For those unfamiliar, a FanEdit of a film is "a new take on existing movie material. Anything can be changed, improved, restructured for a different watching experience and only the sky is the limit." Basically, fans edit existing films and add scenes, remove scenes, add music, add CGI, whatever they want, and recompile it as a FanEdit. The site, since the beginning has said you should not download the edits unless you own the original on VHS, DVD or Blu-ray, and even went as far as to place links to Amazon pages so you can purchase the original. Apparently this was not enough.
Boon23, founder of the site, says: "We all knew this day would come, but on the other side we all hoped, it would never. 3 days ago the MPAA has filed a DMCA warning against our download links. The result: 2 days of downtime, in which we removed all download links and all reference to them, making Fanedit.org just a showcase for fanedits without any possibility for the visitor to download.
Our torrents page: Gone. Our Rapidshare lists: gone. And it’s the same on the forum.
Yes, this is a heavy and painful blow by the movie industry against a free art form, against creativity without commercial interest, against sharing between people, who all own the original versions. It seems you own your own DVDs a lot less than you thought you did.
BUT: We will prevail. Even without the links we will continue to inform you about new releases, because one thing is for sure: FANEDITS ARE NOT DEAD. It is just a bit more difficult to get a hold of them. But the internet is a vast place and he who searches will find it somewhere else."
Of course, as is always the case, the MPAA's decision to target fanedits.org has brought massive amounts of traffic to the site, making sure that FanEdits will not die anytime soon. Well done MPAA, your attempt to kill creative freedoms has backfired, again.
Written by: Andre Yoskowitz @ 23 Nov 2008 15:41
