Minicam movie pirate gets record-breaking five years in prison

I dunno why I'm wasting my time replying to somebody that isn't even up to putting their name beside what they say, but...hey, I guess I'm bored.

"Firstly, how do you know how much the creator receives? I suspect you in fact don't, but are relying on "common knowledge". So the whole thing is based on supposition." - that's right. People sign contracts, but don't tend to want to discuss said contracts.

I can name you a bunch of well paid movie stars. I can even name some bit players in B-movies. But with notable exceptions of scriptwriters who got famous in their own right (the Joss Whedons of the world) and directors who tend to write their own stories (the James Camerons of the world), I can't name you one single scriptwriter.

However...

"It's also worth pointing out we're talking about the movie industry today, which is a completely different kettle of fish to the music industry, but hey." - it is easier to talk about the music industry for two reasons; the first is simplicity as in many cases the composer and the performer are the same person (at least, for the stuff I listen to) and it is simpler to find information on how much a person would receive based upon a standard contract. Let me ask you - if you are watching a film based upon a Japanese film based upon an animé (or manga) based upon a light novel, who the hell is the "creator"? There are so many fingers in the pie that it is going to be difficult to determine who to call "creator". Logically it would be the author of the light novel, but maybe a lot of the character designs were devised by the manga/animé team? The Japanese movie would then jiggle the story to better fit the duration/constraints of a film; and the Hollywood remake would ditch all the stuff that wouldn't make so much sense to an American audience and stick in things they think would be better. Who's the "creator" now? Who has the most influence on the final product - the scriptwriter, the directory, or the editor? That is why I referred to music. It's simpler to discuss.

"Secondly, what is a few pennies divided by zero? The creator goes from receiving something to receiving nothing. It isn't right, as OP said, so why argue the point on this basis? If you don't pay, you are rejecting the principle that people should be paid for their work." - I'm tempted to call you penny wise and pound foolish. You have rather missed the point, so let me outline it for you. If I buy an album, at full price, and the actual creator receives a few pennies, in which screwed up version of reality is this right? The difference for them between a ripped off download of an entire album and a legal purchase is around 50p (if they wrote) and a quid (if they wrote and performed). Per song, we're looking at 5-10p apiece assuming ten songs on an album. Now think about how much you pay for a song download, and for an album. You seem to believe it is sufficient to say that people should be paid for their work. The point I was getting at was that people should be paid fairly for their work. Important difference - without them there would be no product, so why does the credit card company receive more than the songwriter? [go read the Guardian article linked on the second page of comments]

"Thirdly, year after year, people still voluntarily enter into such contracts with the recording industry, without coercion. It may be a shitty deal, but presumably it's better than no deal, which is why people sign." - you might find this interesting: http://www.negativland.com/news/?page_id=17

"Someone with neither the talent nor the opportunity to make that choice, and with no particular insight into the costs involved in promoting an artist, seems ill-qualified to determine what is or is not a shitty deal anyway." - if you are referring to me here, then you are right that I have neither the talent nor opportunity to look to accepting or rejecting a recording deal. I can, however, read. Allow me to quote from the Guardian article: "Regardless of what royalty rate he's on, Skinner will still have to cover all recording and promotional costs from his share of the income.", and if that isn't enough to convince you that the musicians/band cough up for a lot of the stuff out of their share (just what is the purpose of the label if they don't take on some of these costs!?), the negativland article lays it out quite clearly. It is depressing.

"The people making the most noise on this are in fact the pirates," - the pirates are the ones that lobbied congress in the US for the fee per stolen song to be $150K? The pirates are the ones that confiscated a child's laptop for a failed attempt at an illegal download, with the thing in question subsequently purchased legally before said confiscation? The pirates aren't the ones claiming that $58 billion per year is lost to the US economy (and this $58-lots-of-zeroes applies only to the US, scale it up for global damage) - though as Rob Reid points out, the claimed losses due to piracy - this $58b per year, is on par with the entire maize crop failing, plus all of the fruit crops, plus, well, pretty much all of the crops failing. [ http://www.ted.com/talks/rob_reid_the_8_billion_ipod.html and http://blog.ted.com/2012/03/20/the-numbers-behind-the-copyright-math/ ]

"who have an endless barrage of crappy self-serving excuses for behaviour which they know damned well is immoral," - funny, it's the same whatever side of the fence you look. Either way, the creator gets shafted.

"of which "well we're not depriving the artists of *much*" is perhaps the shittiest. If recording artists really are on the bread-line, as you imply,". Lesson one: understand the concept of "irony". Lesson two: understand the concept of "sarcasm". Then try again.

The point, as it obviously needs to be stated again and again to you is how little the artists receive from our purchase.

I dream, and hope, of a time and place in the future where digital downloading will be simple, affordable, and not tied up with licence bullshit [you have a song, I have money, who gives a damn what countries either of us are in]. A track will cost, say, 50p. 10p will go to the hosting service provider. 10p will go to the transaction handler. About 30p (how much would the VAT be?) will go to the band/artist. That is per track. They'll be looking at around £2.50-3 per album sale, which is surely better than the current standard arrangement. You'll notice that the record companies are not even mentioned. This probably explains all the screaming, wailing, and gnashing of teeth from them at the moment. They'll want to resist the option of musicians selling directly to their fans with every fibre of their being. It's just a shame they are so shamelessly fucking up "copyright" in the process of rescusitating their dying business model.

I agree his analogy is flawed because taking your wallet deprives you of the ability to use its contents even briefly. But the larger point is still valid. If the wallet wasn't grabbed but instead he memorialised them while you were making a purchase from someone, you are probably closer to a representative analogy.

Nope. By memorising my CC number you certainly haven't committed a theft. You've just learned something! Learning is good mmmkay.

I'd still have my card number. All's well.

Many companies, their employees and several close family members and friends already have precisely that information and they haven't stolen anything either. If you or any of them were to pass my card number on to a third party, you still wouldn't have stolen anything. If said third party then USED THE INFORMATION to take my money WITHOUT MY CONSENT, then AT THAT POINT that third party WOULD have committed a theft/fraud as something of mine would have been taken and AT THAT POINT you could be implicated as a conspirator (but you still wouldn't have stolen anything)... Do you see?

You really need to lay off the RIAA koolaid... you've had WAY too much already! It's rotting your brain.

So if I were to rob the corner shop, and then return the goods I stole, I wouldn't have commited a crime?

>Reminds me of one of my favourite Ted Talks

That was very good!

Hell, people could argue that the move in fashion from prog rock to punk cost jobs, because punk didn't require as many sitar players or as much of the studio engineer's time. We live in a strange world where people are (in theory) rewarded for inventing labour-saving devices, yet politicians are desperate to be seen to be creating jobs.

...

If I didn't have to work full time to live, I'd love to lend a hand on a film set- be it serving meals to the cast, carrying kit, or creating props and concept art if my skills lay in that area.