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Tag: Dan Glickman

  • Motion Picture Association of America awarded $24 million in lawsuit

    Motion Picture Association of America awarded $24 million in lawsuit

    MUMBAI: This is a big win for the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) in its fight against online film piracy. A federal judge in Los Angeles has ordered MasterSurf and its owner to pay the motion picture studios $23.8 million for copyright infringement .

    Through its now defunct site Film88.com the company charged a fee for downloading an illegally pirated film.

    A report in Reuters stated that a couple of years ago the MPAA had sued MasterSurf. However the company defaulted on its payment. That did not stop the studios from continuing to chase Tan Soo Leong who owns MasterSurf.

    Another report in CNet indicates that the Film88 case provides a window into the difficulties faced by movie studios, record labels and other copyright owners as Internet piracy takes on an increasingly international flavor. The MPAA has had some success in the past shutting down movie-streaming sites. However countries that lack strong copyright laws upgrade their network infrastructure, that type of enforcement action could become more difficult over time.

    Film88’s original incarnation, the lawsuit alleged, was based in Taiwan under the name Movie88. That site, which launched in February 2002, provided the most sophisticated video-on-demand site seen to date on the Internet.

    While the studios themselves were struggling to create similar sites, Movie88 allowed viewers to stream movies with a high video quality for just $1 by using RealNetworks technology. The company used to offer hundreds of Hollywood movies to viewers.

    Working with the Taiwanese authorities, the MPAA was able to shut that site down. Then another site Film88 appeared in June.

    At that time Film88’s operator Hail Hami claimed that the new company was separate from the older venture but had recruited staff and taken ideas from Movie88.

    But that site was also shut down, after MPAA contacted an Internet service provider in the Netherlands that was hosting Film88’s content.

    Meanwhile in a speech a few days ago at the National Press Club in the US MPAA president and CEO Dan Glickman outlined the challenges facing the movie industry in the 21st Century, stressing that the industry was well-positioned to confront and overcome them to launch a new ‘Golden Age’ for Hollywood. Citing the particularly difficult problem of movie piracy, Glickman stated that the industry must be forward-thinking and aggressive in protecting its creative products against theft.

    He went on to state that the movie industry embodies creativity and innovation which are prerequisites for success. The movie industry’s share of the American economy is growing faster than the rest of the economy. And the copyright industries are creating jobs at twice the rate of the rest of the economy. While this foundation for continued growth and reach is strong, Glickman stressed that the same factors that make the industry successful have the power to hurt it as well.

    With access to high-speed Internet access increasing, and the movie industry already losing $3.5 billion annually to piracy, Glickman asserted that legal action is necessary to protect the future of moviemaking.

  • MPAA takes online film piracy fight to another level

    MPAA takes online film piracy fight to another level

    MUMBAI: This is an important measure in the fight against online film piracy in the US. The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) has announced that its lawyers will expand the campaign to prevent film piracy

    The MPAA will work with its members and other film studios to file lawsuits against people who have illegally traded digital copies of movies over the Internet. From 16 November lawsuits will be filed against individual file-swappers across the US by MPAA member companies. The civil suits seek damages and
    injunctive relief.

    Under the Copyright Act, statutory damages can be as much as $30,000 for each separate motion picture illegally copied or distributed by an individual over the Internet, and as much as $150,000 per motion picture if such infringement is proven to be willful.

    MPAA president and CEO Dan Glickman “Illegal movie trafficking represents the greatest threat to the economic basis of movie-making in its 110-year history. People who have been stealing our
    movies believe they are anonymous on the Internet, and wouldn’t be held responsible for their actions. They are wrong. We know who they are, and we will go after them, as these suits will prove.

    “We all know that digital distribution is the wave of the future, and the studios have all supported legal download services in various ways. But we cannot allow illegal trafficking to derail legitimate new technologies that provide consumers with affordable, convenient access to high-quality movies on the Web. Trading a digital file of a movie online without paying its owners is no different than walking into a store and shoplifting a DVD.”

    California Governor and action movie star Arnold Schwarzenegger who is a member of both the Screen Actors Guild and the Directors Guild of America added, “I applaud the decision by the MPAA and its member companies to take strong action. I join the US Department of Justice, the State of California, the recording industry and others in making sure that people use the great promise of the Internet responsibly and ethically, and that motion pictures remain an important part of California and the nation’s economy in the decades to come.”

    The governor had recently signed a bill making it a misdemeanor to swap movies or music online without revealing the trader’s e-mail address. The governor
    also issued an executive order banning the use of state resources, including computers and Internet access, to illegally swap copyrighted material.

    Schwarzenegger added, “The movie industry has contributed immeasurably to California’s economic strength. It has also helped many of my own dreams come true. We cannot let illegal movie piracy continue or it will cripple this important industry and seriously hurt California’s economy. We must teach our children that the illegal downloading of movies and music is wrong, and that it has consequences.”

    A recent federal interagency report estimates that counterfeit and pirated goods, including those of copyrighted works, cost the American economy
    $250 billion a year. In response to the report, the US Justice Department and other federal agencies have committed to increased law-enforcement and
    prosecutorial efforts against pirated and counterfeit goods.

    The MPAA estimates that “hard goods” movie piracy costs the film industry $3.5 billion a year. This total does not include losses from hundreds of thousands of illegal downloads swapped over the Internet each day.

    The American film studios have embraced the digital era on many fronts while confronting its challenges. Those efforts have included building public awareness and expanding and supporting legal online movie services such as MovieLink, CinemaNow and Moviebeam.

    Movie buffs already can see movies in many different ways, for many different prices, in many different settings. These range from theatrical releases in a state-of-the-art cinema to DVDs and VHS tape sales and rentals to video-on-demand services, pay-cable and free broadcast TVofferings.