I got a DVD from Netflix for the movie "Dedication" that stated on the first screen that "This DVD is for sale only."

I'm thinking probably no. Although it's not completely surprising that Netflix doesn't ACTUALLY hand check every DVD. Every once in a while we'll get a DVD in the mail that has a huge crack in it, that clearly would have been noticeable. No biggie, we just report it.

Looks like you stumbled onto a weird set of fake DVD's (since most are from the same series). Netflix should do some investigating to see if perhaps this is tied to a specific customer.

meh - They might be fakes, but that's some pretty fancy printing on the label to be a fake... I don't know.

I know I have gotten discs that are "for rental only" and some that look retail, and some that say they're two sided but aren't... who knows.

I don't really care to be honest - I pay for a service and they provide it - I don't really care if the movie studios get paid like they should for the movies.

Yeah, I also got a "This DVD for is for sale only" message on a copy of The Mist that I just watched.

Never seen the funky labels tho.

Ive gotten quite a few TV shows through netflix and they have always been the originals. My guess is that its somebody in their warehouse burning them and then stealing the originals

I have wondered about this same exact issue! I recently rented "Michael Clayton" and the compression was noticeable, the disc label was amazingly plain (like the ones pictured above), and I put it in my computer and saw the disc was 4.3-something gigabytes. Usually DVD movies come on those 7+GB discs? I didn't think much of it at first - I just watched the movie as usual. Seeing this brought up confirms my suspicion that my rental was probably a counterfeit.

First off, Netflix should know that the "hallmark" of a DVD isn't the lack of a silvery playing surface. Professional bootleg operations aren't churning out homemade looking discs, they're churning out professional grade discs that look legitimate even to the trained eye. My prediction is that Netflix is getting some of their DVDs from a wholesale group in China/Hong Kong/elsewhere that is passing off bootlegs as the real thing.

I received that strange Bones disc as well. At the time, I thought it was that Netflix received "special" rental DVDs instead of normal consumer ones.

I've noticed that some disks are "odd" looking, like the 2 disks you can rent of the 90's anime "reboot". But I think that some of the anime titles might be a special deal that netflix got with the publishers like ADV or US Manga Corps to sell "rental only" copies to netflix for a discounted price.

I rent a lot of movies. After switching from Blockbuster to Netflix, the first thing I noticed was about a third of the Netflix DVDs have exactly the same label on the disk: the same color & design, no graphics, no description, just the title, and very simple printing -- regardless of the studio.

Clearly these are dups. I also have to assume Netflix has permission, 'cause they're not trying to hide it.

In the volumes Netflix purchases discs, I wouldn't be surprised if they came off the B or C line at the duplicating house, where the labels aren't as fancy (read: much cheaper).

You know BMG and Columbia House CDs? The ones where you get a crate full for a penny? Those are from the B lines, duplicated from the masters on the same equipment but have some quality issues that result in a less than 100% accurate pressing of the master disc. Thanks to error correction on CDs you won't hear the difference, but they are slightly less resilient when additional damage occurs due to mishandling.

I imagine DVD duplication with similar (but more evolved data correction) would have similar A/B/C lines.

Personally, I sometimes wish they had counterfeits when they lose all copies of a movie that's out of print, but that's just me.

Reminds me of the shady VHS rental places from the '80s with dub VCRs in the back to have more rentals available to make more $$.

Well, movie companies *wish* they could restrict movies to "sale only."

But once you buy a DVD, you own it. You can resell it on eBay or loan it to other people.

Heh...this would be a problem for me but I only rent their HD DVD and Blu Ray options, and to my knowledge those aren't (cheaply) counter fitted. Yet.

Perhaps they burn copies to replace scratched/destroyed copies?

The pictures are inconclusive to me. Had he compared the same disc from another source to the suspected fake (disc three to disc three, not disc two) we'd have a little more to go on. I'd also like to see some hi res pics of the bottoms of the discs.

Maybe Netflix copying discs to increase profit margin.

Maybe this is why they are having their FANTASTIC used DVD sale.

bdsakx: standard single layer DVDs are 4.7gigs. Multi layer DVDs are 9+gigs, i would be surprised if you were getting 9+gig DVDs from Netflix...
[en.wikipedia.org]

Sometimes for TV shows the netflix disks are not the same as retail disks. I rented some TV's shows and ran into the same episode problem. The sleeve would say EP X-X and so would the site but then the disk would only have 2 of the 3 or 4 episodes on it. The disk was legit, you could tell it wasnt a standard DVD-/+R but i wasnt too happy when i didnt get all my episodes.

I've also rented Planet Earth twice from netflix. One instance I got the USA edition of the HD-DVD instead of the BBC edition yet the sleeve and page was marked as BBC. The USA edition has a different person doing narration and the episodes are also split differently on the disks. So I ended up only getting to watch 1 show because the other 2 were on the first (BBC) disk I got

@Kat@Work: I agree. If you're going to make a fake label with a realistic-looking color logo for the DVD... why not just scan & copy the real disc label?

As someone who works in the DVD industry (or at least reporting on it) I can tell you that it is QUITE easy to get access to the studio sites for DVD boxart (or disc art).

Sometimes its a joke how little effort the studios put into labeling their products... so it is possible some of these are real.

if it does NOT have a copyright line (including sub studios and production companies) or a CARA rating (with the little world symbol and registered mark) AS WELL AS an explanation of why it is rated what it is, then it is most likely NOT legit.

With the volumes of DVDs flowing through the crappy USPS, I would guess Netflix can burn their own copies at will?

I think they are fake. It is incredibly easy to create good looking labels for your DVD's now a days, especially with technology like lightscribe. Perhaps the biggest indicator is that they don't fit in with the artwork on the other DVD's from the set. Production studios spend a lot of money producing these movies, and they would probably keep all the disks consistent. Thats another reason I think they're fake. Another telling factor is that other commenter's have been finding the disks are highly compressed. There are some programs which do the compression so well that you can't tell the difference, but there's no way a movie company would do that before sending it out. Dual layer DVD's have really fallen in price now that there's Blu-ray, but most people don't have Dual layer burners, and thus compress them.

I used to work at Hollywood Video, and we had this happen all the time. Customer's would bring back burned copies, or home movies, thinking we wouldn't notice. We did. A piece of advice however: if you're going to return one of your burned movies in place of ours, make sure it's not kiddie porn. This actually happened once, and since the system remembers the last person who rented a DVD for this reason, the guy was caught.

I'm not an expert, but I do have a little experience with this, and I think that the movies are fake. There's too many corners being cut for it to be the studio or Netflix. For Netflix, it's an error to use human eyes to check every disk. Humans can forget what a disk is supposed to look like, and as long as it has a semi-legit looking cover, they'll accept it without knowing that its a copy. A machine however, could tell that that wasn't the way the cover was supposed to look, and stop it.

Well I mean step one, is the bottom of the disk purple? If they are pressing dvd, well thats just impressive and they get a pass.

@anonymousryan: Seconded. Add Smallville.

Perhaps shady users are keeping the originals, and returning homemade copies, designed to fool the entry-level drones who open NetFlix' incoming mail?

I'm actually considering this myself, now that Consumerist has induced me to infringe copyright. Thanks, Consumerist!

I would say half the DVDs I get from Netflix look like these "counterfeit" DVDs. For reference mine come from Duluth, GA outside Atlanta.

what I'm guessing is people accidentally send back the dvd they copied, and the ones with labels are mistakenly put back in stock. And the ones without labels just go to the trash. Bet thats the case.

BTW I meant to also state that Television shows sometimes have different requirements with copyright and ratings but generally the copyrights are the biggest clue.

..of course, if I was some a$$hole kid, maybe trying to build a dvd collection, I'd probably keep the originals and burn copies to return to Netflix. Chances are, nobody there is really checking to see if the art matches the studio release...

ya think?

FYI, for those who are saying that "maybe they're copies made by a staffer or whomver," it can't be if the bottom of the disc is silver. All burned discs have purple bottoms (or green if they're rewritable discs).

Also, keep in mind that while it's not shown in the blog post, mentioned in the letter and pictured in the blog post are faulty and poorly designed menus that are different from the originals.

My guess is that pressed bootlegs from a piracy-happy country somewhere in Asia.

I always had this idea in my head, since netflix has to buy bulk, they probably have some kind of contract with studios to get "generic" dvd's. I mean no colorfull or flashy covers. maybe that's what it is. But hey that's just me

@.apostle.: I would say its more of an accident. That's flirting with copyright infringement or atleast losing your netflix account, as soon as one of the employees noticed.

These grey discs have been going out for years. They're cheaper to print for the studios - no color screens, etc.

[www.hackingnetflix.com]

@Bladefist:

What makes you think it's accidental?

@esd2020:

If so they're committing massive willful copyright infringement. Enough that they'd be out of business if they copied any more than a handful of titles.

You might want to send this info over to the Hacking Netflix blog. They dont hack netflix, but it's info about Netflix and other online rental businesses, they might have some idea of what's going on or how to get a better response from Netflix.

@Jason Ferguson:

We're not just talking about the disc art, though. The menus are messed up/wrong. Plus, the disc art looks much, much more questionable than the example grey disc at Hacking Netflix and others such as...

@bdsakx:

...are saying they're overly compressed on single layer DVDs (still cheaper even if it's a pressed DVD).

I've never gotten an obviously bootlegged dvd from Netflix, but I've definitely had the "split double disc" thing happen many, many times. I watched most of West Wing seasons 1-5 via Netflix, which are supposed to be double-sided discs with 4 (or 3) episodes to a side. Splitting the discs stretches a 4 disc season into a 7 or 8 disc one, which, if you're on the 1 or 2 at a time plan, like I was, can take up almost 2 months of subscription time.

@esd2020: not to get into an IP debate here, but i think you're only partially correct. true, you can buy a dvd & watch it, loan it, sell it on ebay, but you CAN'T publicly show it, rent it, or charge your friends to come over & watch it. the generation of revenue from the title activates the owner's right to royalty payments.

netflix could be in some trouble for renting "sale only" dvds (assuming they came by them in a non-legitimate way). more likely, a subscriber lost their rented copy & bought a replacement.

did they not play? whats the problem? it's not like you bought the cd's and keeping it forever in your collection. Watch the show and send them back. Maybe put a note saying that it's counterfeit.

My brother in law did a case study on Netflix when he was working on his MBA. They almost went bankrupt when they were purchasing the movies, then they went into a profit sharing plan with the movie companies, and I don't know if they have done this, but I imagine they have the right to copy them as long as they keep track, since they work with the movie houses.

Come to think of it, I'm not sure I've ever received a double sided disc from Netflix. When I buy DVDs, they frequently have the special features on the other side, but Netflix discs almost never do. A lot of times I get discs that I can tell were intended to be two-sided, but were split into separate discs. These did not have the fake looking labels, and on the outside of the envelope was a note to the effect of "Please note. Although the menu indicates that special features are located on the reverse of this disc, they are on a separate disc." Or something like that, that's my wording. I had thought that meant that the distribution companies made a special version for large rental operations like Netflix, although I don't really know why they can't just send us a double-sided disc.

Also, does anyone really know what happens when you submit a damage report to Netflix? Does that flag the disc you're returning for checkup?

I remember noticing this once, and my husband suggested that Netflix has the ability to print their own copies of the DVDs. Basically, that they have some kind of agreement that allows them to print multiple copies when movies first come out since they will be in higher demand, or because so many of the movies will be damaged or lost due to the mailing system. It made sense to me, but I've never seen anything official stating that this was the case.

My guess is that someone is copying the discs, keeping the original for their own collection, then sending Netflix the copy.

Couldn't this be done by customers, too? I doubt the staff is very well trained to spot fake discs, so it would be easy to snag the originals and replace them with fakes. Once they're in circulation, it'd be hard to pinpoint which customer did it.

@Carencey:

Double-sided DVDs kinda suck horribly in that they are really easy to damage (compared to regular DVDs) so I could maybe see the studios providing 2-disc versions of double-sided discs when asked.

I'm pretty sure that I've gotten double-sided discs from them, but I guess it could be on a case by case basis.

@Bix: not true. I've purchased bulk DVDr media that was silver dye instead of purple. Also, the written portion was practically undetectable, much like commercial discs. They weren't special, or proprietary, and came from a well known reputable vendor. there are a number of different dyes that dvdrs can be based on. Purple and light blue are just the most common.

They are not fake. They are the no distributed (for sale) version of the DVD.

Somehow I have been wondering the same problem, that how come every single DVD that I rent is alike. Then I look that the DVD itself, and it says it is for rental only.

So I think those are the special rental edition...

@ludwigk:

Got a link? As someone who does a lot of DVD burning, I'd love to see them. I remember silver dye CD-Rs being around at one point but I've never seen silver dye DVD+-Rs.

@garykung:

This doesn't explain the messed up menus, the compression on Michael Clayton mentioned by a commenter, or the episodes not matching the listing on the top of the disc.

@esd2020: Just because you buy a DVD and you are legally able to change ownership does not mean you can rent it out for profit if it says that.

@montag007: The DVD's you are talking about are the DVD's consumers can buy from the stores for personal use.

Every movie I have seen has been more than 5.0GB and they are pressed, thats why they are silver or gold on the bottom.

You can get bootleg copies of DVD's from overseas that are pressed, so they dont have the purple or green bottoms so you cant dismiss them as genuine.

I always thought this was a "duh" situation. I get tv seasons from netflix all the time and they are always laser ripped copies with lightscribe (grey label with silver wording. Just figured it was something Netflix did. I never see any quality differences so I'd assume they use either dual layer or high quality disks. Not really a big deal to me.

They are real. Netflix gets discounts in volume, wouldn't you think, considering how much business they do with the studios? I'm sure the studios could care less if Netflix gets the premium label DVDs. Yes, Netflix occasionally screws up episode listings and what not too, causing extra confusion.
I've had so many discs that had basically plain labels, and the format for the labeling is the same across different movies, as mentioned just above.

How is this a Netflix problem?

Do the DVDs consistently fail to work?

Are the labels so fake that a casual visual inspection could reasonably be expected to pick them out?

If not, then it is not their problem and really shouldn't be you problem either. I think we have bigger customer service issues to gripe about, other than unusual labels on functional DVDs.

They probably buy bulk licenses for content and can burn their own replacements when they get damaged or lost.

Hmmm. I would have thought that they were one probably made for an Asian country and have crappier menus and labeling to cut costs (or because they're produced independently) to compete with pirates (living in China I can say that this happens; legit licensed CDs/DVDs cost about 1/4 or less of what they do in the States). But, the logos say otherwise...

...

I have bought several anime titles that have fake seeming discs. Perhaps the US versions of some anime releases are of a much lower quality than those for other regions. Two examples are Witch Hunter Robin and Rozen Maiden.

I have worked for one of the largest home entertainment divisions at one of the largest studios in L.A. for over 10 years. Before that I was an art director developing packing and advertising art for VHS tapes and DVDs.

These are all legit, albeit from Netflix likely scratched and covered with peanut butter (they should have an allergy warning).

The grey ones are special Netflix editions. Though the content is the same, they cost much less to manufacture.

Back in the day, Blockbuster started the trend by demanding that the studios produce "clean" versions of films that excluded any romantic scenes. Oddly though, violence was perfectly fine with them.