Movie executives see record profits, salaries despite piracy fear-mongering

Movie executives see record profits, salaries despite piracy fear-mongering

www.rawstory.com

Movie industry lobbyists like to say that online piracy costs their clients billions of dollars every year, and it’s getting worse — but that’s doesn’t quite seem to be the case, according to data released this week by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service (CRS).

The CRS report (embedded below) shows that the movie industry is doing very well, earning record profits and paying executives more than ever, even as it hires fewer workers than it did just a decade ago.

(visit the link for the full news article)

Let's get this straight:

Lobbyists are complaining that piracy is hurting the industry yet they are making record profits.

They are hiring less people even though they are making record profits.

Executives are crying about piracy while they are making record profits.


What the #? While ICE is going to peoples houses and ruining lives for downloading some sucky B movie, executives ARE STILL making record profits, and complaining about it. This is absolutely rediculous....

www.rawstory.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Banks, CEO's, movie industry, music industry, etc. They all rinse and repeat the same thing. Claim they're in trouble, we lose more jobs and liberties, and they make an even bigger profit. Gotta love this American ride!

completely agree its so ridiculous!
I just saw a advert for the protect IP act apparently we should support it because of all the money there losing

"Piracy" incrases profits. People who like what is being produced will always pay for it. "Piracy" is just free advertisement.

While this is going on...

MPAA head Chris Dodd : for the internet censorship bill, China is our model

Bunch of corporatist thugs.

They have a similar guy here in Holland (Tim Kuik, from Stichting Brein). He spouts lies, lobbies for government change and generally screams from the rooftops about how much money the industry is losing. As previous posters have noted, when they actually look at the real effects of piracy, they see it increases sales. People might watch the odd movie for free, or download an album to see if they like it, but 9 times out of ten they will go and buy the product. Unfortunately the industry equates 1 downloaded copy as one sale missed but they fail to consider the other factors. While they are in bed with the media, this will not be changing anytime soon.

reply to post by v1rtu0s0


LL
and once they get rid of actors, cameramen and others and replace them with CGI

they will still Kvetch about not making enough money


you and i want a 10 ft plasma screen?
we 1st check and see if we can afford it.

when they want a 10 ft plasma screen
they just buy it
and then squeeze the money from wherever they can
even if it means tossing their mom under a bus
to collect the insurance

S&F

What we are seeing is a replay of what happened to music industry.

Most people that pirate would not buy %85 of the stuff they pirate. If any thing it helps spread word about how good the product is so that people who are afraid to pirate buy it. I am happy that they keep the propaganda flowing about piracy because it keeps it alive. Every one would be pirating if it was not for that propaganda and then it would truly be stopped and the internet as we know it would not exist. Piracy in video games helps sells, when you pirate a video game you cannot play online you can only play the single player campaign you have to buy the game to play it online in most cases. So it just helps the game even more. More people will be willing to buy the hardware to make a good pc so they can get single player games for free and test them their self before they buy them. As far as movies go, WHO CARES. Most movies that are produced today are complete crap, repeated older movies with different themes (thats how they brain wash you, repetition.) Same with music, the more people that listen to it, the more exposure it gets and more people will be willing to support that artist and go to their shows (shows are where the ARTIST make the most profit.) The more famous they get the more opportunity's they get to make money. This is not 1999, its changed allot, you cant just out law piracy and expect it to stop. You would have to revamp the whole internet. If torrents are stopped something else will takes its place probably a open source operating system.

Hah figures! Thanks for sharing. It's what I've said all alone when they were whining to push laws against piracy. In fact, as mentioned above it's free advertising for a lot of artists, musicians, more. The same across the board with corporate greed; and now with the fear of 2012, economy woes, etc, prices with everything are going sky high, makes you wonder are they hoarding food and building bunkers for 2012 or really being that greedy with profits...probably both.

Pretty soon they will have virtual actors that they can literally control. Then they will see profits go even higher!

It's already stared:
Japans virtual pop star world.

Corporate greed knows no bounds.

Their desire for control is a close second.

So your ATS rats would stop stealing music and videos if they were losing money?
Your human compassion would kick in and you would cease and desist?
You have a limit on how much money they should make?
What is your logic for your argument?

reply to post by v1rtu0s0


what upsets me the most is that i have a collection of about 8000 albums that i bought when i was a teen . and these execs are screaming about a few of us downloading albums that i already own and paid for . oh that's right they made albums then they made 8 tracks then they went to cassettes and then to mp3 and then to mp4 mp5 ipods and so on .and all of us with these vast collections have been left out in limbo.so according to these mental midgets i`m supposed to re buy all of my music in these new forms just to line their pockets. times how many forms ,i`d be dead broke by their standards. and what about my turntable for needles as they are getting scarcer than black rhinos.as i just took 5 weeks to find the proper needle for a friends turntable ,and when i did find it they told me that they don`t ship to Canada from the U.S.A. we have to go through their Canadian supplier who don`t keep them in stock.

5 weeks later and i get the privilege to pay for it and have it shipped to me.my cost was 21.79 including shipping , then i walk into a t.v. shop in Guelph Ont. and low and behold guess what i find the needles that i need for my friend.surprise surprise surprise their cost to my 42.95 plus 13% tax .
i guess money makes the world go round or is greed the death of us all as at this rate they will soon be asking the governments also known as their lackeys to line us up against the wall and shot us all.
the worst part of all of their crap is i have albums that you CANNOT get on cd or any other form as they are all of print but for the measly small amount of cost they can get me these same out of print albums for a paltry 30 to 60 DOLLARS each.
T-REX always said it`s a rip off.

reply to post by picratus


Add to that what happened to CD prices -- they were fairly high when the technology was getting acceptance, and I suppose the argument was exactly that it was novel and hard to produce. Years later the tech became commonplace, yet the prices remained fairly flat. I understand that they had full rights to charge what the market would bear, but ultimately people left record stores in droves.

I was quite reluctant to pay $14.99 for an album from which I only like two songs. I now shop Amazon for MP3s, and often buy a track or two for .99 each, works for me.

It has never, ever, ever been about piracy or the law, or profit.

I've been saying this for several years now, along with a growing number of people just starting to wake up to the fact. They only started all this, for the television, music, film and games industries so they can institute Orwellian control methods, and monopolize everything. They want to be able to spy on you 24/7, they want to get rid of the internet as it is, and replace it with something like a cable subscription service. "Sports Site Package", "News Networks Package", "Official Blogs Package".

That's their dream.

Somehow, they've managed to get low-level consumers to vote and openly talk out against their own interests. Frothing at the mouth at one another, arguing about nonsense. This is how a NWO system works, pit the people against each other.

---

He said it short and sweet;

Originally posted by navy_vet_stg3
Banks, CEO's, movie industry, music industry, etc. They all rinse and repeat the same thing. Claim they're in trouble, we lose more jobs and liberties, and they make an even bigger profit. Gotta love this American ride!

Here's an example I have posted several times, yet haven't had it answered thus far.
The example pertains to music rather than movies, but still can be adapted.

I bought Metallica's Master of Puppets on cassette in 1986.
Due to my un-airconditioned car, I had to buy the cassette again about 1988.
I think it was about 1992 that I bought the c.d.
And again in 1996 or '97.
And again around 2002.
One more time in 2005, owever,
I downloaded it for free in 2010.

The problem is,
I paid Metallica for the "rights" to that album in 1986.
I don't understand why I need to continue to pay those royalties every time I replace the media that it was stored on.

Shouldn't I only need to pay for the actual cost of replacing the media, rather than continuing to pay Metallica for their awesome album?
I paid them in 1986, the fact that my cassette's and c.d.'s wore out doesn't negate the fact that I already paid for the rights,
does it?

Originally posted by Oaktree
Shouldn't I only need to pay for the actual cost of replacing the media, rather than continuing to pay Metallica for their awesome album?
I paid them in 1986, the fact that my cassette's and c.d.'s wore out doesn't negate the fact that I already paid for the rights, does it?

Look, this is the case when the policy is strongly affected by tech capability. There were no DRM systems available, and that in a geat part drove the business model. Now, for example, you can have cloud storage on Amazon and your collection will be preserved for eternity, you can refresh your local copy when you need it (such as you fried your flash drive or lost MP3 player). I'm sure you would like that.

I love how they say Piracy is stealing which is complete garbage. I for one download alot of comic books , well do you know how they get on the internet? Someone BUYS a comic book issue , scans it into there computers and makes copies. I don't understand why "Piracy" is illegally but if I go to Kinko's and copy a few pages from The Great Gatsby and pass them around , that's completely fine. It's clearly a double standard.

reply to post by picratus


Exactly, how many times should you have to buy the same song?