Techdirt. Stories filed under "vcr"

Hollywood & The RIAA Won't Let Tech Save Them

Mike Masnick — Wed, 27 Jun 2012 10:34:00 PDT

We've discussed in the past how ridiculous it is to claim that there's a fight between "Hollywood and Silicon Valley." After all, the tech industry keeps creating the tools for Hollywood to succeed and broaden its market... and every time they do so, Hollywood responds by attacking those providing the tools. Every innovation that created a vast new market from which to profit from has been attacked. The gramophone. Radio. TV. Cable TV. The VCR. The MP3 player. YouTube. The DVR. In the end, all of these created great new opportunities, but were attacked. As we've said, it's a very strange war where one side (tech) is building all the weapons for the other side... only to see them point those new weapons at their own feet.

Of course, it's actually even worse than that. Because, not only does Hollywood point these new weapons at their own feet... they then try to sue and blame the tech industry for creating these same weapons. It's a pretty hostile environment.

And this is a massive problem for Hollywood. Because, throughout history, it has been shown that the only solution that actually helps solve the "issue" of "piracy" is the creation of new and useful legitimate services. And the entertainment industry is doing its best to scare everyone off from doing that by attacking each of those new services as it comes about. Entrepreneur Tyler Crowley has a great analogy explaining how the entertainment industry is driving the very innovators it needs help from away. He talks about how entrepreneurs look at markets as "islands of opportunity." He lists out a few, such as the Facebook island and the Apple island.

For tech folks, from the 35,000' view, there are islands of opportunity. There's Apple Island, Facebook Island, Microsoft Island, among many others and yes there's Music Biz Island. Now, we as tech folks have many friends who have sailed to Apple Island and we know that it's $99/year to doc your boat and if you build anything Apple Island will tax you at 30%. Many of our friends are partying their asses off on Apple Island while making millions (and in some recent cases billions) and that sure sounds like a nice place to build a business.

He talks about a few other of these "islands of opportunity" (and does a nice job breaking them down). But then he gets to the "music biz island" (which I'd argue is actually the "legacy entertainment biz island") and notes the hostile reception:

Now, we also know of Music Biz Island which is where the natives start firing cannons as you approach, and if not stuck at sea, one must negotiate with the chiefs for 9 months before given permission to dock. Those who do go ashore are slowly eaten alive by the native cannibals. As a result, all the tugboats and lighthouses (investors, advisors) warn to stay far away from Music Biz Island, as nobody has ever gotten off alive. If that wasn't bad enough, while Apple and Facebook Island are built with sea walls to protect from the rising oceans, Music Biz Island is already 5 ft under and the educated locals are fleeing for Topspin Island.

In other words, the good entrepreneurs, who actually can help the entertainment industry (some of whom tried in the past) are actively pushed away from helping. And then the entertainment industry whines that no one wants to help them. Perhaps they should look at being just a bit more welcoming...

On a side note: Crowley's writeup was actually in response to a dinner gathering at some super super swank LA eatery that tried to bring together the heads of the major labels with some LA entrepreneurs. That's actually encouraging, though, again, meeting in backrooms is still missing the point. Why is it so hard for the industry to have a discussion in public?

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After Years Of Trying To Kill YouTube, Movie Studios Are Embracing & Profiting From It

Mike Masnick — Mon, 7 May 2012 07:19:00 PDT

When the Betamax/VCR first came out, Hollywood insisted that it was pure evil and that it would be "the Boston Strangler" to the movie business. And, if you looked at how the devices were used at first, you could easily argue that the vast, vast majority of the usage was, in fact, infringing. In part, that was because the movie studios were so freaked out about such devices, they couldn't even comprehend offering licensed movies for home viewing at the time. Instead, the device was purely about "theft." Of course, after a drawn out trial, the Supreme Court (very closely) came down in favor of the VCR, and said that because it had substantial non-infringing uses, it was legal. Just a few years after that, the home video market for the major Hollywood studios was so large, that it was widely claimed that the VCR saved Hollywood, rather than killing it.

This story is not a unique one. We seem to see the same thing with every disruptive technology that old guard entertainment firms can't comprehend. When radio was introduced it was declared that it would kill the music industry. The RIAA worked hard to have the MP3 player declared illegal.

It happens over and over again -- and each and every time, soon afterwards, new markets emerge, new opportunities become abundantly clear, and the platform that was supposedly pure evil and bent on the destruction of the industry turns out to be a huge new revenue base and opportunity, usually providing revenue in ways that simply weren't possible before that new technology came along.

It sure looks like the same exact thing is happening with YouTube. As you probably know, Viacom is still engaged in a drawn out lawsuit against YouTube over many thousands of clips that Viacom insists were infringing and a massive blight on its bottom line.

And yet... because YouTube had the time to develop, something interesting has been happening. By now you're hopefully all familiar with ContentID. While it has its quirks and issues, one thing that is clear is that it's become a tremendous source of revenue for content creators to monetize works uploaded by others. But it's not just others. NPR has a story about how the major MPAA Hollywood studios -- including Viacom -- are now profiting nicely by purposely uploading all sorts of clips from their various movies, knowing that people are searching for and watching key moments... which they can monetize:

Oh, and the fun part: she gets to watch movies, pick the most memorable moments, and upload those clips to YouTube. Today, it's L.A. Story.

"We always pick a clip that has a beginning, middle and an end," says Strickland, pointing out the various fields she has to fill out in the content management system before she uploads a clip to YouTube. "I put everyone that's in the scene: so Steve Martin, Richard Grant, Victoria Tennant, Sarah Jessica Parker, I put some of the memorable dialogue — 'SanDeE your breasts feel weird, oh, that's because they're real' — then you put discussion topics, character types, settings, eras, what they're doing."

It consists of hours of tedious work to ensure this licensed content will show up first when you go searching for your favorite movie clip on YouTube. Not an easy task when 60 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute.

This is a company that all the big MPAA studios are hiring to go out, find these clips in their own movies, and upload them (and then do things to get them to the top of Google searches). Apparently, it's quite lucrative for the studios. Of course, what's funny is that the same people who are now celebrating this new revenue stream are also the ones who just a few years ago insisted not only that YouTube was illegal, but that it was dead, because no money could be made from it. But, somehow, these things have a way of working themselves out if they're allowed to do so.

This is one of the things that is so troubling to me about the abrupt shutdown of Megaupload. While, at an initial glance, it's easy to insist that the service must be illegal, the company was actually very actively trying out unique new business models for artists, which many artists celebrated. But we'll never know how well those would have worked. When the VCR, radio, the MP3 player and YouTube first came on the scene, the industry insisted they were all just as bad as Megaupload. In hindsight those arguments seem pretty silly -- but it seems like we'll never be able to get that same hindsight for Megaupload. And that's a real shame for the content creators who almost certainly would have embraced new business models enabled by this new technology.

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What Would The Movie Business Be Like If The MPAA Succeeded In Killing The VCR?

Mike Masnick — Wed, 2 Nov 2011 11:05:05 PDT

As the fight over the E-PARASITE/SOPA bill continues, it's worth taking a step back, and conducting a short thought exercise:

What would the movie business be like today, if the MPAA had succeeded in banning the VCR?

Remember, in the Betamax case, the studios sought to kill off the VCR, leading to the famous quote from MPAA boss Jack Valenti:

I say to you that the VCR is to the American film producer and the American public as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone.

And, Valenti and the MPAA came very close to convincing the courts, who only granted immunity for those offerings with substantial non-infringing uses by the narrowest of margins (though court initially decided to side with the MPAA before changing its mind). Unfortunately, while SOPA seeks to couch its broad upending of the legal and technical frameworks of much of the internet in the claim that this is "just" about "stopping pirate sites," twenty years ago, this case was about "just" stopping this "pirate technology."

But what happened after that? Once the court finally declared VCRs legal, suddenly the movie industry exploded. With this new method of video distribution, the entire movie business was reinvented in a good way. It meant no longer just viewing in the theaters. An entire new category soon took over: home movie viewing (and renting). Before long, the home video market actually overtook the theater. And, these days, ironically, what do you hear the MPAA whining about the most? That online sharing is decimating the home video market. Of course, if the MPAA had had its way 20 years ago, we wouldn't even have a home video market.

So the thought exercise of where the movie industry would be today, if the VCR had been declared dedicated to infringing purposes twenty years ago, seems particularly relevant. That's doubly true, seeing as the E-PARASITE bill effectively looks to overturn the court's Betamax decision, and open up the floodgates for the MPAA (and others) to cut off all funding from any new technology it believes is "dedicated to the theft of US property" under the exceedingly broad definitions in the bill.

Take a moment, and consider where the movie business would be today, if the VCR never existed. And think about just how wrong the MPAA was then to freak out about a technology that later saved it. And consider that perhaps we should wait before changing the law to allow the MPAA to kill off the next "VCR" in the digital age.

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Copyright Battles Are About Controlling New Technologies

Timothy Lee — Thu, 22 May 2008 12:39:00 PDT

Copyright guru William Patry has a really interesting post remembering Harvey Schein, the man who oversaw the American launch of the Betamax VCR as head of Sony's American division. That was, of course, the product that produced the famous Sony decision upholding the legality of the VCR and its "record" button. The Betamax precedent is widely seen as a foundation of the modern consumer electronics industry because it gives manufacturers confidence that they can build useful media tools without worrying about liability should their customers use the tools to infringe copyright.

Patry mentions an aspect of the case that I hadn't realized before: MCA/Universal, the lead plaintiff, wasn't just worried that the VCR owners would tape shows rather than watching re-runs. It was also planning to release a laser disc technology called Disco Vision. MCA/Universal apparently worried that a successful Betamax VCR would have undercut the market for laser discs. Schein is quoted as saying "I don't think it was accidental that the company that took the lead in fighting the videocassette held all the patents on the videosdisc."

This will sound eerily familiar to anyone familiar with more recent copyright controversies. For more than three decades, Hollywood and the recording industry have consistently tried to use copyright law to stop any technology they didn't control. In 1992, the music industry persuaded Congress to mandate cumbersome DRM for digital audio formats, stunting the development of that technology. In 1998, the music industry unsuccessfully tried to sue the MP3 player out of existence. Also in 1998, at the behest of the copyright lobby Congress enacted the DMCA, which gave content creators unprecedented control over the design of technological devices. Hollywood has used the DMCA to effectively outlaw set-top boxes that act as DVD jukeboxes.

Of course, in every one of these cases, the copyright lobby's arguments have focused on the threat of "piracy." But when they've won, the practical result has been to give content creators the power to control the evolution of media devices. And when Hollywood and the record labels control technological progress, the results aren't pretty.

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