More Unskippable Piracy Warnings for DVDs

[maninahat]

So I'm expecting the forum to be filled with people who are angry at this new inconvenience, whilst totally apathetic to piracy and utterly incapable of suggesting a way for the government to magically fix the problem.

Yes, it is annoying. But I'm willing to man up and accept that it is probably a necessary evil when there is no obvious solution to an endemic crime. Pointing out that this new warning will hardly solve piracy is not a good argument. You're saying that if one can't achieve a perfect result, there is no point in trying anything in the first place. That is not helpful.

Man up? You mean bend over.

This is called "punishing your paying customer" and actually encourages piracy. This is another case of the pirate getting the better product.


Oh and the whole "it doesn't have to be perfect" strawman was a nice touch.

A 10 second advert is comparable to being fucked in the ass? That's your idea of subjugation?

Look, piracy already has all the encouragement it needs, because PIRATES CAN GET WHATEVER THEY WANT FOR FREE. There is no better service than that. That incentive overrides any other reason. So claiming that a weak service creates more pirates, is a cheap excuse that pales in comparison to the real reason for piracy. No matter how good or bad the service is, the pirates will continue to steal for as long as they can.

Anti-piracy adverts want to challenge apathy and change public opinion against piracy. And so they should! You think that I am making a straw man of commentators, but I've seen it throughout this very thread. The industry has to do something about piracy, but these commentators would much prefer it if they did nothing - because this 10 second inconvenience for them is far greater issue than endemic copyright infringement and the devaluation of the entertainment industry. That's the kind of opinion that these ads have to fight.

If a good advert can discourage young people from taking up smoking, or drink driving or whatever, than why not a good anti-piracy ad? At the end of the day, my concern is whether they make a good advert, not whether they're making the ad at all.

 

[Triangulon]

Yeah I think they should stop trying to inform people of the law and trying to uphold it. I mean, who needs laws and rules? They just get in the way of things.

I'm rapidly losing any sympathy I might have possessed for anyone even vaguely in support of piracy even by apathy and omission. Piracy is illegal. This is a statement you would think it is hard to misunderstand but apparently people really are idiots. I don't need to be reminded again and again that stealing from a shop is wrong, or that copying someone's intellectual property and passing it off as my own is wrong, or that burglary or murder or speeding or assault is wrong (I am not comparing piracy to any of those crimes, I am listing them as crimes I have never had to be reminded about) yet somehow people can't get the hint that when something is illegal, you shouldn't do it.

This may blow your mind, but something being illegal says precisely nothing about the morallity behind it.

This may blow your mind but your view on whether a law is moral or not doesn't mean you can choose whether or not to obey it.

 

[loa]

Ah I'm actually still buying DVDs and get those all the time.
Every second at some unskippable screen spells "why? Why do you keep buying dvds?".
It becomes harder and harder to justify.

Who is the idiot that thought dvd players need such a feature to make things fucking unskippable anyway?
I'd like to... thank them. A lot. Manually!

 

[Epona]

Ah I'm actually still buying DVDs and get those all the time.
Every second at some unskippable screen spells "why? Why do you keep buying dvds?".
It becomes harder and harder to justify.

Who is the idiot that thought dvd players need such a feature to make things fucking unskippable anyway?
I'd like to... thank them. A lot. Manually!

You can make a straight backup of a DVD and the unskippable parts will become skippable. Just sayin...

It's the DRM that prevents skipping, a backup sheds the DRM.

 

[loa]

Ah I'm actually still buying DVDs and get those all the time.
Every second at some unskippable screen spells "why? Why do you keep buying dvds?".
It becomes harder and harder to justify.

Who is the idiot that thought dvd players need such a feature to make things fucking unskippable anyway?
I'd like to... thank them. A lot. Manually!

You can make a straight backup of a DVD and the unskippable parts will become skippable. Just sayin...

It's the DRM that prevents skipping, a backup sheds the DRM.

You see, this is where I feel gabe when he says that piracy is almost always a service problem.

 

[Epona]

Ah I'm actually still buying DVDs and get those all the time.
Every second at some unskippable screen spells "why? Why do you keep buying dvds?".
It becomes harder and harder to justify.

Who is the idiot that thought dvd players need such a feature to make things fucking unskippable anyway?
I'd like to... thank them. A lot. Manually!

You can make a straight backup of a DVD and the unskippable parts will become skippable. Just sayin...

It's the DRM that prevents skipping, a backup sheds the DRM.

You see, this is where I feel gabe when he says that piracy is almost always a service problem.

He is correct too. Honest people are willing to pay reasonable prices for something they want but if that something is not available, overpriced or punishes the paying customer, it drives even the most honest person to seek out the alternatives.

-Suppose you want to play a game not released in your country and suppose the console/handheld it was released on is not region free. What option are you left with?

-Suppose you want a legit copy of Disney's Aladdin but with Disney purposely keeping the movie so rare, you are left with the choice of ripping the neighbors copy or paying $100 for one online (that's an example, I don't know the real price).

-Suppose you buy a movie (Blu-Ray or DVD) and are left watching 30 minutes worth of ads and "don't be a pirate" warnings because the skip and menu buttons are disabled (you could manually fast forward though but most people don't know that nor should they have to do that).

 

[RJ Dalton]

SNIP

I'm not going to attempt to defend piracy from a moral standpoint. It is illegal and that's all there is to say. But when Hollywood and other major media industries are not only refusing to evolve with new technologies and, in fact, are actively trying to oppose them because they are afraid of competition that new business models would provide (we all remember the SOPA mess, but that is only the tip of the iceberg for all the unethical and, frankly, evil practices these companies employ in the name of profit), forgive me, but I will never pity the industries their losses. If they go down, creators will find new outlets. They always have. And with the internet, they have more chances for success even on their own.

 

[Snotnarok]

And they wonder why people buy bootlegs and just download it

30-40 bucks for the latest amazing bluray movie that you have to wait to get into vs
free movie, no trailers, dumb fuckin antipiracy warnings.

I mean as if Disney discs werent' enough with their endless trailers for movies before the bloody movie. What is this the VHS era?

 

[General Karthos]

The unskippable additional 10 second delay in front of DVDs makes children starving in Africa look like nothing in comparison.

Seriously though, yeah, it's irritating, but at least we don't have to be connected to the internet to watch DVDs.

Yet.

 

[maninahat]

SNIP

I'm not going to attempt to defend piracy from a moral standpoint. It is illegal and that's all there is to say. But when Hollywood and other major media industries are not only refusing to evolve with new technologies and, in fact, are actively trying to oppose them because they are afraid of competition that new business models would provide (we all remember the SOPA mess, but that is only the tip of the iceberg for all the unethical and, frankly, evil practices these companies employ in the name of profit), forgive me, but I will never pity the industries their losses. If they go down, creators will find new outlets. They always have. And with the internet, they have more chances for success even on their own.

SOPA wasn't made to combat new business models, it was a draconian attempt to make it easier for businesses to combat piracy. Don't get me wrong, its good that it got shot down, because it spelled trouble for perfectly innocent businesses who genuinely have nothing to do with copy write infringement. Eventually though, some kind of SOPA style law will have to be introduced if we are to see piracy curbed; one that will make it far easier for companies to target piracy and illegal torrenting, whilst protecting innocent web businesses (like this here website).

I expect one to appear within the next couple of years - one that may actually stick this time around. Despite all the knee-jerkery about internet censorship, these new laws serve a crucial purpose. People campaigned long and hard to stop SOPA, so maybe those same people could campaign to support alternative anti-piracy schemes - ones that do work.

 

[Farther than stars]

Clearly this will solve piracy. However could I have not realized that the way to combat piracy is to do the very thing that can help breed piracy. Luckily we had the US goverment to ignore evidence and logic as they are so good at doing.

Would you mind providing me with that evidence? I'd be very interested to see some of it. What's more, how does a ten-second-long warning breed piracy? Personally I don't think the average consumer stands there in the store going: "No, I want to buy this movie, but I won't because it will probably contain an anti-piracy message."

It doesn't really. People won't pirate because of a 10 second message.
It's just the whole idea that putting a message that say's piracy is bad in it will stop people, the reason a lot(not all) of people pirate is because it is so convienent.

Im mostly meaning games though, with annoying things like always online DRM and activation keys, people are more inclined to piracy.

As for films, this will make no difference but it seems like a waste of time to even bother trying.

See, that's what I thought. I didn't really think that the backlash to this minor news story was really appropriate for the issue, but more endemic of a larger issue with piracy and/or anti-piracy measures. I too disagree with DRM and the like, but that doesn't I'll say this message is born out of ignorance and incompetence, at least not without hard evidence. To that end, that's a 'no' on the evidence is it?

 

[Alterego-X]

Yeah I think they should stop trying to inform people of the law and trying to uphold it. I mean, who needs laws and rules? They just get in the way of things.

I'm rapidly losing any sympathy I might have possessed for anyone even vaguely in support of piracy even by apathy and omission. Piracy is illegal. This is a statement you would think it is hard to misunderstand but apparently people really are idiots. I don't need to be reminded again and again that stealing from a shop is wrong, or that copying someone's intellectual property and passing it off as my own is wrong, or that burglary or murder or speeding or assault is wrong (I am not comparing piracy to any of those crimes, I am listing them as crimes I have never had to be reminded about) yet somehow people can't get the hint that when something is illegal, you shouldn't do it.

This may blow your mind, but something being illegal says precisely nothing about the morallity behind it.

This may blow your mind but your view on whether a law is moral or not doesn't mean you can choose whether or not to obey it.

That's where Martin Luther King and Mahatma Gandhi would disagree with you.

 

[zachusaman]

so where can i go to download 1080p quality movies LEGALLY?

 

[Fbuh]

Am I the only one who saw unskippable in the title and was exepecting amusing voice overlay?

Yeah I think they should stop trying to inform people of the law and trying to uphold it. I mean, who needs laws and rules? They just get in the way of things.

I'm rapidly losing any sympathy I might have possessed for anyone even vaguely in support of piracy even by apathy and omission. Piracy is illegal. This is a statement you would think it is hard to misunderstand but apparently people really are idiots. I don't need to be reminded again and again that stealing from a shop is wrong, or that copying someone's intellectual property and passing it off as my own is wrong, or that burglary or murder or speeding or assault is wrong (I am not comparing piracy to any of those crimes, I am listing them as crimes I have never had to be reminded about) yet somehow people can't get the hint that when something is illegal, you shouldn't do it.

This may blow your mind, but something being illegal says precisely nothing about the morallity behind it.

This may blow your mind but your view on whether a law is moral or not doesn't mean you can choose whether or not to obey it.

Adultery could be considered a crime, and Hitler was not an adulterer, so that means that YOU ARE HITLER, ORIGINAL POSTER!!! You see how I used your own troll logic against you like that? Welcome to the internet, since you seem to be new here.

 

[Olrod]

When people come up with ideas like this, I just want to ask them two questions:

1) What do you want to happen?
2) What do you honestly expect to happen?

 

[SenseOfTumour]

I've mentioned it before I'm sure, but I've got a fair few sealed DVDs on my shelves at home, because I've decided I want to own it, yet I'm watching downloaded versions of the DVDs that I paid for, because they're easier to use and someone's kindly stripped all the BS from the recordings.

Apparently I'm still a dirty filthy pirate for doing this and deserve to have my internet shut off and sent to jail, because I'm just not LISTENING to the lectures put on the DVDs. Why won't I just pay attention, hmm?

Others I've only unwrapped to watch the extras, because you rarely get downloads of the extras

I've said it a million times however, make stuff cheap and easy to both GET and USE, and you'll cut piracy overnight.

Make it expensive, annoying to watch with warnings and ads, then lock it to certain countries, then further lock it to a number of viewings or only on certain devices, and screw you all, many people will take the free one.

Steam however, has people buying stuff they ALREADY OWN, because of the simple ease of use. £2 for Deus Ex? and I don't have to find the CD and the CD key? Sign me up!

 

[Alterego-X]

Yeah I think they should stop trying to inform people of the law and trying to uphold it. I mean, who needs laws and rules? They just get in the way of things.

I'm rapidly losing any sympathy I might have possessed for anyone even vaguely in support of piracy even by apathy and omission. Piracy is illegal. This is a statement you would think it is hard to misunderstand but apparently people really are idiots. I don't need to be reminded again and again that stealing from a shop is wrong, or that copying someone's intellectual property and passing it off as my own is wrong, or that burglary or murder or speeding or assault is wrong (I am not comparing piracy to any of those crimes, I am listing them as crimes I have never had to be reminded about) yet somehow people can't get the hint that when something is illegal, you shouldn't do it.

This may blow your mind, but something being illegal says precisely nothing about the morallity behind it.

This may blow your mind but your view on whether a law is moral or not doesn't mean you can choose whether or not to obey it.

That's where Martin Luther King and Mahatma Gandhi would disagree with you.

Martin Luther King fought against laws that permitted racial discrimination.

You're fighting against a 30 second clip that you've deluded yourself into thinking is a justification for piracy.

You know, not everything is equal in every sense. I bet Martin Luther King would laugh at you right now.

That's just moving the goalpost. None of the above posters claimed that that pirates are at fault for disobeying a SLIGHTLY immoral law. Their posts categorically ignored the whole concept of civil disobedience, basically claiming that all laws must be obeyed because they are laws.

Besides, I didn't say that copyright holders are as evil as racists. If they would be, I would go out of my way to pirate everything, and even try to actively sabotage them, as opposed to mostly paying for my stuff, but not always paying attention to the letter of the law.

I wouldn't even say that copyright laws are *immoral* at all. they are just... not very morally justified, either. Like low speed limits at an empty straight road. Or alcohol pohibition. The theory behind them kind of makes sense, but to claim that it's still immoral to break them even when their practical execution doesn't, just because they are laws, (and they are not outright evil), is no more than blind rule-worshipping.

Or if you know a reason why only dangerously unjust laws should be disobeyed, but we are morally obliged to follow every less evil one even if they are not moral, I'm all ears.

 

[zachusaman]

Intellectual property "theft" isnt a victimless crime, there are plenty of victims, the consumers. the ones who bought the game, the ones who played by the corporate rules are the ones paying for these crimes, the actual pirates being victims is merely a coincidence.
SOPA, PIPA, just the recent examples of this where the only people being hurt are the ones who paid and supported these companies. these copyright morons are literally shooting their "fanbase" in the head.

 

[userwhoquitthesite]

 "Trololololol," announced ICE director, John Morton.

I FUCKING KNEW IT

But no, in all seriousness, the people who are likely to be swayed against piracy by this are the people that never encounter it
Everyone else either doesnt care and ignores it, or is annoyed and goes out to pirate MORE

 

[userwhoquitthesite]

£2 for Deus Ex? and I don't have to find the CD and the CD key? Sign me up!

that's weird... I bought a copy of Deus Ex for two DOLLARS at Half-Price Books, and it doesn't require the CD either.

I actually had planned to get an ISO to avoid it, but didn't have to. Wonder why that is.