The MPAA, who would love a decisive victory against a cyberlocker service under their belt, probably selected Hotfile because of its relative lack of might when compared to market leaders RapidShare and MegaUpload. The company also has a track record of settling lawsuits rather than fighting them. The outcome in the case, whichever way it goes, will have serious implications for others in the same field in the United States.

At this stage there are no indications Hotfile will roll over in this case, but as pages and pages of legal papers are filed and responded to, it is becoming increasingly clear that the MPAA is determined to play hardball.

In a filing from Hotfile dated June 17th, the company bemoans the tactics employed by the MPAA, describing their requests for information as “over-reaching” and tantamount to “murder by litigation.”

So what data does the MPAA want from Hotfile? In a single word – everything.

“In five short demands for documents and two related interrogatories, Plaintiffs seek all data referring to all files hosted by Hotfile, all data about Hotfile’s users, all data about Hotfile’s business partners [aka affiliates], every line of source code ever written, and virtually every conceivable piece of financial data available regarding Hotfile or its business partners or its individual founders,” Hotfile’s legal time write.

Nevertheless, it appears that up to a point Hotfile is prepared to comply with the requests of the MPAA. However, as the tables below show, the company is trying to protect the identities of users and affiliates as much as it can.

The MPAA’s requests for disclosure go beyond user data. The Hollywood outfit is demanding that Hotfile hands over every version of the site’s source code that has ever existed.

Hotfile is currently resisting that request, describing its code as a trade secret which took two people more than 1,000 hours to create. Hotfile’s software gives it a competitive advantage, its legal team argues, and it would prove catastrophic if it fell into the wrong hands.

The case is becoming increasingly complex and is already developing into a bloody legal brawl. Will Hotfile continue to resist the temptation to settle in the face of “murderous litigation”, or will it concede defeat in the face of overwhelming opposition and financial resources?

Hotfile uploaders, downloaders and affiliates will certainly be hoping for the former.

Source: Hotfile Battles MPAA Over Private User Data Disclosure

The mechanism preferred by the big recording and movie studios is the so-called ‘graduated response’ scheme, whereby Internet users are subjected to ever increasing punishments for their infringing behaviors.

Now, having faced resistance for so long, it seems that the MPAA and RIAA will get their way in the United States.

According to CNET, some of the country’s largest ISPs including AT&T, Comcast, and Verizon are close to striking a deal with Hollywood and Big Music to put in a framework of measures to progressively punish errant subscribers.

Although a final agreement is yet to be signed, plans are said to be “on track” and could be officially unveiled next month. The deal is believed to be structured as follows:

- Rightsholders track infringing Internet users and send notices to ISPs
- ISPs used this data to send warnings, called “Copyright Alerts”, to subscribers
- If subscribers fail to improve their behavior, further warnings will be issued

Eventually though, ISPs have agreed to get tough with customers who don’t heed warnings.

Sources quoted by CNET say that ISPs will be a given flexibility to select from a “menu” of sanctions, including throttling a subscriber’s connection through to limiting web browsing. One scenario would see the web almost completely removed, with access granted only to the top 200 websites. Other more gentle measures include copyright-awareness programs.

However, unlike the legislative changes already implemented in the UK, the range of sanctions in the US will not include the dreaded “3rd strike”, i.e complete termination of the subscriber’s account. Currently there is no mention of temporary suspensions either; they could prove a deal-breaker in this sensitive environment.

The agreements between the MPAA, RIAA and ISPs in the United States will be completely voluntary. The ISPs will insist that they are completely within their rights to amend their Terms of Service to accommodate such an agreement and will almost certainly do so quickly.

In March, during the House Judiciary Subcommittee hearing on Intellectual Property, Competition, and the Internet, it became increasingly clear that the US government would be backing voluntary agreements to deal with the subscriber end of infringement, rather than the legislative change approach favored for dealing with file-sharing and streaming websites.

“Voluntary cooperative solutions are a priority focus and we believe that, in combination with law enforcement action, voluntary actions by the private sector have the potential to dramatically reduce online infringement and change the enforcement paradigm,” said U.S. Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator Victoria Espinel.

“We will continue to push forward to encourage voluntary cooperative actions on multiple fronts. Our ultimate goal is to reduce infringement online so we will continue to assess our approach to ensure that it is as effective as possible.”

The costs of the ‘graduated response’ will be shared between the entertainment industries and ISPs, meaning that regular Internet subscribers will, as always, pick up the enforcement tab.

Source: MPAA, RIAA, Major ISPs Preparing ‘Graduated Response’ To Piracy

While the debate over whether corporations should be allowed to lobby crime-fighting organizations such as the police and FBI will rage on, at least there is an enforced level of transparency which allows the public to see where lobbyists are spending their money.

The MPAA have just made their mandatory disclosure for the first quarter of 2011 and it makes interesting reading.

In total the member companies of the MPAA – Disney, Sony, Warner Bros., Paramount, 20th Century Fox and Universal – spent $400,000 in the first three months of the year lobbying influential government departments. These included the office of Vice-President Joe Biden, a valuable MPAA ally in 2010 with his mantra of “Piracy Is Theft, Clean and Simple.”

In the filing, which covers the period from January 1st to March 31st, several government departments are listed repeatedly including the U.S Senate, House of Representatives, Homeland Security, Dept. of Justice, FBI, ICE, U.S. Copyright Office and U.S. Trade Representative.

On the back of moves to turn the activity into a felony, it’s no surprise that streaming illegal content featured heavily in the MPAA’s 1st quarter lobbying. Considering the huge effort already underway with domain seizures, many of them streaming-related, Operation in Our Sites remained firmly on the agenda.

Also listed is the issue of “Pay processors role in IP enforcement”, a reference to the developing strategy of strangling the revenue to sites that the MPAA believe are generating income from infringement.

In November 2010, file-hosting service RapidShare was among the first Internet services to be labelled by both the MPAA and RIAA as a so-called “Rogue Site”, a move which forced the cyberlocker service to initiate lobbying of its own.

In 2011 it is evident that Hollywood is continuing to pressure on the Swiss-based company. RapidShare is mentioned several times in the MPAA disclosure report under several headings, not least ‘Rogue Site Legislation’ and ‘Law Enforcement/Crime and Criminal Justice’.

Interestingly, ‘Graduated Response’ is also listed as a lobbying subject, although the U.S. appeared to rule out so-called “3 strikes” regimes earlier this month in response to a United Nations report.

On the educational front, the MPAA is keen to drive home the anti-P2P message to the country’s schools and universities. Equally it is pushing for anti-camcording activities in the Asia-Pacific region plus awareness of counterfeit movie usage at US military bases, a subject we’ve touched on previously.

The MPAA also discussed the anti-piracy company MiMTiD. A DMCA-related controversy connected to that company was covered by TechDirt in February.

The $400,000 spent by the MPAA in the first 3 months of 2011 represents a $30,000 uplift on the same period last year and a $60,000 increase on its spend during the final quarter of 2010.

Source: MPAA Anti-Piracy Lobbying Targets FBI, DOJ, ICE, DHS and Biden

A product of the movie industry’s licensing rules put in place to avoid the cannibalization of DVD sales, Zediva allowed its subscribers to rent and view physical DVDs remotely using the Internet. Needless to say the MPAA weren’t amused and in early April they filed a lawsuit at the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles.

“Zediva illegally streams movies to its customers without obtaining required licenses from the movie studios,” said the MPAA, adding that Zediva is little more than a “sham”.

But rather than roll over and die, perhaps surprisingly Zediva are fighting back. According to Paid Content, Zediva have hired a team of lawyers from “elite” San Francisco law firm, Durie Tangri.

The team includes Joe Gratz, the lead attorney in the recent case of EFF/Augusto v Universal Music Group. Troy Augusto was sued by UMG for selling promo CDs on eBay and was represented by the EFF. He won the case, affirming an eBay seller’s right to resell promotional CDs bought from secondhand stores.

Also on the team is file-sharing expert Michael Page. He was lead counsel for Grokster in their epic battle against the record labels and studios, representing them at district, Ninth Circuit, and Supreme Court levels. For this he received the California Lawyer Attorney of the Year award for 2005.

Also on the team is Mark Lemley who commands a place in countless lists of “most-admired” Intellectual Property lawyers. An author of six books, Lemley is a founding partner of Durie Tangri, a veteran of cases involving Comcast, Google, Grokster and NetFlix, and has taught intellectual property law to both federal and state judges.

As detailed by Paid Content, the MPAA aren’t taking any chances either. They’ve hired a team from Munger, Tolles & Olson which includes Glenn Pomerantz and Kelly Klaus – lawyers currently engaged in beating up LimeWire.

Source: Movie Streamers Line Up Heavyweight Lawyers To Fight MPAA

In February Google filed an amicus brief (third party testimony) at the Appeal Court, in the hope that the court would consider Google’s opinion on the case. The MPAA was against a Google contribution, but despite these concerns the Appeal Court has now allowed the search engine’s testimony to be added to the case.

Although Google did not dispute isoHunt’s liability in their testimony, the company stated that some of the reasoning in the District Court verdict went too far, and Google wants to see it scrapped in the appeal.

“While in agreement with the result reached in this case, Google is concerned that some of the reasoning offered by the district court goes too far and would upset the careful balance between copyright protection and technological innovation struck by the Supreme Court and Congress. Particularly because this case is not a hard one, it should be decided narrowly,” Google wrote.

The search giant addresses various issues they feel are not needed to arrive at the verdict, but can negatively impact other services on the Internet. Several of these conclusions are the result of suggestions made by the movie studios, which Google claims are misplaced and incorrect.

Google wants to address these issues because they fear it may otherwise lead to a negative outcome for themselves.

The Appeal Court agreed to accept and consider the amicus brief last month. This is the first time that Google have got involved in a BitTorrent case which is significant itself, but interestingly enough neither the MPAA nor isoHunt are happy with Google’s submission.

In a response to Google’s brief, isoHunt says it agrees with Google’s arguments that the District Court verdict is full of “fatal errors” and “omissions”. However, it doesn’t agree with Google’s conclusion that isoHunt is liable for copyright infringements by some of their users. isoHunt’s lawyer therefore asks the court to reject the latter arguments.

“Defendants submit that Google’s confusing arguments and fallacious reasoning should not obscure the importance of issues presented by this case. Defendants have proposed a practical way to deal with such issues; but Google, like plaintiffs, propose nothing other than affirmance of a factually flawed and legally ill-founded District Court Decision.”

The MPAA also responded to Google’s testimony, and was even less pleased to see the company chime in.

“Google is not a disinterested amicus. Google itself is a defendant in suits charging certain of its business units which intentionally promote infringement. Google’s arguments as amicus reflect its litigation interests in obtaining a legal ruling that facilitation of infringement, even if shown to be intentional, may still be immune from copyright liability.”

The MPAA’s legal team then goes on to refute nearly all arguments made by Google. The search engine wants to scrap all of the District Court’s conclusions regarding liability that could eventually be used against Google, but the movie companies clearly disagree.

“The Court should reject Google’s pleas for immunities for businesses that intentionally facilitate copyright infringement,” MPAA’s lawyers conclude.

Although Google weighed in on the isoHunt vs. MPAA case in self-interest, the mere fact that they got involved signifies the importance of the case. To some it may ‘just’ be a dispute between a BitTorrent site and the MPAA but if affirmed the District Court ruling may have far-reaching consequences for hundreds of other web-services.

After filing the amicus brief Google’s role in the case has likely ended, but isoHunt and the MPAA will continue their battle in court.

There’s a hearing planned in early May where we will find out more about where the case is heading. Interestingly, this hearing is scheduled on the same day and in the same court as Veoh’s appeal hearing. Another DMCA case, but one where the service provider was not held liable.

Source: Google, MPAA and isoHunt Clash in Court

Last year the former president of Brazil posed with Pirate Bay founder Peter Sunde and vowed not to cave in to the interests of the copyright lobby. But with the change of leadership the MPAA sees new chances, and so Frazier went to Brazil to convince local politicians that tougher anti-piracy laws are needed.

In common with most Latin American countries, piracy is widespread in Brazil. According to a recent study more than half of all people living in urban areas regularly pirate movies, something the MPAA believes has to be stopped.

In an interview with local newspaper Folha, Frazier commented on the threat piracy poses to the major studios, responding with the classic textbook answers we’ve heard hundreds of times before.

“If you do not believe in the value of creativity, the importance of protecting it and the need to reward those who produce, then maybe you can justify piracy. But in that case you’ll be doing great harm to culture,” Frazier said. Please note the words ‘creativity’ and ‘culture’ in his answer, as we’ll come back to that later.

The reporter then went on to ask how important copyright really is when 44% of households in Brazil are not connected to the sewer system. Not really a fair question, but Frazier made it very clear that even when people are starving it would be immoral to ‘steal’ entertainment from U.S. corporations.

“Obviously, governments and societies have to work to make sure that the population has access to the basics in order to survive, but that does not mean you should ignore other things. Companies must live together because they respect each other and respect that people do not steal from one another. Even if you battle to put food on your plate, it is immoral to steal,” he said.

Things got more interesting when Frazier responded in a surprisingly open manner when asked about Creative Commons licenses, which allow for a more flexible approach to copyright. Creative Commons licenses are very popular in Brazil and the reporter wanted to know what the MPAA’s view on this approach is.

“They [Creative Commons supporters] don’t always agree with what we advocate,” Frazier responded. “And you are talking about democratizing culture, this is not in our interests. It really isn’t my interest.”

Although this answer may not really come as a surprise, combined with his previous answers it shows how subjective the MPAA’s view on creativity and culture is. According to the MPAA piracy is ruining culture, but at the same time they are not allowing others to use even tiny snippets of their works.

The MPAA is apparently only interested in creativity and culture when it applies to the works their studios produce. Needless to say, this isn’t necessarily what’s most beneficial to society. The MPAA is merely protecting their corporate interests.

For the general public, culture and creativity are probably better off with less restrictive copyright laws. This doesn’t mean that it should be okay to pirate every Hollywood blockbuster, but the laws that are put in place to please the movie studios are the same ones that cripple the creativity of tens of thousands of other artists and the public at large.

To the MPAA and many others in the entertainment industry, copyright has little to do with the word right, nor with creativity and culture. Instead, it’s a restrictive tool that allows works to be traded, leased and licensed in return for money.

Indeed, democratizing culture is not in the MPAA’s interest, but maximizing profits and control is.

Source: MPAA: “Democratizing Culture Is Not In Our Interest”

“Though long on hyperbole, the Studios’ factual allegations fall far short of the legal mark. They fail to state any claims for copyright infringement upon which relief can be granted and should accordingly be dismissed,” adds the 22-page document.

As previously reported, having apparently overlooked powerful market leaders such as RapidShare and MegaUpload, earlier this year Disney, Twentieth Century Fox, Universal, Columbia and Warner filed a lawsuit against Hotfile, making the Florida-based company the reluctant guinea pig for testing the MPAA’s fledgling anti-cyberlocker legal strategies.

“In less than two years, Hotfile has become one of the 100 most trafficked sites in the world,” said the MPAA when announcing its lawsuit against the company. “That is a direct result of the massive digital theft that Hotfile promotes.”

The MPAA went on to state that Hotfile’s business model relies on the company encouraging its users to upload “illegal copies of motion pictures and TV shows to its servers”, something Hotfile denies.

As speculated earlier by HR reporter Eriq Gardner, Hotfile was probably carefully chosen as a target, not least because it uses the United States for its operational base but because, notably, it has chosen to settle rather than fight earlier lawsuits. This time, however, Hotfile does not appear to be backing down.

In its motion to dismiss dated March 31st, Hotfile denies the studios’ first claim of direct infringement. The company says that since the studios’ allegations are based around Hotfile allegedly facilitating the infringements of their users, this “could only support a claim – if any exists – for secondary infringement.”

On the issue of secondary infringement, Hotfile says the studios’ claim is deficient.

“The Studios do not allege the requisite clear expression or affirmative steps showing that Hotfile has the specific intent to promote infringement,” the company states.

‘Clear expression’ in this instance is a reference to existing case law involving three other file-sharing type services after they were previously deemed to have encouraged or approved of infringement.

In Columbia Pictures v Fung (MPAA v Isohunt), Hotfile quote site admin Gary Fung as saying “they accuse us for [sic] thieves, and they r [sic] right.” In Arista Records v Usenet.com – “Usenet is full of Music and Movies so get your pirate on!” and other more general comments from Arista Records v Lime Group and MGM Studios v Grokster. Hotfile say no such claims have been directed at them.

In response to the studios’ claim that Hotfile is guilty of contributory infringement, the company points firmly back in time to 1984′s Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, Inc., aka the Betamax case, again stopping off at 2005′s MGM Studios, Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd on the way.

Claims that Hotfile had knowledge of infringement on its systems “effectively rehashes the argument that they lost in the Supreme Court [in the Sony case] in an attempt to stop technological advances in copying equipment.” Furthermore, the 2005 Grokster case only reaffirmed the legality of products that have “substantial non-infringing users”, say Hotfile.

While noting that it is fully DMCA compliant (and that the studios use its notice and takedown services), Hotfile goes on to refute the claims of vicarious liability on the basis that the studios failed to show that the file-hoster had the “practical ability” to “supervise or police infringement” among the millions of files that it hosts.

Interestingly, in contrast to previous cases involving both Grokster, isoHunt and LimeWire (who all had on-site ‘search box’ facilities, a fact used against them by the plaintiffs), in the studios’ case against Hotfile the lack of a search box is used to support a claim of inducement.

“Hotfile does not organize, categorize or otherwise participate in user selection of files to host. Hotfile provides the same basic service as the hundreds, if not thousands, of other bona fide web hosting services that are critical and necessary to enable the full potential of the Internet,” the company states.

“Realizing that the uninterrupted line of active inducement cases all involved sites with built in search capability, the Studios try to twist the absence of a search box into ‘concealment’. Thus, according to the Studios, web hosts are damned if they allow search (as ‘active inducers’) and are damned (as ‘concealers’) if they don’t.”

Everyone involved in a US-based online hosting business will be watching this case unfold with interest. The outcome will shape their future operations and even has the potential to alter the file-sharing landscape.

Source: Hotfile Files To Dismiss In Pivotal MPAA vs Cyberlocker Lawsuit

“Though long on hyperbole, the Studios’ factual allegations fall far short of the legal mark. They fail to state any claims for copyright infringement upon which relief can be granted and should accordingly be dismissed,” adds the 22-page document.

As previously reported, having apparently overlooked powerful market leaders such as RapidShare and MegaUpload, earlier this year Disney, Twentieth Century Fox, Universal, Columbia and Warner filed a lawsuit against Hotfile, making the Florida-based company the reluctant guinea pig for testing the MPAA’s fledgling anti-cyberlocker legal strategies.

“In less than two years, Hotfile has become one of the 100 most trafficked sites in the world,” said the MPAA when announcing its lawsuit against the company. “That is a direct result of the massive digital theft that Hotfile promotes.”

The MPAA went on to state that Hotfile’s business model relies on the company encouraging its users to upload “illegal copies of motion pictures and TV shows to its servers”, something Hotfile denies.

As speculated earlier by HR reporter Eriq Gardner, Hotfile was probably carefully chosen as a target, not least because it uses the United States for its operational base but because, notably, it has chosen to settle rather than fight earlier lawsuits. This time, however, Hotfile does not appear to be backing down.

In its motion to dismiss dated March 31st, Hotfile denies the studios’ first claim of direct infringement. The company says that since the studios’ allegations are based around Hotfile allegedly facilitating the infringements of their users, this “could only support a claim – if any exists – for secondary infringement.”

On the issue of secondary infringement, Hotfile says the studios’ claim is deficient.

“The Studios do not allege the requisite clear expression or affirmative steps showing that Hotfile has the specific intent to promote infringement,” the company states.

‘Clear expression’ in this instance is a reference to existing case law involving three other file-sharing type services after they were previously deemed to have encouraged or approved of infringement.

In Columbia Pictures v Fung (MPAA v Isohunt), Hotfile quote site admin Gary Fung as saying “they accuse us for [sic] thieves, and they r [sic] right.” In Arista Records v Usenet.com – “Usenet is full of Music and Movies so get your pirate on!” and other more general comments from Arista Records v Lime Group and MGM Studios v Grokster. Hotfile say no such claims have been directed at them.

In response to the studios’ claim that Hotfile is guilty of contributory infringement, the company points firmly back in time to 1984′s Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, Inc., aka the Betamax case, again stopping off at 2005′s MGM Studios, Inc. v. Grokster, Ltd on the way.

Claims that Hotfile had knowledge of infringement on its systems “effectively rehashes the argument that they lost in the Supreme Court [in the Sony case] in an attempt to stop technological advances in copying equipment.” Furthermore, the 2005 Grokster case only reaffirmed the legality of products that have “substantial non-infringing users”, say Hotfile.

While noting that it is fully DMCA compliant (and that the studios use its notice and takedown services), Hotfile goes on to refute the claims of vicarious liability on the basis that the studios failed to show that the file-hoster had the “practical ability” to “supervise or police infringement” among the millions of files that it hosts.

Interestingly, in contrast to previous cases involving both Grokster, isoHunt and LimeWire (who all had on-site ‘search box’ facilities, a fact used against them by the plaintiffs), in the studios’ case against Hotfile the lack of a search box is used to support a claim of inducement.

“Hotfile does not organize, categorize or otherwise participate in user selection of files to host. Hotfile provides the same basic service as the hundreds, if not thousands, of other bona fide web hosting services that are critical and necessary to enable the full potential of the Internet,” the company states.

“Realizing that the uninterrupted line of active inducement cases all involved sites with built in search capability, the Studios try to twist the absence of a search box into ‘concealment’. Thus, according to the Studios, web hosts are damned if they allow search (as ‘active inducers’) and are damned (as ‘concealers’) if they don’t.”

Everyone involved in a US-based online hosting business will be watching this case unfold with interest. The outcome will shape their future operations and even has the potential to alter the file-sharing landscape.

Source: Hotfile Files To Dismiss In Pivotal MPAA vs Cyberlocker Lawsuit

Why, one might ask? Well, because this is the only ‘legitimate’ way to watch DVDs online immediately after they are released. All other services have to abide by enforced long delays before streaming digital (vs. physical) copies, since the studios are afraid that giving people access to movies straight away will cannibalize their DVD sales.

Zediva thought they had cleverly bypassed this restriction by letting people rent a physical DVD that plays in a real DVD-player at their datacenter, but with a huge cable attached to it called the Internet. Although it’s insane that they have to go to such an extreme to give consumers access to content in the first place, Zediva thought they had a solid plan.

The MPAA, however, didn’t agree.

Yesterday the movie industry outfit filed a lawsuit at the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, calling Zediva a sham. “Zediva illegally streams movies to its customers without obtaining required licenses from the movie studios,” the MPAA states in their press release.

“Zediva claims it is like a brick-and-mortar DVD ‘rental’ store and therefore not obligated to pay licensing fees to copyright holders. But the DVD ‘rental’ label is a sham. In reality, Zediva is a video-on-demand service that transmits movies over the Internet using streaming technologies in violation of the studios’ copyrights,” the MPAA added.

The MPAA’s stake in this is clear – money, money and more money. It’s not so much Zediva they’re interested in, but the loophole the company exploited to bypass the movie industry’s twisted copyright restrictions. If bigger players pick up this genius idea the MPAA fears they will lose their grip on carefully constructed copyright restrictions.

The big question that has to be answered here is why going to a brick-and-mortar store to pick up a DVD is so much different from playing the same physical DVD remotely. The latter is definitely more efficient, more ‘green,’ and much cheaper for the retailer and consumer. But, and that makes it interesting, from a copyright stance it’s the exact same thing.

The MPAA begs to differ.

“When legitimate companies stream movies to their customers, they pay license fees to the copyright owners, enabling content providers to invest in new products and services that pay writers, set builders, wardrobe designers, and countless others who contribute to a movie production,” MPAA’s associate general counsel Dan Robbins said.

Oh really?

So if you fill up your gas tank and drive to the bricks-and-mortar DVD ‘rental’ store everything’s just fine, but if the store decided to play it for you then they are suddenly ripping off wardrobe designers? How does that work? Seriously.

There is no difference whatsoever. It’s only that that the movie studios want to control who gets to see what, when and where on the Internet, because they think that will benefit their profits. In reality, it’s just as crazy as setting up separate rules for bringing home rental DVDs in a Chrysler and a Ford.

Let’s hope the judge at the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles asks the same questions.

Once again the MPAA is attempting to keep their copyright cash cow alive, and by doing so they are hindering innovation and prohibiting customers from watching films in a convenient way. They think that this option will be the most profitable for them, but it’s certainly not in the best interest of consumers, who might just be tempted to pirate films instead.

Source: MPAA ‘Goes Nuts’ With New Movie Streaming Lawsuit

Why, one might ask? Well, because this is the only ‘legitimate’ way to watch DVDs online immediately after they are released. All other services have to abide by enforced long delays before streaming digital (vs. physical) copies, since the studios are afraid that giving people access to movies straight away will cannibalize their DVD sales.

Zediva thought they had cleverly bypassed this restriction by letting people rent a physical DVD that plays in a real DVD-player at their datacenter, but with a huge cable attached to it called the Internet. Although it’s insane that they have to go to such an extreme to give consumers access to content in the first place, Zediva thought they had a solid plan.

The MPAA, however, didn’t agree.

Yesterday the movie industry outfit filed a lawsuit at the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, calling Zediva a sham. “Zediva illegally streams movies to its customers without obtaining required licenses from the movie studios,” the MPAA states in their press release.

“Zediva claims it is like a brick-and-mortar DVD ‘rental’ store and therefore not obligated to pay licensing fees to copyright holders. But the DVD ‘rental’ label is a sham. In reality, Zediva is a video-on-demand service that transmits movies over the Internet using streaming technologies in violation of the studios’ copyrights,” the MPAA added.

The MPAA’s stake in this is clear – money, money and more money. It’s not so much Zediva they’re interested in, but the loophole the company exploited to bypass the movie industry’s twisted copyright restrictions. If bigger players pick up this genius idea the MPAA fears they will lose their grip on carefully constructed copyright restrictions.

The big question that has to be answered here is why going to a brick-and-mortar store to pick up a DVD is so much different from playing the same physical DVD remotely. The latter is definitely more efficient, more ‘green,’ and much cheaper for the retailer and consumer. But, and that makes it interesting, from a copyright stance it’s the exact same thing.

The MPAA begs to differ.

“When legitimate companies stream movies to their customers, they pay license fees to the copyright owners, enabling content providers to invest in new products and services that pay writers, set builders, wardrobe designers, and countless others who contribute to a movie production,” MPAA’s associate general counsel Dan Robbins said.

Oh really?

So if you fill up your gas tank and drive to the bricks-and-mortar DVD ‘rental’ store everything’s just fine, but if the store decided to play it for you then they are suddenly ripping off wardrobe designers? How does that work? Seriously.

There is no difference whatsoever. It’s only that that the movie studios want to control who gets to see what, when and where on the Internet, because they think that will benefit their profits. In reality, it’s just as crazy as setting up separate rules for bringing home rental DVDs in a Chrysler and a Ford.

Let’s hope the judge at the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles asks the same questions.

Once again the MPAA is attempting to keep their copyright cash cow alive, and by doing so they are hindering innovation and prohibiting customers from watching films in a convenient way. They think that this option will be the most profitable for them, but it’s certainly not in the best interest of consumers, who might just be tempted to pirate films instead.

Source: MPAA ‘Goes Nuts’ With New Movie Streaming Lawsuit