Posted on 07/08/2006 9:24:52 PM PDT by BenLurkin
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- Sanitizing movies on DVD or VHS tape violates federal copyright laws, and several companies that scrub films must turn over their inventory to Hollywood studios, an appeals judge ruled.
Editing movies to delete objectionable language, sex and violence is an "illegitimate business" that hurts Hollywood studios and directors who own the movie rights, said U.S. District Judge Richard P. Matsch in a decision released Thursday in Denver.
"Their (studios and directors) objective ... is to stop the infringement because of its irreparable injury to the creative artistic expression in the copyrighted movies," the judge wrote. "There is a public interest in providing such protection."
Matsch ordered the companies named in the suit, including CleanFlicks, Play It Clean Video and CleanFilms, to stop "producing, manufacturing, creating" and renting edited movies. The businesses also must turn over their inventory to the movie studios within five days of the ruling.
"We're disappointed," CleanFlicks chief executive Ray Lines said. "This is a typical case of David vs. Goliath, but in this case, Hollywood rewrote the ending. We're going to continue to fight."
CleanFlicks produces and distributes sanitized copies of Hollywood films on DVD by burning edited versions of movies onto blank discs. The scrubbed films are sold over the Internet and to video stores.
As many as 90 video stores nationwide -- about half of them in Utah -- purchase movies from CleanFlicks, Lines said. It's unclear how the ruling may effect those stores.
The controversy began in 1998 when the owners of Sunrise Family Video began deleting scenes from "Titanic" that showed a naked Kate Winselt.
The scrubbing caused an uproar in Hollywood, resulting in several lawsuits and countersuits.
Directors can feel vindicated by the ruling, said Michael Apted, president of the Director's Guild of America.
"Audiences can now be assured that the films they buy or rent are the vision of the filmmakers who made them and not the arbitrary choices of a third-party editor," he said.
I will say that that is a completely different situation seeing as that it is your property. I am arguing the purchase of a movie then making a copy out of it and selling it. That is against the law.
No, the point he was making was that the fact that the product was being sold made the difference -- that although artists have allowed edited versions to be broadcast because the FCC forces them to, no artist had allowed an edited version to be sold. The example I gave proved that edited versions of artistic products are indeed sold with permission of the artist. That makes the "selling" side of the artistic integrity argument moot. It is a valid line of argument.
That edited, and copied version of the original movie, which you turned around and sold or intend to sell.
You are right on the copyright law issue--Clean Flicks is probably infringing. But the vast majority of films are formula, focus-group crap. It's sad the directors can't get past their silly egos and allow parents to control whether some of that crap makes it to their kids.
It's interesting that the directors and studios generally have no problem having their films edited for TV but not for inappropriate nudity, language etc.
When I purchase a DVD at say, Wal-Mart, I'm purchasing the DVD.
They do come with license agreements, the FBI Warning disclaimer is your EULA "End User License Agreement".
You altered the copyrighted work without permission and would be distributing it. I doubt anyone would care about a single copy, but technically that's still wouldn't be legal.
LO!! You're a funny person. You have asked everyone on this thread the exact same question refined with an alternate analogy, including magic marker, replacing words, editing content, censoring, form editing, airline version versus retail, defacing, you name it, blah blah blah and you want another answer to the same question pulled from a legal document that you have not come close to understanding but if the framework isn't just right, you will re-frame the same question?
Now you want a legal answer so you can probably re-frame a point of law verbiage and again ask the same question.
Take a legal course or try to comprehend everything said to you by numerous posters.
Ultimately, everyone answered your questions as posed. But you rejected all of them and asked the same question again, so, I'm wrong, you're right, laws are too complicated and authors works don't matter. Points of law are immaterial to personal desires and most likely wouldn't penetrate your mindset.
PS: Read you links, comprehend it and try again. Educating you is not my lifes work.
Good Morning. :-)
Have you ever watched a home video? EVER? The terms are flashed right up on the screen. They're also on the packaging. No, you didn't sign anything, but you didn't do that when you bought Windows, either. "Shrink-wrap" licensing might be ill-advised, but it's also well-established.
As long as the original is destroyed and you are not creating more than one of the new work, there is absolutely nothing done to violate copyright law.
I'm also purchasing that DVD from Wal-Mart with the full knowledge that if I copied it or altered it, I would be violating copyright agreements if I became a distributor of that film.
Go back to my 236 and follow the line of progression there. At what point am I breaking the law?
It's my property. I bought it. I can make any cuts to it I want. I can even ask someone to help me make those cuts. I can ask someone to make the cuts for me. Rather than purchasing it and sending it to someone to make those cuts for me, I can ask someone to purchase it on my behalf and make the cuts I request then send it to me. I set up a standing order for them to make certain cuts to new movies (the same ones as in the TV and airline versions that the directors and studios have already approved). I can ask for them to stock these in advance. I can tell other friends of mine that they too can partake of this service. There we are.
If you made additional copies, sure. If the original was destroyed and you are not making additional copies, then you are not depriving the rights of the copyright holder from making profit. The reason for copyright law is to ensure the copyright holder of being able to profit from their work. If no loss of money occurs, no laws are broken.
So if the companies reverted to their original business model of only altering copies of movies that people send in, then you agree that would be legal?
Not the FBI. But it's pretty easy to have a federal marshall show up and seize all equipment and CD's, even from a little guy. I've had it done.
The only instance where I know the original film was destroyed was when the movie M*A*S*H was put on DVD. Large chunks of the movie frames and most of the audio deteriorated to the point they restored it using computer technology, under the strict observation of Director Robert Altman and conducted at the 20th Century Fox Studios.
There is also an hour long episode of the M*A*S*H TV show in Season 9 that was destroyed, the studio (again with director Lerry Gelbart's permission) was dubbed from 1-inch digital videotape that is distributed to TV stations through syndication.
You seem to be confusing ownership of the individual unit and ownership of the copyright. Taking it outside and having someone essentially have a business or service operation of altering copyrighted works is not legal...and taking it another step further and having these edits be sold as the products in the stores is even worse. That is a whole other level than just you playing around with the individual unit that you are not distributing in your own home.
You seem to indicate that if the first link the chain of progression may technically not be illegal that means everything else that follows in the chain of progression is also legal. No!
What your talking about is "personal use". If you have no intent on selling, then you're not breaking any laws.
LOL! Cite the law that so states that.
Hint: it doesn't exist!
Like I said, you don't even know your copyright laws.
Because you haven't bothered looking it up.
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