Someone Should Make a Move About This

I've blogged a lot about the obscene behavior of the music industry as it relates to pirates. The major four labels (which own a whole lot of smaller labels) sue sue sue anyone, regardless if the targets are alive, employed, own a computer, are of a decent age. The idea of big business suing individuals sickens me. So I boycott all non-independent record labels. I encourage you to do the same.

But what of the television and movie industries? While the movie industry is evil, is that a reason enough to boycott? At first, you may think so. But if you do your homework to find out if any company you may support has a history of evil, you'll soon be living on your own barge in international waters, living off of whatever you can grow.

In Today's Article we see 6 things the film industry doesn't want you to know.

Summary:

1. Using clever accounting tricks, movies that gross large can net nothing. The guy in the original Darth Vader costume has never been paid for The Return of the Jedi because that movie hasn't made a profit in 30 years.
2. They extort movie theatres - which is why a popcorn and a pop can cause you to have to take out a second mortgage on your house.
3. Movie review quotes taken wildly out of context.
4. Redefined copyright laws to go from protecting an artist and his works, to protecting the studios' profits for years and years to come.
5. Because the studios get more money from pay-per-view DVD sales, rentals don't make as much money, so they charge video rental places (like Blockbuster, Netflix, and your corner store) insane prices for rental editions of movies. A DVD that costs you $20 at the store, costs a rental place more like $100.
6. While stories can be copyrighted, ideas can't. Studios routinely reject scripts, only to turn around and write another script based on the same idea so they can control IP rights.

So, there you have it. Six reasons the movie industry is a cesspool. I don't know how that relates to the television industry. Is that enough for a boycott? If so, there's a lot of worse industries one should boycott to be consistent. If not...I don't know. Gotta think about it some more.

I'm boycotting the record companies because they're suing their customers. What about movie studios? In this case, it's mostly the independent studios that are suing. In fact, here's an article that talks about that. Their practices seem to be similar to those of the music industry. The first story is about a blind man being sued for downloading porn. You think they might have gotten the wrong guy? In the end, instead of trying to prove his obvious innocence, he settled with the studio.  It's cheaper and easier and keeps his name out of the papers.  And it's basically extortion.  Now that should be illegal!