AfterDawn: News

UK urges film industry to use technology to fight piracy

UK film minister, Shaun Woodward was recently quoted in saying that he believes the best way to fight Internet film piracy is to make movies available in an on-demand format as soon as the movies are released.

In an interesting interview with Mr. Woodward, he brought up some points that most pirated software is used in such a way that the "consumer" wants to watch the media at home. He believes that if the film industry sets up a standard where new releases could be available for a premium download as soon as they are released in the cinema, this may help alleviate some of the £300m profit that goes towards DVD pirates.



It is not a new fact that movies are most often ready for illegal download on the Internet days, and in most cases hours after their cinema release. Having these movies available in the same time frame under a legal model just may be the way to reach a comfortable medium between the movie industry and Internet pirates.

Mr. Woodward told film executives in a conference Thursday, "You're going to have to look at release dates in a slightly different way than you have done before. You're going to have to look at slightly more ingenious ways of making electronic copies available so that people may actually pay a different price for something that they can download at home, which is just being released in the cinema. If they want to watch it at home, then maybe you should make it available to them. But they should pay a premium rate for having it earlier on and it should be encrypted in such a way that it can't be copied."

Source
BBC News

Written by: Dave Horvath @ 13 Oct 2006 6:43

• Previous article

• HD DVD may have early edge in format battle

• Next article

• Microsoft to promote IPTV... again

• 33 comments

• limelight

  Great idea, but it all boils down to price, download speed and how long i can watch it.

  13.10.2006 06:56 #1

• emachine

  Yeah do this in the us I hate the quality of dled movies so this could work. But if I bought it should be able to be copied.

  13.10.2006 07:19 #2

• marsey99

  woodward is my local mp and i can state he is a 2 faced hypocriticle ponce. i bet that while he was holding this interview condeming priates who download illegal movies he had limewire running on his pc getting him his latest fix of gay s+m porn

  13.10.2006 07:38 #3

• gogochar

  Quote:and it should be encrypted in such a way that it can't be copied.Um, they should realize that the industry is trying their hardest to make a way to encrypt their content without it being copied.

  13.10.2006 07:45 #4

• georgeluv

  for the love of fuck when is the rest of the world going to come around and do what france did? its pretty much the only way.

  13.10.2006 08:24 #5

• ZippyDSM

  its simple you are not going to stop it what you can do is screw it all and make a profit off selling movies downloads and bury sites that share it,as for BT ISPs are needleing away at bandwidth little by little soon you wont know when you to have been FAP"D!
  
  LOL

  13.10.2006 10:05 #6

• mcmad99

  the only way these companies will make this work (if they are serious about the piracy problem) is to make the downloads much cheaper and UN-DRM them !!

  13.10.2006 10:18 #7

• ZippyDSM

  mcmad99
  DRM is pointless and ti saves them money to just make download sites you pay to download movies.
  
  but if they did that then they would go after Bit torrent because unlike web sites it dose have a large traffic in shared stuff knowing them they would lobby to make BT and shareing illict...
  
  on the other hand the government could step in that is if we had one and made shearing league impose a tax on net that raises it 10$ and be done with it...

  13.10.2006 10:23 #8

• bhetrick

  Quote:But they should pay a premium rate for having it earlier on and it should be encrypted in such a way that it can't be copied."Ya... this idea will stop piracy.

  13.10.2006 10:30 #9

• CiDaemon

  No matter what they do, people will still prefer pirated copies.
  
  Why? Because, no matter how much they "adjust their marketing", they will never reach a level that can compete with piracy- who can compete with a zero-cost, multi-source, no-wait, and totally non-profit organization? If companies were to try and compete with pirates in terms of release times, they'd still be falling way behind on price. If they tried to compete on price, they'd all go bankrupt-pirated copies cost NULL, and they can't afford to give out free movies! If they try to stop piracy altogether, the court, lawyer, and auditing costs would throw them into bancruptcy anyway.
  
  If they realease "on-demand" content the day of release, it'll only provide another way for pirates to get their originals- people will simply copy the "on-demand" movies and put them up on torrent/p2p networks. Any DRM/copy protection they try will be beat, with all of the software geniuses that support p2p/torrent. This could possibly be the worst choice they could make. And no matter what they do, people will still prefer pirated copies.
  
  Why? Because, no matter how much they "adjust their marketing", they will never reach a level that can compete with piracy- who can compete with a zero-cost, multi-source, no-wait, and totally non-profit organization? If companies were to try and compete with pirates in terms of release times, they'd still be falling way behind on price. If they tried to compete on price, they'd all go bankrupt-pirated copies cost NULL, and they can't afford to give out free movies! If they try to stop piracy altogether, the court, lawyer, and auditing costs would throw them into bancruptcy anyway.
  
  The companies need to face it: there are pirates, there always have been pirates, there will always BE pirates. Even before p2p networks, south asian businesses were copying movies and selling them around the world. In the Information Age, there's no way to stop data from getting around if people want it to. And we do.

  13.10.2006 10:38 #10

• CiDaemon

  ^^^It seems I got a little trigger happy with copy and paste... ignore the thesis and first paragraph//they are repeated later.

  13.10.2006 10:40 #11

• ZippyDSM

  teh double post ><

  13.10.2006 10:45 #12

• ZippyDSM

  CiDaemon
  I disagree if they halved their prices right then and there I would have no trouble buying it new,but it seems buying used has been forgeten about in this argument there will always be a mass of used movies and music least until we go fully digital.

  13.10.2006 10:48 #13

• mm2000y

  The way I see it is they have to come up with something better than the piracy method. They could do that by offering a way for the consumer to simply insert a blank DVD disk into their computers DVD Recorder, hit the buy button and let it auto record the movie to the disk so they can watch it on their computer or TV. They can even put copy protection on it like any DVD you would buy in the store and everybody would be happy (except Walmart), as long as they didn't try to overcharge. Instant satisfaction!

  13.10.2006 15:14 #14

• tnarulz

  If they gave me a way to buy the dvd release of a movie the same day it came out in the theaters as long as it's say 10-15 dollars (last time I went to the movies in 04 the regular movie ticket cost 8.50, non matinee showing)and they'd still make a profit!

  14.10.2006 05:54 #15

• cart0181

  MR. Woodward is stating the obvious, it seems to me. A "premium rate" will surely not fly, however. I disagree less than usual with CiDaemon's position this time; film companies can definately compete with P2P networks in terms of quality and availability. Most movies I want to download I usually find lousy CAMs so I decide to go see it in the theater or not at all. I would definately be willing to pay a small fee for a film (non-drm) in perfect DVD or better quality that I can download at the full speed of my connection. How much would you guys be willing to pay for a service like that? I'd pay at least $5 for full DVD quality, maybe twice that for HD-DVD on the day of release.

  14.10.2006 14:51 #16

• Dunker

  I fundamentally disagree that piracy is inevitable. The average consumer isn't nearly tech-savvy enough to pirate, even in this era of one-click copying programs. Many, if not most, people aren't tech-savvy enough to beyond turning on their computer and getting into their email program. But I will agree that there is a significant percentage of people that the entertainment industry is DRIVING into piracy due to price, release times, etc.
  
  I've also found, and this may come as a surprise, that some people who pirate, do so partly for political or ideologic reasons - they don't want to enrich the sleazy, already-too-wealthy entertainment industry. While these people are probably a minority of those who pirate, perhaps the entertainment industry ought to learn something most other businesses figured out a long time ago - don't piss off your customer base.
  

  -Don't be a sucker - don't buy Blu-ray or HD-DVD!
  -It's not a coincidence RIAA and MPAA are four-letter words.
  -Since half the questions here involve media problems, here ya go: Only use Verbatim or Taiyo-Yuden discs. Forget the rest, no matter what "brand" they sell under. If you have burn problems with these then you have to upate your drive's firmware. For double-layer discs, only use Verbatim.

  14.10.2006 16:08 #17

• marsey99

  cart0181 so would i but i think they would charge more than double your prices.
  
  dunker your right on the money there, they have pissed their customers off to many times. yet they are about to do it again with blueray and hd-dvd(marsey shakes his head). when will they learn?

  14.10.2006 16:48 #18

• sssharp

  The at home on demand dvd release can work. I wait until movies are on dvd to see like many others, unless I get free movie tickets. They can compete with a fair market price not that $20 new release price. People will be enjoy the opportunity to watch new movies from the home.

  15.10.2006 06:56 #19

• Discmania

  Personally I don't think the major film company's are secretly that bothered since they still make billions from the official DVD releases on top of the theatre takings. Why should they give much of a toss about some techy people who download pirate copies? Shaun Woodward sounds like he's using the 'pirate' card for his own ends. I don't agree with downloading movies camed from the theatre but there's no way you're going to stop people doing it or sharing ripped DVD's. Sure, make available to buy, but one has to live in the real world.

  15.10.2006 07:24 #20

• crea2k

  "and it should be encrypted in such a way that it can't be copied."
  
  There is no such thing, however it is encrypted, all it takes is someone with video out card on thier pc and a dvd recorder to get past the copy protection, then just convert the dvd back into AVI and hay presto you have a copy that you can dish out where and when you feel like it.
  
  I think the idea of this all is good though, I go to the cimena quitea bit but it would be cool if I could download a decent copy of a film if I didnt want to go out that night.

  15.10.2006 10:52 #21

• angelXL

  When will they learn- Jesus H Corbett!
  
  Do you wanna know how to mostly get rid of piracy?
  Simple- when a new movie comes out at the cinema, bring the DVD/VHS/UMD or whatever format of the movie out at the SAME TIME for the people to buy.
  
  Thats the only way its ever going to really work, but if you can download a film which is DVD quality AND do what you like with it for a small subcharge- then that would be a good idea also.
  
  You cant really kill off piracy to be honest- but I reckon my solution above would help a lot.. and thats coming from an ex-pirate as well.

  16.10.2006 00:38 #22

• Discmania

  AngelXL - I think your idea is idiotic (apologies for being so blunt). If the DVD's were ever realeased at the same time as the official movie release it would be goodbye to cinemas and theatres as we know it and would have a serious knock-on effect to the film studios. In effect it could lead to the end of decent cinema. It would also increase the number of illegal downloading sinvce the DVDRip links would become available earlier so would in now way hrlp to stop piracy.

  16.10.2006 04:37 #23

• cart0181

  AngelXL's idea isn't exactly idiotic, but may indeed be ill-conceived. However, it seems to be almost exactly what Mr. Woodward is suggesting when he says, "you should make it available to them." Also, I've heard rumors of major video stores offering DVDs for rent and purchase while the films are still in theaters. Does anyone have a link to a news article on this? I never followed up on it, and the "Blockbusters" may have only been toying with the idea or experimenting with test-releases.
  
  What I'm really interested in is what would cause someone to become an "EX-pirate." AngelXL??

  16.10.2006 22:05 #24

• Niobis

  If it comes to war, I'm with the pirates. They can't stop us no matter how hard they try, we will prevail!
  

  
  

  16.10.2006 22:36 #25

• lbbz

  I like pirated movies for different reasons than the, um, price; and having them immediately after their release. I like them because (read this well, film_industry_people):
  1. They are small, both in virtual and in media size.
  2. They have no strings attached.
  
  What this means:
  I like keeping what I buy, but fifteen movies can fill either a briefcase (each movie in its own case for protection) or, at identical quality, 5 single-layer DVDs, in just paper envelopes because I give each a healthy amount of PAR2 recovery data in case the medium is damaged (takes ~1 hr per DVD).
  Also, I can play them back wherever I want, on whatever I want (Linux, portable thingies), from HDD (notebook drives tend to overheat), and move them to a different medium if the previous is likely to fail (scratches, age).
  
  
  I'd give up downloading pirated movies if they were available in a similar format (small XviD/h264, etc, but v.good quality - encoded directly from the source, not from DVD), at similar speeds (why not BT?), and a price of about 5-8 dollars, a bit more for HD.
  
  Of course, that should mean buying the rights to view the movie period (for yourself and anyone in your home); instead of dozens of "if"s and "as long as"'. The medium and player should be free to choose and change.
  
  
  {Is there currently any blasted way to buy the right to legally own and view a re-coded copyrighted movie?}

  17.10.2006 04:58 #26

• Discmania

  You forgot one minor point ibbz - the pictureand sound quality are absolute crap. Not only that but you are directly encouraging pirates to continue their illegal work of caming movies in the theatre and pocketing thousands in the process.

  17.10.2006 08:46 #27

• ZippyDSM

  Frankly I don't mind the horrid quality of them,becuse if its worth watching I will get the DVD or go the the movies but thats a rarity...

  17.10.2006 10:51 #28

• bertf

  I actually know Shaun Woodward personally - but let's not let that detract from what is basically a statement of the obvious. Apart from the 'premium' price element (clearly a non starter) I have been saying for yonks that the film industry business model has got to change - they need to accept that movie theatres are not the be all and end all of initial movie sales - I would go some steps further - pucker DVDs should be released at the same time as the theatre release, and at a reasonable price, not €25 but €10. Canadian Pacific learnt a long time ago that if you have a product with almost zero marginal cost you make a lot more profit by selling three times as many at half the price . . look at low cost airlines. The legitimate industry CAN compete with the pirates in every area, they have just chosen not to . . .

  18.10.2006 00:17 #29

• ZippyDSM

  bertf
  if they were a business they would have changed already but they are a monopoly and monopolies don't take well to streamlining and price changes 0-o

  18.10.2006 00:30 #30

• lbbz

  I forgot nothing, Discmania, except to mention that I do NOT watch cam releases - only DVDrips, usually 1.4GB ones, and 120-310MB 25min cartoons. I can wait. Always do.
  Also, few people actually BUY anything from pirates - it's not really about the profit anymore, just about the distribution method and price.

  19.10.2006 09:13 #31

• Snoopy06

  No its not going to stop Pirated Videos but if they put a good price that ppl can afford to d/load them from the net yes i will proberly pay as you will get a better quality products than what you get with pirated copys...

  21.10.2006 16:26 #32

• ZippyDSM

  I check cam releases because they are the fastest to hit the net I use them as a preview...most movies blow and not worth the price of a blank DVD or CD 0-o

  21.10.2006 16:29 #33