must too consider the price for their actions. After all, studio heads are not quite like the Bernie Madoffs and rich multi-national corporate CEOs when it comes to controlling the market. In fact, they don’t control the market for their industry. We do.
Studios aren’t as concerned about those of us who make a copy of a DVD every once in a while as much as they’re worried about the pirates who see their films before they are released in theaters. Because it is during this small interval of time where the theatrical movie as a product is of the greatest value. Once available on DVD, the hype is over and the film is likely to have already been sunk by critics.
Piracy can not realistically be eliminated and the MPAA must first accept this fact before resorting to extremist measures. Remarking on alternatives for reducing piracy, Disney CEO Robert Iger remarked, “The best way to combat piracy is to bring content to market on a well-timed, well-priced basis.” This may be the most reasonable and realistic solution for studios. Once a movie comes out on DVD, it is so incredibly easy for it to become viral that the MPAA can’t possibly resolve this phase of the movie’s life-cycle without pissing off governments and censoring the internet.
The MPAA should heed the advice of Richard Dreyfuss from Frank Oz’ What About Bob? (1991) by taking “baby-steps.” If the MPAA expects to eliminate piracy, it must first focus on protecting a movie’s theatrical release. This may require targeting the source, the owners of torrents providing free downloads. But targeting individuals can only lead to bad things and will certainly not solve the issue of piracy. That leaves it up to you, yes you, the studios; make quality products or bite the bullet.
Charlie Wachtel is a Senior Writer for The Film Crusade and Founder of www.filmcrusade.com.
We know providing quality films is a no brainer and is the best way to fight piracy, nevertheless, movie execs should also focus on providing what viewers can’t enjoy at home, the experience. For example, not only did I watch the batman sequel in an IMAX theater, I watched it again the following week at my local theater, and in the following months I watched a pirated copy a few more times. The experience was worth spending my money a few times, but the inevitable delay in home distribution did not prevent me from indulging in a downloaded copy.
I think this explains why movie studios are pushing 3D so hard. It’s an experience that few can replicate properly at home and if it’s done well, one would assume people would pay to see it in theaters.
First off this article was excellent
Really well written and had some good points.
Overall piracy is a tough one for me. I am an artist too and I am torn on people pirating things. I personally don’t really pirate. Ok I have downloaded a song or two. But part of the problem with movies being pirated is that to me they don’t look as good and the audio sometimes isn’t right. I’m a stickler for good picture and audio.
I would stress until a movie is on dvd to make sure no dvd’s exist that aren’t water marked so people know this is a pirated movie.
I think people get a bit embarrassed believe it or not when it is clear they stole something. Make it obvious this is not a copy of the movie that should be watched at home. I think that would have an impact and would stop people from trying to sell the movie as if it were a store dvd copy.
Also I think it is important for Studios to pack the movies with extras. I am shocked how many of my family members watch the extras now on dvds. I thought they were only for me seeing how I am a film junkie. But no a lot of people watch them and most pirated dvd’s don’t have them.
I think there is a lot that can be done to stop or slow down pirating. Another big one which I think studios have done is make movies affordable. Do you really want to pirate a movie that you can buy for 10 bucks? Not really. I think as long as you aren’t gauging the consumer you can actually make some great reasons why people should buy the dvd and not pirate it.
We will see what happens but honestly a solid article on the matter.
Ron
Most of the pirated movies I’ve seen are copies of the previews the studios send around to select people. If they are trying plug leaks, maybe they should start there.
some thoughts. essay is quite good. but there is more in a piracy.
i think piracy is not “stealing something” and not piracy at all.
it’s more like sharing information and acquaintance with something.
internet gave us so much information and so many ways to find something, that we just have to understand for ourselves what is good. and with so many records and movies we can obtain it turns out most of it is crap, most actors and musicians are overpaid, most movies are overpraised. rare person could afford to buy everything he can download, listen to or watch once and delete forever from hdd, ‘cos of poor quality of that “piece of art”. Bad written song and horrible blockbuster are rarely deserves money spending and rarely worth seeing just once, not to mention twice or more, but i for example will not go for free to the live performance of favorite band or performer and to the cinema to watch new verhoven movie. and fans are buying good records. records they like.
so the thing is – anti-piracy theme is more connected to the inadequatly big incomes for the industries, income they do not really deserve but do not want to loose, than art or really stealing from artists. let’s face it – big budgeted record and movie industry based mostly on trickery,sociology and deceiving, and so-called piracy is mostly the way for the people to find out who is who, find out what’s worth their money.
Chris/Ron: Some good points. 3D is really going to make piracy interesting once it picks up.
Ilya: You’re right in making the distinction between “stealing” and “sharing”…this is where the law can get tricky. This is also a dangerous distinction that can threaten censorship to some of our most utilized websites–and that’s for non-pirates.
Looks like someone read this article, felt guilty, and turned himself in! http://torrentfreak.com/drm-breaker-reports-himself-to-anti-piracy-group-091103/
Back in the day, we used to tape songs off the radio, copy each others tapes and records, copy vhs movies, etc. It didn’t kill the industries then and it won’t now. I still believe that people who pirate a movie probably wouldn’t have spent the money on it anyway. Music is a little different as the British research shows. This is mainly because you can listen to an album more times than you’re going to watch a movie. I buy DVD’s, but really, there aren’t many that I wind up watching more than once. By the same token, though, I don’t pirate movies because 1. I need a quality image and sound and 2. movie files are huge and it would take pretty long to download.
Film makers like Steven Soderbergh talk about piracy as if it were going to kill indy films. I completely disagree with that. People that watch Indy films are less likely to pirate them. If anything, priating will kill bloated hollywood fare and make room for smaller, better written movies.
I agree with some things and disagree with others.
I agree that content producers should focus on keeping their products secret longer and focus on the pirates who steal WITHIN their own organizations who actually leak the product.
I disagree that anyone should EVER get sued. EVER. This is new technology and as such it means a redefinition of the world as we know it. Any legislation to restrict the internet is a step backwards in time. The internet should not be less free, it should be more free. The more communication we have as a society the better.
Think about it like telepathy. If we could all suddenly communicate with each other telepathically then the moment an idea was had we could instantly spread it around the world. That is a good thing and the limiting of that is only about gathering up power in the form of limited access.
Anyone who is right minded would know that all this attempts to limit communication are pure power grabs. The MPAA is just trying to enable weapons and chains to enslave the population that are just as real as any concentration camp or shackles that have ever existed to keep a population under control.
Believe in the good nature of humanity. Believe that people are smart enough to govern themselves. Everything else is a lie and chances are if your reading this then you are part of the 99% of the population that has absolutely no power save for the internet which is the greatest taste of freedom most people have had in their whole lives.
P.S. Rich people DO live off the backs of the poor and no amount of stealing from wealthy people is going to make them even begin to understand what it is like to live like the rest of us. One of the greatest tricks in our culture is to make you believe that some day you will be rich or that you already are. You’re not rich and you never will be.
When a DVD is sold to a used DVD store and then sold again no profits go to the studios or creators, just to the store. Is this piracy as well? What about when I let a friend borrow a DVD. He didn’t pay for it, but gets to watch it. MPAA quit your bitching, cause you will never be happy. If piracy was that big a problem then the entertainment industry would have gone broke already. When I see 200 million dollar budgets for films I think they are doing just fine.
You worthless parasites call yourself fan of film , yet you dont support the thousands of workers who go into making the films you consume? You try to justify your criminal actions for the fact that Movie studios make money of a product that they pay hundreds of millions to produce?
With worthless fans like you, film will cease to exist. Then what will you morons do with your free time? I hope they enact Frances 3 strikes youre out law in this country, so maybe you criminals will actually pay for something instead of feeling entitled to anything you can steal.
The fundamental problem I have with defenders of piracy is that many, deep down, don’t believe in anti-piracy only because they don’t ever want the day to come that they can’t watch movies for free. Period. People pirate not because of any moral belief in piracy’s righteousness; people do it because they both want to and, most importantly, can…the same way that people would take just about anything in this world that they could easily get for free and know that they wouldn’t get caught.
This argument that the industry just needs to make more quality product wouldn’t translate to anti-piracy in a lot of cases as some people would be even more inclined to want to see those movies for free. Yes, some great movies you’ll want to see in that full cinematic experience, but we’re growing into a more home theater culture, and the industry has to nip things in the bud the best they can. Anti-piracy has not been a failure in the music industry; as many people as there are still committing piracy, I believe there are far fewer than there would have been.
People pay for music and movies not because they want to lend their support to the industry; they pay because they want the product in a particular form. But as the day comes that the theater experience ceases to exist, and the gimmick of 3D wears thin on people, then people will be downloading free movies to the same screens as the ones they pay for. What’s going to distinguish the two? Especially as the pirates out there get better technology on their side to copy greater quality audio and video?
Many here make the claim that movies would survive just fine with smaller budgets and celebrities with smaller salaries (overall, true), but it is the nature of capitalism that drives what an industry profits, not greed alone. People pay what they want to pay for the things that they want. NFL players don’t NEED the amount of money that they make, but the industry can afford to pay them because people pay good money in high numbers. Some may argue that the big budgets are unnecessary, but people do go to see movies like Transformers, as cheesy as the story may be, …because they want to. And movies the size of Transformers, with that level of special effects, or the look of a film like Pan’s Labyrinth, wouldn’t be possible if it wasn’t for the ticket prices for all movies, not just those. Even beyond the money it takes to make one movie alone at that level, in order to keep every cog in the machine – every gaffer, every makeup artist, every special effects guru – churning and exercised in preparation for that next big hit, the industry has to remain funded not simply when the “good” movies are made, but the “bad” ones too…because some of the very quality products that you love and adore would not have been nearly as good if it wasn’t for all of the mistakes that were made along the way.
The day that movie tickets routinely cost $2 instead of $12, it’ll show…and then people will really start to complain.