I need to break a law to be free.
Oct 20 '00 (Updated Dec 19 '00)
Before your click on the rating button I have clarify that I am not saying that the film studios are wrong to protect themselves from piracy. Hope you rate my opinion on the effects of the DVD regional coding and not whether you agree with my belief.
For those who do not realised this already if you read the back of your DVD movie you should see the label which say Region 1 or words like For US and Canada only. It says that if anyone who would like to purchase, sell or bring this copy of that DVD into another country other then these they are lawbreaker and punishable. Motion Picture Association of America claims they have to enforce this because they would like to protect theirs films archives and works from illegal copying. You can read further on this website http://www.mpaa.org/Press/DVD_FAQ.htm. I can understand their fear and wishes but the solution they proposed solution is unfair and possibly not ethical as well.
We should consider DVD the same as music CDs, magazines and books. If anyone try to argue for legislation today that a copy of a music CD can only be used and marketed in one country or continent alone by law, you should think it is ridiculous. If during your travel abroad you find your favourite singer CD is selling cheaper or find a title not available at home I am sure you would like to purchase and take back home to enjoy at leisure later without the complication of technical incompatibility or worst restriction of commence law.
In the development of DVD technology it was conceived from the beginning that like CD, any player in the world could play any disc available. There will be one format and it will be compatible irrespective of the country television system. I think it is a very good and clever idea even if I do not know how difficult it is to implement due to the myriad of system in the world like PAL, NTSC etc available. I am sure you would agree it is a good thing if manufacturers could from the beginning agrees on a unified system and not confused the user with another war of format. Are you a Mac or PC user? Are you a Playstation or Nintendo gamer?
I am staying in Scotland, which is coded as Region 2 like the rest of Europe and Japan. The catalogue is very small and limited say about one tenth of US catalogue. Hollywood Region 3 titles, for South East Asia, are only less then 50 in the shops. I have no patient for argument that it is all right for some authority to dictate somebody else choice of movies they would like or even could see. We are told that the regional coding helps protect the practice of staggered cinema release. In that case what about movies already been shown a few times around the world years ago. What are they protecting? Why should television series like the original Star Trek be available in North America only? I believe this work the other way as well. If people in Quebec would like to see more French speaking movies do they have do be dictated by a few importing company what they could only watch? In this day and age of Internet discussion on line and shopping I believe this is archaic practice.
Actually come to think about it just because some studio say it is expensive for them to produce enough copies of celluloid film for simultaneous worldwide global release why should it be my problem. Why should we in Europe and the rest of the world have to wait for months and then watch films that are inferior having sustained some degree of damaged already?
You would think perhaps they could use the regional DVD to be made more suitable for the specific requirements and needs of the market. One of the heavily promoted advantages of DVD over its older format was the extra available spaces will be used for director commentary, product notes, surround sound, choice of audio languages and subtitles. When consumers find out that some region 2 discs have inferior picture, sound quality as well as devoid of the extra features found in earlier region 1 releases they are having none of it. Shops stock region 1 disc because they are in more demand. In the end the strong-arm of the law have to be used to stop this practice. However, in Britain at least I notice complete clampdown was not enforced. Consumer could import on individual basis as long as it is for personal use by post or by Internet. Perhaps someone in authority recognised that total ban even to personal use could be one step to far to take.
Unfortunately movies could still been censored by nannies state like Britain. It is irritating and annoying especially if the British Film and Censorship Board can find the need to cut Disney cartoon films for British DVD release. More worrying is censorship that may prevent freedom of speech, expression and knowledge. We need total freedom uncensored to develop an understanding of our world or current issues. If a book is prevented from been imported and read in a country especially if they are not available in that country bookstores you will immediately think it is very dubious. One example I can think of now is the movie Schindler’s List by Steven Spielberg. It is ban in Malaysia where the majority are Muslim. It has been ban from both cinema and video release. My family is from Malaysia and I would not suggest we should advocate copies of this movie to be smuggled into that country. We should respect their wish even though the official reason given that the movie was ban is stated as only because it contents a lot of nudity and violence. My point is that regional coding allows censorship of media like movies to continue even more easily.
Lets come to the issue of piracy. Again I will use the example that I can confidently comment on. For countries in SEA it is actually not for the benefit that consumer to like piracy because they are themselves being ripe off as well. Most pirated movies in VHS and Video Compact Disc (VCD) are very bad. They are no more then privately made hand camcorder taken over the cinema screen. Local cinema complexes and shops are also losing business. Unfortunately, our world economy disparity between the developing world and developed countries like us are too wide to be having the same standard of pricing. Contrary to western beliefs products from the West when sold in Malaysia are not significantly readjusted to be affordable. Based on the income of average person the following is the real cost of some of our export. A copy of music CD is as if it is $40 of US dollars. DVD will be $120. Copy of Newsweek is $15. A full version of Microsoft Word 2000 is over $2000. I would suggest that since VCD is very popular in places like SEA and China, film studios could release movies in this format as well and priced them in the region of $20 of local money or just above VHS tapes. That will be a more reasonable way to stop DVD piracy. VCD format is not popular in US or Europe so they will not interfere with these markets.
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Epinions.com ID:
GeraldLui
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Member: Gerald Lui
Location: Scotland
Reviews written: 20
Trusted by: 11 members
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