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UK industry to create films people actually want to watch


Phil Rhodes

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The only reason nobody's willing to fund them is because they absolutely will not be distributed, and they will not be distributed because of the American stranglehold on distribution.

 

Well, the world's changing. It's up to the film maker to gather momentum for distribution. You'll hear distribution talked about a lot by Chris Jones on the Geurilla Podcast series for instance. There's never been a better time to be making films, whether you're in LA or London.... and you've got to hand it to Chris. Here's a guy who's literally trying to bring about a better foundation for the British film industry and succeeding; making information that's going to help the artists get out there and onto the world stage freely available. We could do worse than having a few more people like him.

 

If people actually embraced internet piracy and the transfer of information across the web and moulded it slightly to harness it's potential instead of winging on about copyright infringement, forever stuck in a mind-set that ought to be dead by now and following the greed model inherited from the corporations you quite rightly point the finger at towards the end of your post, this thread probably wouldn't exist.

 

We're also moving away from a system that indoctrinates the public with "what you need to watch, honestly." or we should be. I'm working through a list called '50 Turkish Films You Need to See Before You Die' and it's intoxicating. Would I have been able to watch these films, or even know about them in 1995? Don't think so, I was probably watching Die Hard 3, thoroughly disappointed with the whole affair and my options.

 

 

 

 

As is so frequently the case, the solution is simple, but requires far more political courage than modern politicians can even imagine. They simply have to either restrict or tax film imports. It's very easy; it's not complicated, it's not controversial (well, doing it is controversial, but the fact that it's the only realistic solution is not really controversial). "Protectionism", I hear you cry. Well, yes. In a world where there is not one unified government, one unified standard of living, one unified currency and one unified labour market (thankyou, Brian), some degree of protectionism is the only way to ensure that people don't get completely screwed.

 

I mean don't get me wrong I'd like this idea of taxing imports granted (provided the end-user wouldn't foot the bill), but we really aren't going to get any help from politicians. It makes me so disheartened to see people time after time after time expectant of Westminster with "please help us", particularly in light of how we've all watched Britain's industries systematically dismantled over the past 60 years. I mean, we've seen this with our own eyes, it's real. "It's the Labour Party, no it's the Tory's, No it's Blair, No It's Europe, No It's the Jews, No It's the Muslim etc etc" and the whole illusion keeps on turning around. There's always going to be difficulty while people continuously use the crutch of statements like "I'm not sure about the Conservative parties economic and foreign policy" when what they should be saying is "I'm not sure about the economic and foreign policy manufactured by the Tavistock Institute of Human Relations and The Fabian Society. The Royal Institute of International Affairs has fairly destroyed our country and DEMOS is a bit of a bad egg who on Earth are these people?"

 

This lot aren't gonna help you, me or the reader. On the contrary they're gonna make life gradually more and more difficult for each of us - "What schools are my kids going to go to? What will the Carlylse Group pay to have me on board?" (and in Tony Blair's case it's £500,000 per annum)

 

Social engineering is what matters and the way things are in terms of this stranglehold you mention suits that end perfectly. Politics is a game designed to distract anyone from what's really going on, and it works.

 

 

Most importantly though, America is owned by the people who own Britain, why on Earth would they care what proportion of profit lands where?... They don't... and I'm taking about tax here.

 

 

 

We're waiting, Dave, with baited breath. We'd love to. We're all set up and ready to go.

 

Keep waiting. Nothing will be done.

 

And they've got every right to do this to us. Because we keep buying into it all.

 

 

 

But right now, the behaviour of large international corporations has completely destroyed the market.

 

I liked this bit. It's also destroyed a number of countries.

Edited by Rex Orwell
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If people actually embraced internet piracy and the transfer of information across the web and moulded it slightly to harness it's potential instead of winging on about

 

Uhhh, excuse me how in the hell will someone make a profit in film if we "embrace internet piracy?"

 

I assume you have a plan for us all to profit from internet piracy?

 

This I gotta hear!

 

R,

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Not at all Richard. A man called Kim Dot Com had the plan. It was shut down.

 

I predicted someone might want that point ellaborated on, which is why I linked you to an article on this board in the 'Off Topic' section where no one goes. If you read my post again and click on 'Copyright Infringmenet' it will lead you there.

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Not at all Richard. A man called Kim Dot Com had the plan. It was shut down.

 

I predicted someone might want that point ellaborated on, which is why I linked you to an article on this board in the 'Off Topic' section where no one goes. If you read my post again and click on 'Copyright Infringmenet' it will lead you there.

 

Kim Dot Com was and is a criminal. Which is why he's in jail now, or heading there.

 

Here's an idea for you...spend 1 million of your own money on a movie, and then watch as people watch it for free over the web. See how that makes you feel.

 

I'm guessing you have never raised equity for a movie, am I correct?

 

R,

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Yes. As I've labelled myself as a 'Student' (and I'm a student Director) it ain't a difficult assumption to make.

 

What would excite me most is a platform where people could download our film for free and I, all the crew; the DP, the Sound engineers, Editors and actors etc still get paid. No third and fourth and fifth parties and no discrimination - Films are judged and achieve success solely on their merit and popularity.

 

Much like the platform Kim Schmidt was about to create.

 

spend 1 million of your own money on a movie, and then watch as people watch it for free over the web. See how that makes you feel.

 

But that isn't what would happen using the Megakey platform though (did you read it?). Frankly, I think the whole team would be a damn site better off.

 

I mean no disrespect naturally, but we're trapped in a state of mind Richard and the world's changing. File sharing isn't going away, and we'll both see that in 5 years time.

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I think you may be taking Rex rather too literally. Probably he's talking about some sort of group licensing model but I don't think you even need that.

 

I could give you the chapter and verse but I suspect you've heard it before and are choosing to try and ignore it, like most of the rest of the movie industry. I shall therefore limit myself to a couple of examples.

 

I own an Android phone and would be willing to pay money to watch movies on it. I own a desktop PC and would be willing to pay money to watch movies on it. The requirement is that I that I can move the file about among any of the devices I own and watch it however I like, much as has always been the case with DVD players, which is entirely reasonable. This is a market that nobody in the film industry is even trying to serve. The only way I can do it is to pirate things or strip them off the DVDs.

 

A friend of mine sells software via the Apple app store and makes a fortune. The internet is an incredibly cheap way to distribute things. I think in time that the film industry will look back on this period with its fist in its mouth at the degree of incredible, crass stupidity that's going on, at a huge and massively lucrative market that it is not only failing to exploit but actively trying to destroy.

 

P

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What would excite me most is a platform where people could download our film for free and I, all the crew; the DP, the Sound engineers, Editors and actors etc still get paid. No third and fourth and fifth parties and no discrimination - Films are judged and achieve success solely on their merit and popularity.

 

And how in the heck to you propose this to take place? People download the film for free and you still get paid? Sorry but what the *bleep*!! :blink:

 

Clearly economics is not your major at school, I'm guessing maybe....fairy and unicorn sciences? You live in a mythical fantasy world, so I assume you study mythical creatures.

 

Like a lot of people of your generation, you are going to get a harsh wake up call as to how the world really works.

 

R,

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I own an Android phone and would be willing to pay money to watch movies on it. I own a desktop PC and would be willing to pay money to watch movies on it.

 

Ah Ha!! But Phil you said the magic words...."willing to pay." I'm fine with "willing to pay," that's great.

 

Rex uses the word, "free." No where does he use the word "pay."

 

That's what I'm talking about.

 

R,

 

PS: To younger people on here that think file sharing is not affecting them they are dead wrong. The value of lower budget movies has dropped like a stone as a result of file sharing and illegal downloads. Many of these movies in this budget range provided a leg into the industry for many new film school graduates. As fewer and fewer of these movies get made, that equals fewer and fewer job opportunities. I know this for a fact, it's the budget range I work in, and I speak to buyers around the globe weekly.

 

So yeah, keep on promoting illegal downloads and you are quite possibly dooming yourself to never working a day in the film industry.

 

Good luck breaking in out of school Rex, you're gonna need it!!!

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I tell you what Richard. Please treat me and my posts with some respect before pushing me up into a corner and I'll continue to discuss the issue with you. If you're not even going to bother to read the material I put in front of you why would I bother to waste my time speaking on this.

 

I'm really sorry but I expected a bit more from you.

 

 

Good luck breaking in out of school Rex, you're gonna need it!!!

 

... and that's condescending. I'm in my mid 30's, experieced in a wide range of fields and it's a long time since I was in school. I've entered 'student' as my occupation, but If I had 5 Academy Awarads and had won at Cannes twice I'd still have 'Student' in my profile field. (it's also unfortunately not the only rude remark you've aimed at me and that's cool)

 

It's possible you're going to need more luck than me. There's a storm coming.

 

 

 

I think in time that the film industry will look back on this period with its fist in its mouth at the degree of incredible, crass stupidity that's going on, at a huge and massively lucrative market that it is not only failing to exploit but actively trying to destroy.

 

We did drive at different things in actual fact here, but you're usually on the money in one area or another Phil, and your last post was important.

 

 

_

Edited by Rex Orwell
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I hear it a lot from women.

 

 

... on their birthdays.

 

There's a lot to it. The formats we view media through are gonna turn on their head and it seems to me that any tieing the opourtinues created by failings in how things are currently distributed into knots of copyright legislation is just pulling everyone down no matter what your occupation.

 

That website would have been incredible an opourtunity has been missed.

 

The US film industry under the current structure even, will see a difference as Chinese business models influence the world, probably.

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Ah Ha!! But Phil you said the magic words...."willing to pay." I'm fine with "willing to pay," that's great.

 

Rex uses the word, "free." No where does he use the word "pay."

 

That's what I'm talking about.

 

R,

 

I think what Rex and others are saying is that distributors need to look at the current downloading model (legal or otherwise) and find a way of adapting it to something that pays.

Can it be done? Of course it can be done. iTunes has an enormous turnover from paying customers (I'm one of them). The bottom line is that iTunes music downloads are reasonably priced, iTunes cards provide an extremely secure means of online payment, and most importantly, it's really easy to find titles on iTunes.

The only time I've ever considered illegal downloads was when something I wanted wasn't available on iTunes or simiilar, normally something of minority interest that's a few decades old. And it's a waste of time in most cases. You have to wade through countless acres of crap cover versions from talentless imbeciles, and run the gauntlet of dodgy sites that want to install crap on your computer.

And I don't even own an iPod; iTunes lets you convert your downloads to to other industry formats at will.

It's pointless for film production companies to try to prevent copying of their DVDs, they would be far better off accepting that they're only going to get paid for a certain percentage of views of their product, but it will be made up for by the negligible cost of distribution. Quite a few DVDs even now come with an MPEG4 version that you can play on your portable media player!

 

I rather think it's like a lot of other things: Film distributors have entire departments full of overpaid executives, whose very careers depend on maintaining the fiction that their alleged efforts at curbing piracy are worth the company's while.

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Yep.

 

I think what Kim Dot Com was about to do, was create a website so massive that it was going to knock everything out of the water. If we asked what is it that people want most in the developed world we'd probably say music. Essentials like food and water aside people want media. Nobody doesn't want music or film. In fact I'm sure most would consider that they need more music and more media, in better quality too. What are the biggest profit makers in the world? well it's juggernaughts such as Facebook (currently in decline) and Google etc (and for the reader, time of posting is a few hours after Facebook was put onto the NASDAQ). Facebook is worth more than Coca Cola and Ford combined if you can imagine that (today). How many people on this board own a Facebook account? 3%? 5%? 15% as many as 20%? I don't.

 

 

 

Facebook-001.jpg

 

I mean the pervasive and plastic Facebook in intself is just their version of trying to cash in on this (follow the funding at inception). That's why it's balls.

 

When a site like Megakey is able to distribute media uploaded directly from the artist or the production company and occasionally charge the end-user a few pennies / cents but generally allows them to download media in the best quality for free, then essentially everybody who uses any kind of modern technology in the developed world will have a Megakey application on each of their personal and home entertainment devices. The word 'piracy' disappears suddenly from use.

 

So then it transcends media, and becomes information, with the user acquiring both through one primary source. And the best thing is it's totally unrestricted. Like I said earlier and films being judged purely on their merit and popularity. You'd literally have access to anything, anytime. You'd give access to anyone, anything, anytime. And it's a self sustaining, publicly fuelled, publically controlled organism.

 

The crew get paid no matter what, through the advertising space utilised within the application on a user's machine.

 

They couldn't allow it. Like I said in the SOPA and PIPA thread, these people haven't got your interests at heart as an artist or a skilled professional. It's their own pockets they'd prefer to line better. Having this site operational was gonna make that more difficult.

 

The victimisation of Kim Dot Com has got nothing to do with the file sharing up to date on Megaupload, and in turn piracy has got nothing to do with destroying this industry. It's there to save it.

 

This is like the basics of the internet. The majority of us are still in some sort of hard-copy, Back To The Future, Chuck Berry Dance state of mind.

 

58615517.png

 

It's a bit crap really.

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I think what Kim Dot Com was about to do, was create a website so massive that it was going to knock everything out of the water.

 

And Kim Dot Com was doing all this out of his humanitarian interests to make the world a better place. Gee move over Gandhi, Kim Dot Com has arrived.

 

The fact that you can't see Kim Dot Com for being what he was, a criminal, is beyond me.

 

I suppose next someone will make the famous, "one country's terrorist, is another country's hero," argument.

 

R,

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And Kim Dot Com was doing all this out of his humanitarian interests to make the world a better place. Gee move over Gandhi, Kim Dot Com has arrived.

 

The fact that you can't see Kim Dot Com for being what he was, a criminal, is beyond me.

 

I suppose next someone will make the famous, "one country's terrorist, is another country's hero," argument.

 

R,

The concept of someone being a "criminal" is purely a reflection of local Laws, which are man-made artifacts themselves. In general, in democratic countries, laws are made in the interests of a smoother-running society. For example, copyright and patenting laws make it worthwhile for individuals to pursue their own creativity, perhaps at the expense of their own capital and perhaps their own leisure time. Land ownership laws make it realistic for people to invest time and money putting up buildings where goods can be manufactured efficiently and so on.

 

Here and in most Western countries you're free to down as many beers as you like, within reason, without breaking any laws. If you do exactly the same thing in most Arab countries, that makes you a criminal. Similarly, in the majority of Western countries, you can do just about anything you like with any consenting adult you like, as long as it's done in your own home or premises. In a lot of other countries, you can be executed for the same activities, no matter how discreet you are. Would you regard such a person as a criminal?

 

It's true that most Western democracies had similar laws at one time or another, but the difference is that most of them were eventually repealed (or greatly diluted) under voter pressure.

 

I hesitate to bring Nazi Germany into this, but there were many thousands of "Criminals" there whose only "crime" was hiding (or assisting the escape of) Jews. Would you still regard them as "criminals"? That's what they were, according to the laws of the land.

 

Kim DotCom might be a dodgy character, but as far as I know he hasn't killed or injured anybody, doesn't import heroin, doesn't plant bombs, and hasn't been demonstrated to show any unhealthy interest in under-age children. He's trying to overturn basically unenforceable laws, to allow experimentation with new internet business models without having money-hungry IP lawyers snapping at people's heels all the time. The copyright laws he's breaking are not designed to protect the interests of creative individuals, as they were originally. They have mostly been perverted to protect the interests of the generally talentless shareholders of large corporations.

 

Unfortunately, most of our laws are still based on copyright laws going back centuries, to when the only practical means of piracy was re-printing books by hand-set type, a painfully slow and easily traced procedure. It's interesting to note that none of these laws ever covered the possibility of compensation where the same book might get read by several different people, and not through lack of trying by their proponents. The simple reality was that the lawmakers of the time recognized that there was simply no practical means of enforcing such compensation, so it has never been made part of copyright law. If all the laws were repealed and re-drafted from scratch today. I'm sure they would look very different.

 

 

God knows how much money Disney have made from their productions released first on VHS/Beta Tape, then DVD. Yet, guess who dragged Sony into a lengthy, expensive and ultimately futile court battle over 30 years ago, over the supposed ability of Betamax recorders to infringe their copyright....

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Point of order: copyright infringement is not a criminal offence in many places, it's often a civil matter, so it's even more of a stretch to call the guy a criminal.

 

That said, I think there's a lot of hiding behind that sort of definition. "Oh, we don' host the files, we just link to them," or "Oh, we don't control what people do with our service". At some point people like Pirate Bay and Megaupload knew full well they were making an overwhelming proportion of their money out of copyright infringement and I don't think it's unreasonable to forcibly suggest they should stop doing so. Claiming they didn't know or control what was going on or somehow weren't responsible for it is facile and obvious and, even if true, would be evidence of a staggering degree of irresponsibility.

 

So I don't think DVD or blu-ray or iTunes encryption is about "stopping piracy", nothing's going to stop piracy. As has been said many times, copyright laws are tolerated only because they're so poorly enforced and that's been a desirable status quo for a very long time. The purpose of these measures is to reduce piracy, to keep it down to a level that's compatible with other enforcement methods and where it can be overlooked as a cost of doing business - which it what it has been for decades.

 

So yes, outfits like Megaupload and Pirate Bay should be prevented from doing what they did because it had the potential, if unchecked, to facilitate a really unreasonable amount of piracy, casua piracy that requires no real technical expertise or any other sort of gatekeeper to keep the sheer volume down to a manageable level. It's not about absolute prevention or absolute facilitation of piracy, it's a matter of degree.

 

This does create something of a problem because I think it's important that we should all be able to watch stuff we've paid for on various devices, and effective encryption either precludes that, or makes it unreasonably difficult (which is the current situation). This is before we've even considered the technical issues inherent in trying to decode and display complicated things like h.264 video without screwing it up. Anyone who owned one of the early Archos-style pocket video players will have encountered clips that play back in the top left quarter of the screen, upside down, in false color, without audio, or not at all. There's enough of a technical challenge here without clobbering both developers and users with another layer of reasons things might not work. A good mitigation procedure for this is to allow people to download short demo clips for free, to check quality and ensure compatibility, which is actually something that the pirates have been doing for quite some time.

 

I think the unanswered question here is what would happen if the major distributors did start selling things online, unencumbered by encryption. Piracy would go up, certainly, because it would suddenly become easy for anyone to give their friends a copy on a flash key, but it's not clear how much difference that would make. Hardcore pirates can already pirate. I'm confident that what would also happen is that the distributors would start making very, very large amounts of money, which might well more than offset the spike in infringement.

 

The logistics of doing this are not complicated. Given a DVD, the process for creating the necessary assets can be very nearly automated. Doubtless the big LA postproduction houses would find a way to require the HDCAM-SR originals and make it cost $20k a film to put it online, but that's an artificial, industry-created problem and not therefore a very valid counterpoint. It could be done for dollars a film. And I'd suggest that it should be sold for dollars a film, too. Imagine what would happen if Universal had its entire back catalogue online, with everything other than the most recent stuff priced at a few dollars. Would they clean up? I think so.

 

P

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That said, I think there's a lot of hiding behind that sort of definition. "Oh, we don' host the files, we just link to them," or "Oh, we don't control what people do with our service". At some point people like Pirate Bay and Megaupload knew full well they were making an overwhelming proportion of their money out of copyright infringement and I don't think it's unreasonable to forcibly suggest they should stop doing so. Claiming they didn't know or control what was going on or somehow weren't responsible for it is facile and obvious and, even if true, would be evidence of a staggering degree of irresponsibility.

 

So yes, outfits like Megaupload and Pirate Bay should be prevented from doing what they did because it had the potential, if unchecked, to facilitate a really unreasonable amount of piracy, casua piracy that requires no real technical expertise or any other sort of gatekeeper to keep the sheer volume down to a manageable level. It's not about absolute prevention or absolute facilitation of piracy, it's a matter of degree.

 

Exactly Phil, I could not agree more.

 

R,

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Imagine what would happen if Universal had its entire back catalogue online, with everything other than the most recent stuff priced at a few dollars. Would they clean up? I think so.

 

P

Pretty much what iTunes has done, in fact.

Sadly, there are a few titles they don't "stock", mostly based on the bloody-mindedness of joint copyright holders terrified about piracy.

Of course, and ironically, you can mostly get those illegally, if you want to wade through the crap....

Actually I had a sample of nifty little gadget that would probably be legally problematic: A walkman-stye media player with built-in digital radio (DAB) that allowed you to make true data-stream recordings of digital broadcasts. Sadly, the sample died on me and the buyer decided not to proceed with the product. That would have been a music pirate's dream :rolleyes:

 

But generally my point has always been that the best way to combat piracy is to provide a legal alternative to the Pirate "service", that's easier to use, provides a guaranteed quality level, at a reasonable price - again; what Apple did with iTunes. I'm sure the film distributors are acutely aware of this, but they're still being hamstrung by the notion that there MUST be some way to prevent further, unauthorized, distribution of their product. They need to get over it; there isn't. Originally iTunes really only worked for "Authorized" iTunes players; if you wanted to use your legally downloaded songs on a different sort of player, you had to first burn them onto a CD, and then re-rip to MP3 or whatever. At some point they realized that all they were doing was cutting themselves off from a lucrative alternative market, so now current versions of iTunes allow direct conversion to MP3 etc.

 

What the activities of people like Kim DotCom will hopefully do is give the distributors the kick up the arse they so badly need, and get on with it.

 

How much money did The Avengers make, by the way?

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DVB receivers that let you stream the raw MPEG transport stream to a file (complete with all the ancilliaries, soundtracks, subtitles, &c.) are trivially available.

Yes I have some of those. I also have digital set top boxes that record to USB media and software that will turn the files into a DVD.

DAB receivers are much thinner on the ground, though. I have seen DVB sticks that offer DAB reception as an added feature, but I've never seen one that works terribly well.

With the dedicated DAB receiver I had, you just pressed "Record" and "Stop" like a cassette recorder, and it spat out a labelled MP3 (or whatever) file, which you could load into a computer at will through a USB cable!

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Point of order: copyright infringement is not a criminal offence in many places, it's often a civil matter, so it's even more of a stretch to call the guy a criminal.

 

That said, I think there's a lot of hiding behind that sort of definition. "Oh, we don't host the files, we just link to them," or "Oh, we don't control what people do with our service". At some point people like Pirate Bay and Megaupload knew full well they were making an overwhelming proportion of their money out of copyright infringement.

 

The beginning of this could have been me typing. I did start a post going into more depth before you posted and thought "Ah, I can't be bothered".

 

"I'm not a criminal I uploaded the files I don't own the website."

"We run the website, the network provider transfers the packets."

"We own the network but the satalite isn't owned by us."

"I killed 4 women. I'm a patriot, what are you talking about I'm not a criminal I didn't start the war."

 

We love the windows provided to absolve ourselves of any blame ay.

 

File hosts are an essential service, forget music and films for a minute. I'll not go into my various professions, but I used to backup 500Mb portions of documents / pictures (some of which I'd had pro photographers taking for me at cost) / contracts / marketing material / design work on Megaupload. Because of crashes it saved me many times. Thousands and thousands of hours of work that would have been lost without Kim Dot Com’s website, just sitting there as a URL ready to save my bacon should the worst happen or if I skipped from one country to the next and just simply deleted all of my work from whatever computer I was using at the time and downloaded it all again at the other end. It felt safer than lugging a sensitive piece of computer hardware around at 20,000 feet possibly being bashed about in cargo bays.

 

Would I have used this If I knew all my documents were gonna be scanned, redirected or scrutinised by a human being in case they violated Copyright 'law' ? No, because it was valuable information.

 

What happens if I need to send 15Mb of designs and spreadsheets to someone in China? Can't use an email, it's not possible and it's discourteous clogging someone’s inbox up like that.

 

This is a guy who started a website that's all. It was up to the user to take responsibility for how they used it.

 

 

megakey.png

 

If the 'right' person was behind Megaupload it wouldn't have been touched, and like I said its takedown was nothing to do with its file sharing up to date.

 

We know that because there are a dozens of file hosts out there. Some of them are much bigger than Megaupload ever was.

 

...They're still running. Why? Because they haven't tested and weren't about to launch a platform like Megakey.

 

 

 

 

A walkman-stye media player with built-in digital radio (DAB) that allowed you to make true data-stream recordings of digital broadcasts. Sadly, the sample died on me and the buyer decided not to proceed with the product. That would have been a music pirate's dream :rolleyes:

 

And it was configuring the ID3 tags? I'd be surprised.

 

For the really obscure stuff I use Audacity. But then I've still got to edit the ID3 tags. If music is out there on wax or any other hard vehicle someone out there has ripped it, so a lot of the time it's easier to just use Google. If they're ripping regularly they've usually got the nouse to sort the tags out.

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I was a ‘music pirate' for years. Frequently I was approached by artists and production companies thanking me for ripping their product and directing those who downloaded to purchase the vinyl. They knew the value of what I and others were doing.

hummingbird_avatar_LARGE_X.png

Vinyl is the music pirates dream. I know people who pay 2000 GBP for a record regularly. It’s the only format worth paying money for. It retains its value at minimum and can't disappear when a drone flies overhead sending out an Electro Magnetic Pulse.

 

Good luck trying to get the files (music or film) you've paid for back without paying for them again when the above happens or you've had a hard drive crash on you.

 

 

insect-drone.jpg

 

Film, has yet to come up with a true hard solution and it may never have one.

 

I'm happy to buy a film on DVD*, and I've got a library of hundreds. As a matter of fact, I've paid for so many DVD's they're in storage I've got nowhere to put them at present. No one can point the finger at me saying I haven't supported the film industry or individuals working within it. Yet, I'm still a heavy user of soft and there's no shame in it. I'm real I'm not going to lie to anyone about anything.

 

Whilst it might appear that we're deviating from the subject of this thread, in my opinion we're not because a website like Megakey would have reinvigorated the British Film Industry.

 

There'll come a time in the future when we look back at this issue surrounding Copyright and say "We were idiots" mark my words.

 

Think I've said about all I can say. The rests up to us.

 

 

* I say happy, I'm not. It's a flawed format and discs are liable to scratching. It'll also be obselete in 3 years time.

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Whilst it might appear that we're deviating from the subject of this thread, in my opinion we're not because a website like Megakey would have reinvigorated the British Film Industry.

 

er, okay, how will this re-invigorate the British film industry at all. It doesn't really change any of the fundamental issues. Hollywood would still control the agenda. They would still have control of the cinemas and the marketing. It would change things no more than the creation of DVD's changed things.

 

What would really change things of course, is if all the 3d stuff and everything, manages to destroy cinema, a bit like the music industry forcing cd's on people to destroy vinyl. Then we would live in a very different world, rather like we do with music now.

 

Where that would lead who knows, but the ensuing turmoil would certainly create a lot of change.

 

There'll come a time in the future when we look back at this issue surrounding Copyright and say "We were idiots" mark my words.

 

Whose "we", you got a mouse in your pocket?

 

If you mean the film industry, well people already say that now, so it's hardly any great shakes to say such a thing.

 

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Freya

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We know that because there are a dozens of file hosts out there. Some of them are much bigger than Megaupload ever was.

 

Youtube is the one that springs to mind instantly...

 

Long history of being rife with piracy and still is, but the word on it has gone quiet.

 

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Freya

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Theres been a little bit of talk about iTunes here, which of course sells moving image content as well as music, but they aren't the only major player out there in this field. I'm surprised her has been no mention of Netflix. Netflix has recently stepped up to win the bidding for a David Fincher directed series called "House of Cards" which some people may remember from the BBC long ago. Here are some details:

 

http://www.deadline.com/2011/03/netflix-to-enter-original-programming-with-mega-deal-for-david-fincher-kevin-spacey-drama-series-house-of-cards/

 

Hulu are also funding their own original content with "arrested development".

Cable channels are increasingly making their own original high quality content too.

Amazon are entering the field.

 

There are a lot of smaller new companies all entering into the party.

Of course established players like the major studios struggle with change as they are used to having their monopoly and aren't easily able to move and adapt. Kodak might be another example. A lot of the big uk moving image companies tend to be like this too. Loads of examples of this out there. Xerox is another one. In fact Kodak and Xerox have a lot in common.

 

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Freya

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Youtube is the one that springs to mind instantly...

 

Long history of being rife with piracy and still is, but the word on it has gone quiet.

 

love

 

Freya

Yes, but people generally put stuff on YouTube for other people's enjoyment, not commercial gain. For example, funny commercials that would otherwise only get shown in the country of origin. I wouldn't call that piracy. This is more a case of unscrupulous lawyers (if that's not a tautology) trying to make a buck by trying to make a case out something that's really pretty trivial.

For a while, Constantin Film, the people who own the the IP for "The Downfall" routinely issued takedown notices to YouTube for all the Hitler parodies, but at some point they realized that precisely because of those, far more people had gone out and rented or bought their film that would have otherwise been the case. So now they don't bother.

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