A 67-year-old man was sued by the movie industry for his 12 year old grandsons movie downloads. Apparently, the kid downloaded four movies - three of which they already owned. For this, the movie industry asked for a settlement of four thousand dollars. When the man refused, mainly because he didnt have four successful
, they then sued for $600,000 to generate an example of the poor old guy. Personally, I think it is an outrage that legal technicalities would be placed above human beings. Hollywood is always big on raising taxes to support the poor, but download their movies and theyll take grandpa and grandson out. I understand
they do not
want everybody watching their movies for free, I get that, but hopefully reason will prevail in this case and grandpa will be let off the hook. If not, Hollywood has just taken up tactics reminiscent of the Nazi Gestapo.
It has been reported that illegal downloading costs the movie industry an estimated $5.4 billion a year, but I dont see how. The quality that Ive seen in the past on movies that my friends downloaded is so bad I really dont see the point. I have spent a lot of money to have a big screen high definition television set. Why would I download a blurry movie? I mean if you are going to spend the money for a fancy TV, its a pretty big waste not to have the store bought high quality DVD of your most acclaimed movie. Most downloaded movies are caught by a camcorder in theatres. So you have to imagine the guy doing the recording is wavering back and forth the whole instant. You also have to deal with noises from the audience. If you inquire of
, me its too nerve wracking to even sit through that.
As much as I empathize with Hollywood on protecting their turf, attacking their prospects is not the way to go. Producing workable products is the most logical course. Hollywoods movie box office slump this year is not caused by a bunch of 12 year olds downloading movies on the net. DVD sales, after all, are still very high. People want to watch movies on their big screen TV at home at their leisure. Besides, you pay the identical
amount to take your family to the movies as you do to buy a DVD you might
watch over and over again. You can not
have your cake and eat it too. Either you sell a item to your audience in the theatres or for their home make use of
. The movie industry can not
expect to have all the people paying to see all their movies at the theatre and turn around and buy the DVD too, unless the movie they are selling is of superior quality like a "Passion of the Christ", "Batman Begins", "Star Wars", etc. An increasing number of everybody are not going to rush to the theatre to get the same acquired skill
they can get at home.