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Comments: 438 +- Your Rights Online: UK Copyright Group Tells Cinemas to Ban Laptops on Thursday October 15, @09:10AM
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Sockatume writes "Cinema chain Cineworld now has a policy banning anyone from carrying a laptop into a theatre, even if it is not used. The management claims that this is an anti-piracy move on the advice of the Federation Against Copyright Theft, the much-mocked source of all kinds of dubious anti-piracy statements. When it was pointed out that the laptop had no camera, the management made a temporary exception. For customers, the message is clear: leave your laptop in the car. For pirates, the message is clear: there is more money to be made slinking around cinema car parks looking for laptop bags."
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Movies (Score:5, Insightful)
It's funny they had no problems with mobile phones that certainly have good cameras now a days, but with a laptop. Oh well, maybe that changes soon too.
I'm just waiting them to take off our eyes while in movie theatre.
Re:Movies (Score:5, Interesting)
Good thing we have engineers working hard to remove the smartphone/laptop distinction.
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Re:Movies (Score:5, Funny)
Good thing we have engineers working hard to remove the smartphone/laptop distinction.
Not to worry, the film industry is hard at work on legislation to make engineers illegal.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Also, "leave your laptop in the car". Erm, what car? I couldn't even tell you where the nearest cinema with a car park is...
Next time I travel to "the other side of the pond" as some say, I might be in some of these areas you speak of (but not to buy DVDs). Clearly, any UK instruction involving "leaving your laptop in the car" was written by someone who watches too much Top Gear and thinks everyone has a car or by someone thinking of the colonies.
Re:Movies (Score:5, Insightful)
On the other hand, smuggling in a reasonable quality camera would be fairly easy. I dare say it would be possible to bring in a tripod as well.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah it's a pretty stupid ruling, coming down from people who have no clue. I have a standard-def digital camera that fits inside my palm and can be easily hid inside a suit jacket..... that's all you need, not a laptop.
Re:Movies (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Movies (Score:4, Insightful)
That just means when you arrive at the theater, and the owner refuses you entrace, you can yell, "Congratulations dumb shit. You just lost $20 worth of sales," and walk away.
Businessmen hate losing money. It makes them hide in their office and cry. And it gives us, the citizens, power over them.
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Re:Movies (Score:4, Insightful)
Ah, but the question is - do you block people from entering just on the basis they have a phone/laptop, or do you advise them "please don't use those in here"? This is all about people not even being allowed in with these items - it makes perfect sense to ask them not to use them.
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Re:Movies (Score:4, Interesting)
Last time a theater employee even asked if he could check my stuff, there were three things in the bag I was carrying around...
- A high quality digital still camera also capable of HD video, mounted on a tripod.
- A smartphone with less-than-worthless 640x480 noise-o-vision video
- 2 bottles of Aquarius 'Red Blast' ('peach' flavor sport drink).
( Quick backstory: I ended up at the theatre because it was raining out. Not so bad in general, but I was making a photo trip on the bike and the weather report said the rainshower should last 2 hours tops. I was in the area of the theatre, so I figured I'd hop in there, catch a movie, and by the time I'd get out I could continue on my shoot. )
Employee: we can't allow those inside ... wait, I can't take the bottles - which I'm only carrying for outside; I just got a Coke Zero at the bar, see? *holds up coe zero* - but the camera is okay?
Me: oh, I know, but I'm just on a shoot; I can leave the battery with the reception if you want
Employee: no, no.. the bottles. We can't allow those inside; we don't sell those (they sell regular and whatever the hell flavor the blue-colored Aquarius is)
Me:
Employee: yes.. sorry, policy
Me: o-kay.
Employee: Could we put those in storage for you, perhaps?
I guess they already knew that the movie had been available for download for weeks, as a telesync, probably snatched up in the U.S. with a proper audio feed, and didn't much care about anybody bringing in cameras.
But the drinks.. oh noes, the drinks!
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Re:Just "blind" the cameras (Score:5, Informative)
Well they don't really need to send a blinding light at the camera.. they can just project (near-)IR light from the projection booth, make it vary randomly in intensity, and all but the most well-equipped cameras (with a *very* decent IR blocker that can at least block the frequency used by the theatre; no, the standard IR blocker does not cover this, as pointing a TV remote at your camera will show) record utter junk.
It's even a relatively cheap solution; certainly cheaper than having personnel run around with nightvision goggles trying to catch people, or checking people's bags and banning cameras, etc.
But in the end, it still only takes 1 person - a projectionist not adhering to policy, a print shop that has a mysterious 'leak', a review board member wanting some extra crash - to get a transfer to a format that distribution groups can use, and the whole world will have access in no time.
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Re:Just "blind" the cameras (Score:4, Funny)
the standard IR blocker does not cover this, as pointing a TV remote at your camera will show)
Oh wow, I didn't know this, that's nifty. Purple lights! Woo!
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Re:Bionic eyes (Score:5, Funny)
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
No problem, you'd just have to learn to blink one eye at a time.
Re:Bionic eyes (Score:4, Funny)
That'd be a horrible pirate copy. The video would go black every few seconds.
It would also be more prone to "male gaze" than even normal movie standards.
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Re:Bionic eyes (Score:5, Informative)
Not true, your eye doesn't look at the whole picture the whole time. And what someone else looks at at in a particular scene (the hero's face) might be very different from what i am looking at (the heroines breasts). So you'd be bound to reconstruct the image incorrectly
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According to a blog post (Score:5, Insightful)
Important caveat, neatly snipped from the start of the post.
Re:According to a blog post (Score:5, Funny)
To be fair, it's a professional journalist's blog post.
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Idiotic (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
In some states a driver's license is the only valid form of identification to purchase alcohol. So those incapable of obtaining a driver's license due to disabilities cannot drink.
(Though this may actually primarily apply to out-of-staters, as this anecdote comes to me via a friend who could not use her state ID card to purchase alcohol in Utah. Or maybe Nevada, I don't remember.)
My exposure to that sort of case is that particular institutions implement an internal rule to not accept out of state non driver's license ID because the loss from the occasional lost sale this policy generates is significantly less than the loss from selling alcohol to a minor with a faked out of state non-driver's license ID (significant fines and loss of license to sell alcohol at all). I would bet that even a lawsuit based on the Americans with Disabilities Act would be cheaper than getting tagged for
Laptop bags. (Score:3, Insightful)
From summary: For pirates, the message is clear: there is more money to be made slinking around cinema car parks looking for laptop bags.
What? Sigh. Once again, all together now: Piracy is not stealing.
So that advice is for thieves, not pirates. But wait, there's one more oddity in the same sentence: "more money" - which assumes that money is made at all by piracy. It's sad that even among the IT elite (/.), such myths are propagated.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Laptop bags. (Score:5, Funny)
Pirates do make money, not only through piracy, but drug dealing, selling babies, and holding the Earth itself to ransom with their deadly Asteroid Ray. I'm apalled that you would even question this.
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What about cellphones? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd be ok for banning cellphones in a cinema.
There's nothing worse than having a cellphone ring in the movie, and there's always some douche who forgot to turn it off and who can't find it in the dark in her huge purse, or some teenage dirtbag who just HAS to answer his buddy's text message right away with this distracting and blinding light by your side.
And GUESS WHAT MPAA.... CELLPHONES HAVE CAMERAS, TOO!!! :-D
Well at this rate (Score:4, Insightful)
The rest of us will forego the spanish inquisition, the extortionate prices and the hassle in general of getting parked and bothering to go to the cinema, we will instead sit at home watching our bootlegged copy, pausing it to go to the loo and still have the poeple walking infront of the screen, laughing and coughing.
Actually I feel like doing piracy vs cinema:
Cinema:
Pros
Cons:
Piracy:
Pros:
Cons:
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually, I'd put "popcorn" under Cinema/Cons.
In my country, it used to be that food was completely prohibited within movie theaters. I never really understood the obsession with eating popcorn while you watch a movie and thought it was purely an American thing, that it'd never take here.
Then food became allowed (well, food sold within the theater did), and whaddaya know, people did start eating in the theater.
Oh the horror! The noise of opening bags of crisps! THE INFERNAL CRUNCHING EVERYWHERE!
Seriously, i
Re:Well at this rate (Score:4, Insightful)
I thought copyright infringement was a civil matter. Is that no longer the case?
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A Better Answer (Score:5, Insightful)
For customers, the message is clear: leave your laptop in the car.
I have a better answer: When they ask you to put your laptop in your car, ask for your money back and leave. Is it really worth being treated like a criminal to see that movie right now? Customer service matters. If the proprietor of some establishment is a dick, don't give him your money.
To stop filming, or stop twittering? (Score:4, Insightful)
I wonder if this has more to do with the Twitter effect (see Brüno) than stopping piracy.
It seems rather implausible (to be generous) that someone would try to illegally film a movie using a crappy webcam on your average laptop (particularly if they manage to do it with the laptop in the bag). If you think about how a laptop is likely to hurt them financially, the reason should be pretty clear.
Seriously? (Score:3, Interesting)
Am I missing something here, or are these anti-piracy groups really that dense?
Re:Seriously? (Score:4, Insightful)
Aside from the obvious absurdity of someone trying to record a movie with their laptop -- how much of a problem are off-screen recordings for the movie industry? I may be naive -- but I really have a hard time imagining someone saying -- "I was gonna go see this movie in the theater, but I have a copy that someone recorded with a video camera in the theater! This is just as good! Now I don't need to go see it!" Am I missing something here, or are these anti-piracy groups really that dense?
Actually what they are afraid of is: " I was gonna go see this movie in the theater, but I have a copy that someone recorded with a video camera in the theater and now I know it sucks! I'm not going to waste my time and money going to the theater to see it." (see also someone else's comment about twits tweeting how bad the movie is).
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Lost me here... (Score:3, Insightful)
It turns out the small boy was the manager."
Yeah... that kinda makes you sound like a prick. Waving around a BBC ID like it makes you special and somehow exempt from the rules everyone else has to follow isn't the most endearing quality either.
Who watches these horrible videos? (Score:4, Funny)
Who are these people who watch theater video camera recordings of movies? That's really sad. At leaste be a self-respecting pirate and get a decent copy.
This is very irritating (Score:5, Interesting)
Cineworld Southampton have therefore just lost my business. This is particularly stupid of them, as quite often (even with newly released films) I can count the audience members on my fingers.
Anti-Piracy Warnings (Score:4, Funny)
Myself and friends used to emit a fairly loud "Yarrrrrrrrrrr" every time a "Piracy is a crime" warning came up at the cinema. Sometimes even heard an answering one from across the cinema.
Don't know how it is in other chains but at Vue cinemas in the UK they now use night vision cameras to monitor the people watching the film. ]I once saw a spoof anti-piracy ad involving night vision and silenced sniper rifles - life imitating satire, so I guess I know the next step.
Secondly, this monitoring strikes me as being like the millimetre wave scanners at airports. Sure it's nominally for justifiable purposes but every time I see a message saying they're monitoring us with night vision for copyright purposes I have a mental image of a couple making out in the dark at the back of a cinema and a security guard in an office somewhere watching them using light-enhancing CCTV going "Oooh, go on! You dirty minx! Oooh, you like that, do you?". Seriously, copyright or not, it's not OK to watch cinema goers watching the film - that's plain just creepy.
they should just ban people from their theaters (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:why would you need a laptop in a movie theater? (Score:5, Insightful)
Or maybe conveniently located rentable lockers will start showing up at the theater, which you can pay to store all your potentially infringing devices. Dump your laptop, phone, and any pens or pencils which may be used to write down dialogue. Also, when you leave the theater, please make sure to stop by our convenient memory erasing station, so that you don't carry unauthorized memories out of the theater.
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Or maybe conveniently located rentable lockers will start showing up at the theater, which you can pay to store all your potentially infringing devices.
Ooooo - I like that idea. Then, while you're in the theater, the duly authorized officials from the RIAA and MPAA can search your hard drive for stolen music and movies. :)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
...please make sure to stop by our convenient memory erasing station, so that you don't carry unauthorized memories out of the theater.
Where was this device when I made the mistake of seeing 'Ultraviolet'? /shudders
Re:why would you need a laptop in a movie theater? (Score:5, Insightful)
Where I live we have trains, bus, and a great transportation system. I don't need a car either, I walk. I have never seen anyone bring a laptop to a movie theater, ever. So much for sarcasms [sic].
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Re:why would you need a laptop in a movie theater? (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe that's because they leave them in their bags instead of holding them up in the air and waving them around while shouting "Hey, everybody, look at my laptop!"
Just a thought.
Unless you were trying to say that you have never, ever seen anyone bring a bag more than 30 cm wide into a movie theatre, in which case I would have to ask you just what kind of movies legally bind people enjoy.
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I'm a sysadmin (Score:4, Funny)
One week a month, I get paid extra for being at most 15 min away from ssh 24/7. So I have to carry a laptop and a 3G usb key at all times.
Of course I don't go to the movies anymore, the experience sucks so much with all the stupid jerks talking and/or forgetting to turn off their phone.
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Gee gosh. You meet your wife/friend/furry-afficionado after work, have dinner and then go to movie. In your briefcase you have your notebook.
God dammit, that just ruined any desire I had to go see "Where the Wild Things Are"
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
While it seems like a rather silly policy, why on earth would people be taking their laptops into the movie theater? Are there that many occasions when people don't go home prior to going to a movie?
You don't have a job, do you?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes lots of people do strange things like go watch a movie, go to a bar, go to a restaurant, go to the grocery store, etc. on their way home from work.
Students sometimes even go watch a movie after studying at the library and so on.
There's no plan to use the laptop, they just don't want to leave it in the car to get stolen. Or they're catching the subway and don't have a car to put it in.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
How about people who live in the city and walk or use public transportation?
What about people who own hatchbacks and are not comfortable leaving a laptop bag out in the car?
The movie industry is only making "pirated" content even more superior to the "genuine" product. They're missing the fact that most of the pre-release torrents are coming from their employees or from DVD replication houses to begin with.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Wow, way to be auto-centric. What about all the people who don't drive to the theater? And for that matter, who the fuck are you to say what is or is not a valid reason? I most certainly have gone to a movie directly from work; I have had many jobs which do not require me to dress like a trained monkey. And working from home is not the only reason to take a laptop back and forth; for a while I used my last work laptop as my home system too, because I was between powerful computers at home, and they did not
Re:This would be the last straw for me. (Score:4, Funny)
Where can I get this free popcorn and soda? And on a related note, where is all this free beer the OSS people keep talking about?
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