posted 10-29-2007 06:03 PM                    

Yes I know we have a thread for news articles, but this one is a standout as it directly relates to the industry. (And also because it's my site darnit.)

So it looks like Universal is already blaming the failure of American Gangster on internet piracy before it even opens. Nice save guys!

Also I find this article very interesting in that Universal is telling people that the copies available for free download on the internet are "pristine copies". Why would you tell people that would otherwise be expecting a crappy camcorder job or a watermarked screener that they can download a perfect copy?

Also, the quote "consumers are then more likely to buy a theater ticket rather than a poor-quality bootleg DVD."

And since when did moviebootlegging become a word?

Link to story, reprinted from Wall Street Journal

quote:

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Hollywood security not enough to foil movie bootleggers

BY SARAH MCBRIDE AND PETER SANDERS THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

Posted on Monday, October 29, 2007

A new high-profile moviebootlegging case involving the coming Oscar hopeful American Gangster shows that Hollywood’s supposedly reinforced preventive measures on piracy aren’t as reliable as the industry thought.

The movie, which stars Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe, is being distributed by General Electric Co. ’s Universal Pictures and is set to open to the public Friday. The premiere took place Oct. 19 at the Apollo Theater in New York.

But the movie has been available since at least Wednesday at various file-sharing sites on the Internet. High-quality DVDs were being sold for $ 5 on Thursday morning in Los Angeles, where someone in a car pulled up in front of a Wilshire Boulevard office building and quickly sold a few copies before moving on.

While studios have come to accept that their movies will quickly find their way onto the Internet after their theatrical releases, they have been fighting hard to prevent them from landing online before they hit the big screen. For the past few years, the studios seemed to be succeeding in that mission, with few prerelease-piracy issues. The companies have taken extensive security precautions at prerelease screenings in theaters and have been vigilant about stamping watermarks on other copies of films that circulate in a quest to identify potential pirates.

But early releases are on the upswing again. Earlier this year, Ratatouille, the animated film from Walt Disney Co. ’s Pixar, began appearing online about 10 days before its official release. Other titles that have been affected this year include Weinstein Co. ’s Sicko and Lions Gate Entertainment Corp. ’s Hostel: Part II. The events show that leaks may be occurring during postproduction, when various vendors working on each film have access to it.

The impact of such releases on a film’s ultimate box-office and DVD performance is hard to gauge, but industry officials say there is no doubt that it hurts.

“The longer you can prevent a scenario like this one with American Gangster from occurring, the better the return on investment for a studio,” said John Desmond, vice president of SafeNet Inc. ’s MediaSentry, an online piracy-research company.

In the case of American Gangster, the problem is compounded by the excellent quality of the bootleg versions, which appear to be pristine, lacking even the “not-for-distribution” scroll at the bottom of the screen that would identify it as an “early screener.” If a movie is going to be pirated, the ideal for studios is for poorquality copies to predominate online for as long as possible, Desmond said, since consumers are then more likely to buy a theater ticket rather than a poor-quality bootleg DVD.

Universal officials say they aren’t sure how a copy of the movie leaked. In recent years, studios have clamped down on many sources of piracy, such as copies leaking out from postproduction houses or members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, who vote for the Oscar awards and typically receive DVD copies of films at the beginning of the annual awards season. But Universal says that isn’t the case in this instance.

“There have been no screeners sent out to members of the academy so that’s 100 percent impossible as the cause of how this leaked,” said Michael Moses, a Universal Pictures spokesman.

American Gangster is a project many years and more than $ 100 million in the making, and the studio has high Oscar hopes for it. The early release is “disappointing and devastating, but unfortunately, it’s part of doing business,” Moses said.

Equating every bootleg copy with a lost sale is faulty logic, many in the industry say. Many people who buy the illegal copy are prepared to spend $ 5 for the bootlegged movie but wouldn’t have forked out $ 20 for the legitimate DVD, let alone paid for the whole family to see it in a theater.

The situation leaves studios in a predicament. They need to hammer hard on piracy, presenting it as a serious problem worthy of crackdowns by law enforcement, lawsuits and massive public-relations campaigns.

At the same time, they are sometimes reluctant to concede ground to the pirates. After the leak of Hostel: Part II, Tom Ortenberg, president of Lions Gate Films Releasing, told the Los Angeles Times it wouldn’t hurt box-office sales much because the early leak was of such poor quality. When the movie didn’t do well as well as he had hoped, director Eli Roth blamed piracy.

The industry has prosecuted individual pirates — though the consequences are often underwhelming. When Star Wars: Episode III — Revenge of the Sith leaked online a few hours before its 2005 release, the industry used forensic technology to determine that the leak originated with an employee at a postproduction house who had lent a copy of the movie to friends, one of whom uploaded it onto the Internet.

Eight individuals we re charged in that case, most with misdemeanors. The man who originally took the movie was sentenced to two years ’ probation and a fine of $ 2, 500. The uploader was fined $ 1, 000 and sentenced to four months’ house arrest as part of a threeyear probation.

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posted 10-29-2007 08:23 PM                    

quote:

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The events show that leaks may be occurring during postproduction, when various vendors working on each film have access to it.

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Um....DUUUUUUUUUHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!


Fucking Hollywood idiots.

Weren't we pointing out this very issue when "crap code" was all the shiznit on 35mm film prints? Hollywood studios: it's your fucking DVD-R screener discs. That's what's getting pirated. I wish one of those studio "suits" was in my living right now so I could punch him in the face with a can of Green Giant creamed corn!

quote:

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The impact of such releases on a film’s ultimate box-office and DVD performance is hard to gauge, but industry officials say there is no doubt that it hurts.

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quote:

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When the movie didn’t do well as well as he had hoped, director Eli Roth blamed piracy.

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quote:

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When Star Wars: Episode III — Revenge of the Sith leaked online a few hours before its 2005 release, the industry used forensic technology to determine that the leak originated with an employee at a postproduction house who had lent a copy of the movie to friends, one of whom uploaded it onto the Internet.

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Ah. A leak which "crap code" would have done nothing to prevent. Of course all of the people running Hollywood studios know the truth in where leaks occur for movie piracy. Obviously the problem is not costing them enough money that they would do something like force movie stars and movie critics to watch the movie in a regular movie theater. They'll keep playing fast and loose with post production materials and DVD screener discs yet still blame problems of piracy on movie theaters.

posted 10-30-2007 08:42 PM                       

quote: Chris Slycord

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I'm sure all your screenings have a manager or a supervisor of some sort in them.

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