Apology to Russell Crowe...The bootlegged song being promoted on his Twitter site is called My Hand My Heart. The legal song on the South Sydney Media Youtube site is called Lover's Hands. My comments stand with an apology for the mistake. I believe as a consumer of videos we should be given a choice of what we consume. Perhaps I am old fashioned but I like legal quality videos where any profits made go to the artists. I am a fan of the Crowe/Doyle songbook.
On your @russellcrowe Twitter site you have retweeted and provided a link to a live recorded concert by Lynda Elstad or @lyndahere. @lyndahere is a full time bootlegger and music pirate known to you and your friends. She operates without a licence to record live concerts or permission to reproduce copyrighted videos.
On your @russellcrowe Twitter site you have retweeted and provided a link to a live recorded concert by Lynda Elstad or @lyndahere. @lyndahere is a full time bootlegger and music pirate known to you and your friends. She operates without a licence to record live concerts or permission to reproduce copyrighted videos.
@russellcrowe Merry Christmas My
Hand, My Heart, Russell Crowe and Scott Grimes Crowe Doyle NYC Indoor
Garden Party 23 December 2012
@lyndahere MT @proguesofficial
@russellcrowe will NOT be performing this song at The Progues’ show
tomorrow night at the London 02. 19 December 2012
@russellcrowe @russellcrowe
@youtube 26 December 2012
Firstly, I am wondering why you have
chosen to provide a link to a bootlegged copy when you have made a
legal copy of the same song available on the South Sydney Media site.
Secondly, I am wondering why you think
you and your friends need publicity gained through illegal means. I
mean aren’t the legal ways and the activities of the paparazzi
enough? Surely with the release of the film Les Miserables and the
presence of superstars like Sting and Hugh Jackman at your concerts I
am wondering why you think you need this illegal type of
promotion?
Thirdly, I am wondering why you are
promoting someone who doesn’t seem to have any understanding of the
concept of a ticket. @lyndahere has this idea that she the consumer
deserves more than what your offering for the price of the ticket to
a concert or movie. On Twitter @lyndahere wrote “Les Mis
time. Slipped into prior showing to catch the film’s end –sniffles
and applause. Bodes well” @russellcrowe @alanthomasdoyle
26 December 2012. She always wants more than what you
and your friends are offering for the price of a ticket whether it be
live recordings of concerts or the screening of a movie.
Fourthly, I am wondering why you are
promoting and encouraging illegal activities on your Twitter site. I
hope you seriously don’t believe that members of the public believe
bootlegging and piracy are victimless crimes. On Twitter @lyndahere
wrote to @BevyJean72 “You’re very welcome Beverly, you and
anyone who’s enjoyed the videos. I love sharing great shows and
great music 21 December 2012. It is illegal
under US and Canadian law to record and distribute live recordings of
concerts without permission.
Live concerts are not the only
activities bootlegged. Movies are also bootlegged as they are
screened in a theatre. Research shows bootlegged movies were a
phenomenal problem in New York city. That is a problem distinct from
being pirated movies. “About half of all the bootlegged films
recorded live in a theatre, duplicated thousands of times and sent
around the globe originated in New York city according to the MPAA
(Motion Picture Association of America)” (as sited in
‘Cracking Down on Bootlegged Movies’ by
David Caurso in 2009).
In an episode of the American comedy
Seinfeld one of the characters Kramer becomes involved in video
recording movies in theatres and distributing them on the street. He
takes it upon himself to change the original presentation of the
movie and in the process becomes a celebrity artist in his own right
in that industry. A bootlegged video or cam movie is a video
recording of a movie made by a moviegoer while sitting in the
theatre. Bootleggers do it for a number of reasons to make copies,
distribute it and make money, to make copies so that people who can’t
see it can or don’t want to pay the price to see it.
In an article in the New York Times in
1997 titled ‘Bootlegged Videos Piracy with a
Camcorder’ journalist Linda Lee investigates the activity
of bootlegging movies in theatres, their distribution in New York
city and their negative impact on the entertainment industry. The
journalist investigated how video recorders were being smuggled into
screenings of movies, copies made and released. “Using a $500
videocamera and a tripod and occasionally making use of theatre’s
audio jacks a bootlegger can go to the movies and make a $1000 or
more…he makes copies and sells them…and that’s tax free” said
Bill Shannon, the head of Motion Picture Association of America’s
New York anti-piracy office. These activities were thriving in
America and in particular New York city. Some of the copies made and
released were done by industry employees as well as members of the
public however, regardless of who is bootlegging there remains a
problem…“The growing sophistication of technology and the
cachet of seeing something first are combining to intensify a
persistent problem”. Not only seeing something first but
missing out on seeing something altogether.
So I gather it
would be alright then in your view if someone went into the Les
Miserables movie premier, recorded it and put it up on Internet?
People could then download and watch it for free. Universal Pictures
and its shareholders who finance your creative endeavours do have
something to say about these types of activities as they and other
movie studios lose millions of dollars per year to piracy of all
kinds. Or perhaps you don’t really care as you have your money and
quite a lot of it. More money than you and your children will ever
need in their live times.
Some people may ask with all the
technology around for movie pirating is bootlegging movies in
theatres still being done. In a 2009 article ‘Cracking Down
on Bootlegged Movies’ the journalist discusses new laws
being introduced in New York city to outlaw bootlegging in theatres.
In New York it is illegal to film in a movie theatre and offenders
can face a fine of $250. New York has been identified as the worst
city for bootlegging and has some of the worst penalties for
offenders. The Motion Picture Association of America and others have
been pushing for tougher penalties. While there is debate on the
Internet about bootlegged movies and whether they are still being
made there is still an audience for them in particular for people
wanting to watch rare or unusual movies will resort to obtaining a
bootlegged movie.
While there may be not a consequence
for people bootlegging, the person selling or watching it, with
little chance of being traced, caught and prosecuted Linda Lee’s
‘Bootlegging Movies with a Camcorder’ finds there
are huge threats to the entertainment industry who fund these
projects for example financial loses. It is difficult to know how
much bootlegging costs the movie industry but it is estimated at
hundreds of millions of dollars every year. The article states “One
problem is that blasé New Yorker’s tend to see bootlegging, like
counterfeiting Rolex watches as, a victimless crime” which
of course it is not. From my experience of social media I don’t
think that attitude is exclusive to New York but in America in
general. @lyndahere is definitely blasé about the impact of
bootlegging and music piracy and has no conscience about what she
does. Michael Murray in his article ‘Why Pay for Anything?Movie
Bootlegging and the Evolution of Media’ writes about the
evolution of the media industry. He regularly purchases bootlegged (as
distinct from pirated copies) of DVDs “I have to admit to
feeling some excitement if the DVD I brought is going to be a dud or
not…maybe you are going to beat the system or the system is going
to beat you”.
I am wondering if you have thought
about what you are saying to your followers by providing links to and
retweeting @lyndahere’s videos on Twitter. It is of course up to
you what you tweet and retweet but what are you saying to others in
particular to children and teenagers about the laws created to
protect creative artists and their work. Children and teenagers read
your Twitter page. Your children and their friends read your Twitter
page. Most people only make a small number of recordings at concerts
for personal use and that is okay. However, @lyndahere records
everything she attends with no regard for the quantity or quality and
puts it on Youtube. And you and your friends are encouraging it. You
are trivialising copyright, music piracy and bootlegging laws that
protect creative endeavours of individuals and corporations.
What are you saying about the quality
of goods people are listening too and peoples creative
work being presented? In a tweet to @alanthomasdoyle @lyndahere
writes “I thought the nose looked rather familiar.
Distinctively Doyle – it’s why I didn’t crop it out of the
frame” 20 December 2012. It seems okay to her to make
adjustments to others creative work and present them to the public in
the way she sees fit. Like live recordings of concerts, live
recordings of movies capture a range of activities in the immediate
environment for example people talking, eating popcorn and candy
interfere with the quality of the sound. Like live recordings of
concerts those skilled in editing can alter the original copy of
the movie. Michael Murray in his article ‘Why Pay for Anything?Movie
Bootlegging and the Evolution of Media’ who purchases
bootlegged DVDs as against pirated DVDs writes about the editing of
bootlegged movies “The Craziesin which a theatre goer’s shoulder was
visible at the bottom of the screen and the copy of Alice in
Wonderland I brought curiously devoid of what I would call colour.
(Personally I kind of like interpretations of the filmic experience,
seeing them as a kind of mash-up or a piece of found if degraded,
art’)…
@lyndahere is being encouraged and
rewarded for committing illegal activities like bootlegging and music
piracy. She is engaged in music piracy and illegally copying DVDs and
making them available on her YouTube sites. It is difficult to know
how much illegal activity she is involved in. She demonstrates little
constraint when bootlegging then why would she show constraint when
engaging in music or other types of piracy. Some of those people whose
work is being pirated are friends of yours. I am wondering why you
are promoting illegal activities on your sites when you have blocked
people whose only “crime” is to say something you don’t agree
with. They have remained blocked. Yet here is a person who breaks the
laws and commits crimes like bootlegging and music piracy whose
activities you and your friend @scottgrimes promote and reward.
“Regardless, the experience of
attending a movie and seeing it in a theatre cannot be duplicated.
To have everything dissolve around you and fade to black, and to see
a world-so much larger than life-unfold before you just as the
artists intended is unique. And without even knowing it, the mood and
expectations of the rest of the crowd, like weather blowing in,
passes through you and then a rare but unforgettable moment of shared
transcendence might emerge, and for that, well for that we will
always return” (Michael Murray in his article ‘Why Pay
for Anything?Movie Bootlegging and the Evolution of Media’).
And that is why I enjoy paying for goods brought legally whether it
be a concert, movie, CD or DVD. I enjoy the experiences offered to me
as the artist intended.
References
Caruso, D. B 2009 ‘Cracking
Down on Bootlegged Movies’ viewed 23 December 2012 at
www.cbsnews.com
eHow Contributor ‘How to
Bootleg a Movie’ viewed 23 December 2012 at www.ehow.com
Lee, L 1997 ‘Bootlegged
Videos Piracy with a Camcorder’ viewed 23 December 2012 at
www.nytimes.com
Murray, M ‘Why Pay for
Anything?Movie Bootlegging and the Evolution of Media’
viewed on 27 December 2012 www.pajiba,com/think_pieces/why-pay
