<![CDATA[Consumerist: Films]]> http://cache.gawker.com/assets/base/img/thumbs140x140/consumerist.com.png <![CDATA[Consumerist: Films]]> http://consumerist.com/tag/films http://consumerist.com/tag/films <![CDATA[ Lara Is Not A Porn Star ]]> When Lara placed a self-portrait taken at age fourteen on deviantART, she never expected it to be stolen by TVX Films and placed on the cover of the DVD porno "Body Magic." Lara asked the President of TVX Films to remove her photo and compensate her for the theft. He responded with the following email:

I'M SURE BY THE END OF THE MONTH YOUR FACE WILL BE HISTORY. WE HAVE STOPPED SELLING THE DVD UNTIL COVER IS REPLACED. WE HAVE FURTHER CHECKED OUT YOUR NAME AND ITS NOT LIKE IT'S A HOUSE WHOLE NAME. ACTUALLY, REMOVING YOUR IMAGE WILL HELP IMPROVE THE SELL OF THE DVD..... SO FAR IT BOMBED.

THEY ARE REMAKING THE COVER AS WE SPEAK SO YOUR TEN SECONDS OF FAME WILL SOON COME TO AN END.

AS FOR COMPSENSATION;YOUR SILLY!

We can't help but appreciate the juxtaposition of our beloved semicolon and the wrong form of "you're." These pornographers, who make their business by slapping new covers on old DVDs, are clearly classy with a "K."

Lara, now seventeen, needs a lawyer. Oddly, nobody is willing to take her case. Come on Verizon, lend Lara one of your blood-sucking lawyers; they could have this straightened out in an hour. — CAREY GREENBERG-BERGER

(HELP) TVX Films situation (still not resolved) [deviantART]
(Photo: Lara Jade.)

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Sat, 26 May 2007 09:01:45 EDT Carey http://consumerist.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=263775&view=rss&microfeed=true
<![CDATA[ MPAA Says: "DRM Exists To Annoy Honest Customers" ]]> We saw this astonishing quote from Dan Glickman of the MPAA over at the Beeb, when asked about the effectiveness of DRM:

No, it is not correct to assume that one clever hack dooms all use of DRM. Content owners use DRMs because it provides casual, honest users with guidelines for using and consuming content based on the usage rights that were acquired. Without the use of DRMs, honest consumers would have no guidelines and might eventually come to totally disregard copyright and therefore become a pirate, resulting in great harm to content creators.

Isn't that just the reaction you'd expect from an MPAA bigwig? DRM isn't there to stop criminals, because it can't; it's there because, without DRM, honest consumers wouldn't have "guidelines" on how to properly (read: prohibitively) enjoy their legally owned product. In other words, this is a clear admission by the MPAA that DRM's only purpose is to annoy honest customers. Great!

There's some other interesting Q&A's about film industry rationale, ranging from region-encoding to simultaneous DVD/cinema release. And Lavinia Carey of the British Video Association cites this astonishing statistic: " UK research shows that, on average, downloaders are film fans who view the same number of legitimate films (cinema, rented and bought DVDs) as the average active DVD consumer (24). On top of that, they also consume illegitimately acquired movies. "

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Thu, 09 Feb 2006 15:03:14 EST consumerist.com http://consumerist.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=153871&view=rss&microfeed=true