Business

Following the announcement of legal action by the Motion Picture Association (MPA) against DVD copying software company 321 Studios, the companies founder, Robert Moore, and its CEO, Rob Semaan will be coming to the UK on Monday to clarify their position.

They hold a strong belief that individuals should be able to backup copies of their DVD’s and said “Following on from similar lawsuits in the U.S., we have been anticipating this legal action, and are fully prepared to meet it head on.  We will fight it, and are certainly not prepared to take it lying down, or shut up shop and go away.”

The million-plus selling software already has a number of safeguards in place to avoid mass duplication of titles. These include restricting the owners to only make up to three copies of any one DVD and not allowing the copying of copied discs.

Jack Valenti, the MPA President and CEO view is quite different, “The law does not allow for the copying of commercial DVDs, and technologies designed to get round copyright protection are plain unlawful.”

Both parties believe they are right and are ready for a fight in the English High Courts. The lawyers must be pleased.

The International arm of the American film industry representative body, the Motion Picture Association (MPA), is taking legal action in the UK against 321 Studios seeking to prevent the sale of its DVD copying software in the UK. The industry organisation has launched its High Court bid through Warner Home Video UK.

The MPAA claim the the software is in “flagrant breach” of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 because it allows anti-copying protection of DVDs to be bypassed. Jack Valenti, its President and CEO said “The law does not allow for the copying of commercial DVDs, and technologies designed to get round copyright protection are plain unlawful.”

321 Studio’s position is that the purchaser of a DVD has a right to make a copy to guard against its loss or damage. Back in February 2003, 321 Studios announced their own Piracy Prevention Program offering a $10,000 reward for information leading to the conviction of any parties misusing the software for pirating movies.

This news comes on the same day that another UK company, Redxpress, plan to launch their DVD copying software in the UK.

A Brooklyn woman, currently only identified as “nycfashiongirl”, is seeking to keep her identity private in a case brought against her by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) for sharing 900 music tracks on the Internet.

She claims that songs on her family’s computer were from compact discs she had legally purchased but the RIAA claim they have proof that her files were in-fact downloaded from file sharing networks. Their evidence includes showing that her music files contained hashes, a type of electronic finger print that can included in the files, that trace them back to being downloaded from Napster. This is the first time that the forensic methods used for detection have been exposed.

What has yet to come to light is how the RIAA knew what hashes to identify. One view is that the music industry ‘seeded’ the file sharing networks with their own fingerprinted versions of music tracks and created ‘Honey-traps’, computers sitting on the filesharing networks, waiting for people to download them. The RIAA claim that this method had been used since May 2000.

Some observers feel that the release of the use of fingerprints may be to create Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt (FUD), encouraging people to delete the music tracks that they may have previously downloaded.

What is currently unclear is whether copyright law has been breached –

• if people already own a music CD and then download one of its tracks from a file sharing network
• if people download a track and then subsequently buy the CD

The lawyer representing “nycfashiongirl” claimed the argument was “merely a smokescreen to divert attention” from the related issue of whether her Internet provider, Verizon Internet Services Inc., must turn over her identity under a copyright subpoena. “You cannot bypass people’s constitutional rights to privacy, due process and anonymous association to identify an alleged infringer,” he said.

Link

An anti-piracy task-force is being setup by the UK Film Council and government. With the Federation Against Copyright Theft (FACT) estimating the cost of counterfeiting to the UK’s domestic film industry at around £400m, the task-force will focus on getting accurate figures for the size of the problem and suggestions of how it can be tackled.

The new task-force, which will be chaired by UK Film Council board member Nigel Green, includes representatives of the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, UK film producers, distributors, exhibitors, visual effects companies and major US studios, film sales agents, as well as actors’ union Equity.

Copy VHS tapes are still the major problem, with around one in three videos purchased in the UK believed to be an unauthorised copies. FACT say the numbers of pirate DVDs are also expanding rapidly citing a number of 100,000 DVD raids having been carried out already this year. The majority of the DVD originate in the Far East.

Links – UK Film Council, FACT

After a long period of speculation and rurmors Microsoft has confirmed that it is to change the supplier for it graphics subsystem on the Xbox 2 to ATi. Nvidia supplies the chip set for the current Xbox.

The base cost of the Xbox has been something of a concern to Microsoft and they have been keen to drive the price down to reduce the amount of money they lose on each one. Many in the industry feel that Microsoft wanted Nvidia to drop their previously agreed unit price for the current Xbox graphics chips and Nvidia declined. Nvidia recently reported a hike in profits that they attributed to the Xbox deal.

The official Microsoft quote was, “We’re combining Microsoft’s vision, software experience and R&D resources with ATI’s pioneering leadership in graphics technologies to create innovative future Xbox products and services that meet the lifestyle needs of consumers in the Digital Decade,” said Robbie Bach, senior vice president of the Home and Entertainment Division at Microsoft. “We selected ATI after reviewing the top graphics technologies in development and determining that ATI’s technical vision fits perfectly with the future direction of Xbox.”

Link

No great surprise to see that Barclay Knapp, who headed up NTL, is to leave the commpany. Many people have been amazed to see that he’s lasted a long as he has after the company emerged from bankruptcy in January. He’ll be replaced by current chief operating officer, Simon Duffy.

Sales for the April to June quarter edged slightly higher to £551m, lifted by subscription revenues from 40,000 new customers. Losses for the quarter have been cut by 38% but still stand at £159m ($254m).

Link

There’s lots going on in the UK at the moment with the Communication Bill. The blog ofcomwatch is currently providing comprehensive coverage of all of the twists and turns as the Bill travels through the Lords. Well worth a look.