MPAA Lobbying for Home Theater Regulations

[BigTex]

You dear lemur have scared the heck out of me. I had to re read the top portion of your post a couple of times through that aritcle. It has a chilling realism about it. With the way the MPAA is going though it's only a matter of time till someone starts spouting off those comments.

Wasnt there a couple lawsuits from the MPAA or a related organization sueing a few people for having superbowl parties last year?

[Fragony]

Is that one of these protection of rights casa nostra organisations? We have these vultures here as well, 'you don't steal a wallet blablabla piracy is a crime'. Now what happened, the money that should have gone to the artists incidently went to the stock-market, and they lost 60% of it. So piracy is a crime yet speculating with other people's money isn't, weird.

Recently they wanted to have extra money for every mp3 player, I can't believe they have the nerve.

[doc_bean]

If you go to the cinema these days you get a warning that taping is illegal, and at least one 'info-mercial' about piracy being a crime.

Not as bad as rental dvd's though, I once rented a movie that had over 10 minutes of anti-piracy warnings (same text in different languages), unskippable...

[Don Corleone]

While entertaining and amusing, isn't this entire thread just one giant straw man? You're attributing an argument supposedly made by the MPAA that they've never actually made?

I mean, after all, they actually want to get paid for their work and enforce the law. Bloody fascists!!!

[Lemur]

While entertaining and amusing, isn't this entire thread just one giant straw man?

I was wondering when this argument would surface. As I said in the first sentence, the article is a joke, but a representative one.

I'm all in favor of artists and the corporations that support them getting paid. If you would like to really get into what the RIAA and MPAA have been up to, and if you think their behavior is fine and dandy, well, don't let me stop you. Suing your own customers is the best idea evar! DRM r0x0rs!

[Don Corleone]

God Lemur, take a chill pill. All I said was that the MPAA didn't actually say this, and you have a coniption fit. A simple reminder that this was a parody (you say fair and representational, I'd argue it's a hatchet job) would suffice.

Let me try this a different way. At the end of the day, in this and all the other threads in which you've villified the MPAA/RIAA, aren't you essentially arguing that you should be able to take whatever IP you want, whenever you want?

[doc_bean]

I'd say he's arguing for consumer friendliness.

Pirated goods are often 'better' than non pirated ones these days (music you can play on an mp3 player or even in a car and a computer, shock ! Games that don't require digging up the disc everytime you want to play it, etc.).

I have, in sevveral threads, spoken out against piracy, but the way honest consumers get threated these days is terrible and unjustified.

[Lemur]

At the end of the day, in this and all the other threads in which you've villified the MPAA/RIAA, aren't you essentially arguing that you should be able to take whatever IP you want, whenever you want?

Absolutely not. I don't believe I've made that argument, um, ever.

As per usual, the lemur has an unextrordianary (and likely boring) opinion on the subject. As I said in the chill-pill-requiring post:

I'm all in favor of artists and the corporations that support them getting paid.

However, as technology moves along, business models are going to have to change, and I am beyond irritated at the MPAA and the RIAA attempting to freeze time with a combination of mass lawsuits and bad laws (DMCA, anyone?).

The way to deal with online piracy seems straightforward to this lemur -- do what's necessary to make filesharing irritating (in other words, go after any company that commercially supports IP infringement), and then (this is the important bit) hit the market with an easier, nicer, better-quality method of distribution. Something similar to the iTunes store, but there's no reason that should be the end-point of quality and convenience. Even if you don't recapture 100% of the legitimate market, you'll still have a fantastic income stream, and both the company and the artist will get paid.

And for crying out loud, don't sue your own clients en masse. That way madness lies.

The RIAA in particular is trying very hard to hold back time and technology, and I find this irritating. The way to get ahead is to advance, not to turtle indefinitely.

Does this position at least seem coherent to you?