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The Courts Government News

Australia Rules DVD's are Films, Not Software 440

Posted by michael from the one-small-step-for-oz dept.
divereigh writes: "The Sydney Morning Herald is reporting that an Australian Federal court has decided this case in favour of the Australian Video Rental Association. The Association had taken Warner Home Video to court for trying to classify DVD's as software and thus double the price for those sold into the rental market."
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Australia Rules DVD's are Films, Not Software More

Australia Rules DVD's are Films, Not Software

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  • What? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Wheaty18 ( 465429 ) on Saturday January 26, 2002 @10:46PM (#2908194)
    DVD's are a storage medium. They are what someone makes them to be (ie. Movie DVD's, Software DVD's, etc).

    Trying to classify Movie DVD's as software is sort of... dumb.

    • Re:What? (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Sc00ter ( 99550 )
      What about a Movie DVD that has a computer game on it that can be played in a computer? Or a DVD that's for your DVD Player that is a game.. Like space ace and alike?



      They can be both, and now adays, they usually are?

      Like the ones that have stupid little games in the menu.. that's not part of the movie, and I would cosider it software.

    • Re:What? (Score:3, Informative)

      by subsolar2 ( 147428 )
      DVD's are a storage medium. They are what someone makes them to be (ie. Movie DVD's, Software DVD's, etc).

      Trying to classify Movie DVD's as software is sort of... dumb.

      My reply is DUH give Wheatly18 a dunce hat.

      The court case was not about DVD in general, but about Movie DVDs in particular. WB was trying to say that because a miniscule part of a nomal movie DVD is software for menus and such that the whole this should be considered software. This has nothing to do with DVDs in general.

      The court basically said that the reason people by DVD Movies is to watch the movie, and not use the software, and so Movies on DVD should not be considered software.

      Wheatly, get a brain, read the story and give the moderators who modded him up some anti-depressants so they may have a clue.

      - subsolar

  • Screw us with Broadband (Score:3, Funny)

    by obi-1-kenobi ( 547975 ) on Saturday January 26, 2002 @10:48PM (#2908201) Homepage
    For a second their People in australia were going to get screwed with DVDs and bradband... Good thing its now back to get screwed with broadband

  • Hmmm (Score:4, Insightful)

    by sulli ( 195030 ) on Saturday January 26, 2002 @10:49PM (#2908210) Journal
    Does this mean Region Code Enhancement, which uses scripting to check whether the player is region 1 (and IIRC only region 1), would be banned in Oz?

    • No. (Score:4, Funny)

      by volpe ( 58112 ) on Sunday January 27, 2002 @10:09AM (#2909421)

      Does this mean Region Code Enhancement [...] scripting [...] would be banned in Oz?


      No, it just means scripting isn't considered software, which we all knew already. Sorry, kiddies.

  • Moral victory (Score:5, Insightful)

    by kenneth_martens ( 320269 ) on Saturday January 26, 2002 @10:53PM (#2908230)
    Since I'm not in Australia, this doesn't affect me directly, but it's still a moral victory (now if we can just convince a judge in the US to accept an Australian court finding as precedent...)

    Basically, the decision ruled that DVD movies cannot be treated as software simply because they are digitally recorded, and because DVD players have processors. I wonder if now AOL Time Warner will try to "modify" the DVD standard in order to make DVDs into "software" so they can go ahead with their scheme anyway. I doubt customers (meaning me) would go for that, since it would probably mean that people would have to get newer-model DVD players, but I wouldn't put it past them to try it.

    • (now if we can just convince a judge in the US to accept an Australian court finding as precedent...)

      Actually, thanks to CSS, DVDs are already allowed to be rented here in the US. The subsection making rental of software specifically exempts:

      a computer program which is embodied in a machine or product and which cannot be copied during the ordinary operation or use of the machine or product; or

      • Re:Moral victory (Score:2, Insightful)

        by heideggier ( 548677 )
        now if we can just convince a judge in the US to accept an Australian court finding as precedent...

        hmm, I know this may sound like a troll (I don't mean it to be), but the American supreme court, over turned the universal declaration of human rights in order to allow the death penalty. At the time this was considered pretty scandalous but I think that there was a general public outcry that none of the Manson family got the chair. The yanks tend to have a pretty good bill of rights with the declaration of independence so I guess they can get away with it (something which Australia does not have, see the current situation up north).

        Anyway, my point is: If an American court can just ignore the united nations, then I don't think a issue on DVD's, would be given any consideration at all.

  • Further Reading (Score:5, Informative)

    by Metrollica ( 552191 ) <m etrollica AT hotmail D0T com> on Saturday January 26, 2002 @10:56PM (#2908237) Homepage Journal
    Can be found here. [news.com.au] It is dating back to Novemeber 05, 2001.

  • That's crap. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by sllort ( 442574 ) on Saturday January 26, 2002 @11:00PM (#2908258) Homepage Journal
    Sorry - but it's total crap. DVD's are software. They contain logic - menu systems, scene browsers, and most importantly, a nasty little piece of malicioius code called "region coding" which illegally allows the Motion Picture cartels to practice Predatory Price Discrimination [ftc.gov] against a worldwide customer base.

    No, DVD's are software. Malicious software, in fact. They should be dealt with as such.

    • Re:That's crap. (Score:2, Informative)

      by cscx ( 541332 )
      I think you're wrong. The region coding is simply a byte (or something similar) set that describes the region coding. The DVD player can choose to (or not to [dvd365.net]) read it. Music CDs include a serial number that identifies them. How do you think CD player software can dial up CDDB and get the track info? Would that make music CDs software too by your definition? The menu systems are not executables... i'd imagine that they are scripts of some sort, including the images, etc stored somewhere on the DVD. Also, the videos are stored in .VOB files so, the player just looks for them and plays them.

      DVD videos are _NOT_ software. They are a _STORAGE MEDIUM_. Just like VCDs. I can make a VCD in Nero with the "logic" you describe --- a menu system, even images that backdrop it. Is it software? Hell no. The studios are just trying to make another quick buck - region coding is _not_ "nasty malicious code."

      • region coding is _not_ "nasty malicious code."

        No, but it certianly is nasty and malicious.

        • >region coding is _not_ "nasty malicious code."

          No, but it certianly is nasty and malicious.

          Yes it is code on some titles. These "Region Coding Enhanced" (RCE) discs contain valid content for all regions, but in all but the "correct" region the content is only "Wrong region" (confusing region-free players), and in the "correct" region there's a menu program that reads the player's make and model, and if it's a model known to be region-switchable or too easy to to modify to get rid of Macrovision or region lockout), the disc won't play.

    • Sorry - but it's total crap. DVD's are software

      Just because they contain some software elements, that doesn't make them software. If I bought a music CD and it had a data track on it with some pictures/videos of the band I would still consider it a music CD, not software. Why? because the main reason I bought it was the music, why do I consider DVDs to be films and not software because the main reason I bought it was to watch a movie. Adding a level of interactivity doesn't change it into software, hell my TV has menus - guess my TV must really only be a piece of software, fuck look I found a menu on the internet - the Internet must be software then.

    • Re:That's crap. (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Scooter ( 8281 )
      Yeah sure they may contain some software (although they don't have to - just put one item on the disc and it will play) And the menu software is on the player - only the data that says what is on the menu is on the disk. But anyway that's not the point - any software thats present is usually part of the delivery/playback mechanism - you telling me theres no software in a VCR? Course there is, but its a part of the playback mechanism. The exception to this is when they put game demos on the movie DVDs - which could make things awkward even though these often have little or no value (I certianly don't want them - and have never bought a movie DVD becasue it had some demo of the game-of-the-film).

      So far from being total crap, its common sense - and in fact - why was it ever in doubt?

      I guess you'll be burning all of your malicious DVDs then? I have no problem with region encoding - its the studios right to decide when they will release a product in each market. They've done it for years with tapes and cinema releases - why is everyone suddenly bitchin because they're still doing it with DVDs?

      Sooner or later, just about everything will have some sort of processor and associated "software" embedded in it - but thats no reason to start re-classifying everything as "software", when we all know what the main "point" of an object is. I mean - there's more software in a new 7 series BMW than in 50 DVD players - but it's still a car.
      • guess you'll be burning all of your malicious DVDs then? I have no problem with region encoding - its the studios right to decide when they will release a product in each market. They've done it for years with tapes and cinema releases - why is everyone suddenly bitchin because they're still doing it with DVDs?

        Because now I cannot go to japan and buy a copy of Kenshin to watch on my home VCR in America. A certian amount of freedom to choose has been taken away from me by the region coding. Before the "invisible hand" of free market trade held the prices of VHS down because I could always wait 6 months for the foriegn (read cheap) versions of the film to be released. Now I can no longer do that. I am also limited in the content that I can recieve, especially if you are a Anime/Japanese television/Hong Kong Cinema fan. At least thats why I make a stink about this crap. :)

    • price descrimination (Score:3, Informative)

      by Kohath ( 38547 )
      Actually, price descrimination can be a good thing. For example, price descrimination is largely responsible for the availability of cheap airline tickets and airline tickets being generally available on short notice. Without price descrimination, you'd likely have a situation where you'd pay more than the cheapest fares these days and/or there'd be no seats available for the last minute traveller.

      The DVD region system was a good idea, but it's poorly implemented. It's supposed to allow cheap DVDs to be sold in places like India without affecting the market in the US and Europe. Without it, DVDs would probably never be released in India at all, or they'd be released there at the same price as in the US and the middle class wouldn't be able to afford them. I don't see how either of these outcomes is better than $5 DVDs that only work in local DVD players.
      • Actually, price descrimination can be a good thing. For example, price descrimination is largely responsible for the availability of cheap airline tickets and airline tickets being generally available on short notice. Without price descrimination, you'd likely have a situation where you'd pay more than the cheapest fares these days and/or there'd be no seats available for the last minute traveller.
        Without "price discrimination" in the airline business, that is government regulation, just like it was until about 22 years ago, you had:
        • Fixed fares set by the government.
        • No ruinous competition over profitable rules, competition that leaves with airlines unable to replace their aircraft fleet (the US has an average fleet age that rivals many third world countries. Before deregulation, it had the newest aircraft fleet.
        • No out-of-the-way towns left without service, or with pretatorly-priced fares
        • Airlines had to serve little out-of-the-way towns at a reasonable fare, because it was forced to subsidize money-losing routes with the big moneymakers. And there was money available because the big moneymaking routes had no ruinous competition.
        • Safety standards were adhered to, because Government regulation insured that there would be enough money coming-in to maintain planes properly. With deregulations, airlines struggle to survive and will cut corners on maintenance and even falsify service records to go by.
        • When airlines are responsible for the security checkpoints, dwindling revenues make them cut corners there, so they hire stupid morons at minimum wages to let people with box cutters go aboard planes.
        'Nuff said. The "invisible hand of market" is just ideological bullshit to suit the biggest fish at the expense of the small fry.
        • This is off topic now, but fares were a lot higher before deregulation. You've said as much in your second point.

          Government regulation had the effect of largely denying affordable air travel to the middle class. This made things a lot more convenient for everyone else, but it's not a good thing.

          It's pretty easy for the government to make things good for you at the expense of everyone else. Unfortunately, that's a bad outcome, and only a bad person would desire it for themself. Too bad it's such a common attitude.

      • ...the insanely expensive plane tickets to small places. It's cheaper for me (Germany) to fly to the USA than to fly home (Norway, a little country just north of Germany for you US-centric) because of price discrimination.

        ...and what made DVDs that different from other media? Don't they sell VHS movies in India? Actually, I'd live with it if the European versions usually hadn't been late, in a worse format, lack extras and on top of it are more expensive. When you force people to pay more *for a late and inferior product* you're begging for trouble.

        I don't think MPAA get it. If I can stroll down to the shop and buy a DVD, in a good format, with all the extras the US version has, I'll probably do that. If I can't buy it, but I can get it on DivX (not screener, DVDrip, from a US DVD) or it's a horribly crippled version, I'll screw it and get the DivX. I can deal with living in a rich part of the world and be expected to pay more. But when I'm treated like a second-rate customer, I take offense. Of course I should probably simply not buy DVDs at all, write a letter to WTO and sulk. Uh huh. See you all in the line to get the LotR DVD.

        Kjella
    • Prick. Windows ME forces you to watch a video when it's installed, does this mean its a movie?


      DVD movies are infact movies.

    • Unsoft (Score:2)

      by fm6 ( 162816 )
      Jeez, another thoughtful, interesting post. Oh well, at least you managed to be unnecessarily offensive in the title.

      Anyway, I beg to differ. Menus, browsers, and region codes are not code, they're data. The line between code and data is often fuzzy, but these things are well beyond the fuzzy area. There's no programming that the player uploads and executes. (That would present interesting opportunities for virus writers!) It's just information that's used by the logic that already embedded in the player.

      Which is not to dispute the "malicious" part of your comment. Indeed, that's why the entertainment industry is so uptight about open-source DVD software. Putting logic where people can hack it makes it more difficult for them to control the data the logic interprets.

      I also have to point out that even if we accept your classification, it's a technical classification, not a legal one. Judges tend to classify things according to the way people use them. That's why the tomato is a legal vegetable [cornell.edu], though botanically it's a fruit. And people use DVDs for watching movies, so embedded data is neither here nor there. Which is also true for the ID info embedded in MP3 files, the sideband data [tbbs.net] in analog TV broadcasts, and the recording speed info on VHS tapes.

  • No big deal, but cool anyway... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Stephen VanDahm ( 88206 ) on Saturday January 26, 2002 @11:11PM (#2908287)
    This ruling probably won't benefit consumers because, as someone else has already pointed out, DVD's will cost more to rent than VHS tapes regardless of how expensive it is for the rental chains to purchase them. However, I think it's gratifying anytime someone manages to beat the film industry in court.

    Do people actually rent DVD's? Because of the higher cost of renting them, I've found that it's usually best just to buy the movie outright. In most cases, I find that a movie worth watching is worth watching again. So I think it would be kind of nice to have a movie library.
    • Don't know how much you Americans pay to rent your DVDs , but all the major australian rental stores charge the same price for DVDs as videocassetes, with quite a few new releases being 'special edition' types with an extra DVD.

      Waitaminnit... "new release" rental prices *have* been creeping up ... maybe they just up the VHS price and lower the DVD one to match!!

      Bastards!
    • I find that a movie worth watching is worth watching again

      Offtopic rant time! My variant on this is that a movie worth watching is worth downloading - it takes a day or so and is a hassle, so I don't waste my time watching crap movies. Sure, it's piracy, but I'm not going to buy a DVD drive that will only work with certain movies and may be obsoleted to fix the broken region coding. I'm also not going to wait a year for the VHS, this is *much* less convenient for me than watching it on my computer.

    • > Do people actually rent DVD's?

      Around here, you can check them out of the library.
    • Do people actually rent DVD's? Because of the higher cost of renting them, I've found that it's usually best just to buy the movie outright.

      Down here in NZ, the two shops I rent from (one a national chain which has a local near my house, the other an independent but a bit farther away) rent at the same price as VHS.

      Both of them get RC1's in as well, but the national one might not get them in anymore as the local branch of the big studios has recently clamped down on an importer who used to sell to the chains. The independent will probably still get them through DVDExpress and the like...

  • software vs. movies (Score:5, Interesting)

    by MiTEG ( 234467 ) on Saturday January 26, 2002 @11:17PM (#2908299) Homepage Journal
    I think the main difference between a piece of software and a game is how much interactivity is offered. The first CD-ROM games that I played, back in the early 1990's, were "Spaceship Warlock" and "Hell Cab". While these were computer games and as such would be classified as software, they interactive experience entailed essentially clicking on things every once in a while and the rest of the time watching the story unfold.

    The main difference between "playing" these games and watching a movie was the fact that they had a "choose your own adventure" style of playback; i.e. you could dictate the basic actions of the main character. So I would conclude that most DVD movies are indeed movies and not pieces of software, because they are mostly non-interactive, and for the most part, people by them to watch the movie and not play the silly little games included.

    I think my sig has never been more appropriate than now. Check out my site [wox.org] if you want to know about backing up DVD's.
  • The company argued that it was entitled to charge more because, since a DVD - unlike a video-tape - is digitally recorded and is played on a machine containing a processor, it should be treated like a computer program and subject to copyright law.

    The company argued that [...] a DVD [...] should be treated like a computer program and subject to copyright law.

    The courts rejected the company's claim.

    Does that mean that DVDs aren't subject to copyright law?

    (yes, I know this is a silly conclusion; but I really can't work out what the quoted paragraph is supposed to mean.)
    • They don't throw in the "-video" that they should; A "DVD-Video" is distinct from a "DVD-ROM" the same way a "CD-Audio" is distinct from a "CD-ROM." Anybody here who is making cracks about 'watching their FreeBSD DVD' and the like might as well make the same cracks about 'listening to their FreeBSD CD.'
      • Heh.. At one point I managed to coax mplayer into playing a DVD-ROM. Wasn't FreeBSD but I'll try it later...

        Mpeg compressed the raw data which was block segmented into frame pngs. The goal was a performance test, as it'll be fairly random (as far as video is concerned) to see what my worst case framerate would be.

        Anyway, too much time on my hands.

  • DVD's are films? (Score:3, Funny)

    by matroid ( 120029 ) on Saturday January 26, 2002 @11:26PM (#2908331) Homepage
    Hmm... Maybe I'll watch some FreeBSD [freebsd.org] tonight.

    • Ooh, ooh. I got another one:

      Frankly, I always thought Linux belonged at Sundance.

      Does this mean Debian can finally win a Golden Globe?

      So then I can find Windows in the Horror section at Blockbuster, right?

      ... and I'm spent.

  • They are both (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Binary Tree ( 73189 )
    Why must they be pigeon-holed into either category?
    • Well, let's try an analogy here. Your PC (personal comp.) is pretty much useless without some software, minimally BIOS (or equivalent) plus an operating system. Should it then be classified as software? You can also rip and encode music and video footage and store it; is it now movie or music product?

      The same applies to all kinds of appliances; washing machines have lots of software to control the functionality; cell phones are mostly software (plus hardware to run it on). And still few would claim they are software, even as a secondary functionality. This is because software has supporting role, not accessed directly by user.

      So, basically for _movie_ DVDs primary function is to contain audio-visual content. It wouldn't make sense to say that they are both content and software, unless DVD contains both a movie and an interactive application (which certainly is possible). Movie industry tried claiming that just having software in there controlling viewing classifies movie DVDs as applications... which is silly, and fortunately court agreed.

  • Movies are data (Score:2, Insightful)

    by bokmann ( 323771 )
    Sure, the DVDs may actually come with some executable code on them, but by and large, THE BITS OF THE DVD REPRESENT DATA.

    This data is consumed by software to generate media, but IT IS *NOT* SOFTWARE.

    Any good software engineer knows that CODE and DATA should be SEPARATE. I'm glad the court recognizes this as well.

  • Don't understand all the negativity... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by NanoGator ( 522640 ) on Sunday January 27, 2002 @12:03AM (#2908447) Homepage Journal
    I just don't understand all the negativity here. Here's how I see it: WB was playing games with what a DVD really is in order to squeeze more money out of rental places in questionable ways. They lost that right, and were punished. Customers at rental places are renting MOVIES, no matter what kind of 'software' is on the DVD. They're not renting DVD's to solve a problem, virus scan their hard drive, or render images in 3D.

    Most DVD's aren't worth owning. I don't want to spend $40 or so on a DVD unless it's the type of thing I think I'll come back to again and again, like I did with T2. However, I do rent quite a few DVD's. And what Warner Bros. basically did was try to take that right away from me by jacking up the prices on their DVD's specifically for rental stores. That was not right. Tough noogies if WB doesn't get money for each rental. If their content isn't worth owning, that's their fault. Don't punish the consumers for it.

    I do have concerns of the ramifications this might have in the future, though. So far, I'm encouraged though. By defining DVD's as movies, then movie rights are seperate from Software rights. At least Warner Bros. can't grease up some politician to take movie rights away that affect how I use software.
    • This is something that most socialists don't understand. In a free market, the consumers determine the price. If they overcharge, then they will go out of business. Blockbuster is heading in that direction. Anyone one rent from Blockbuster, they seem to be dead. For the price of 1 video rental, I can rent 3 from a mom and pop store.
      • I saw a blurb on CNN last night where the RIAA made a claim that MP3 trading (like Napster) cost them four billion dollars. I think their math is based on "everybody that has MP3 is worth the CD that it was on."

        I just don't think they can make this claim. What's going on with MP3 trading is not so much piracy, but demand for a new type of service. People want individual songs, not over-priced CD's full of crap. They want it on a non-CD media so they don't have to juggle CD's. And finally, they don't want to have to look very hard to find it. You'd have thought somebody would have said "hmm.. there's demand here, we should fill it!".

        Then the RIAA would have created a business model for purchase and download of MP3's. If they had done that, I'd understand if their case that Napster is costing them money. But they're not even in that market, instead they're trying to sue it out of existence. Ever wonder if phone companies tried to sue cell phone companies?

        The market has spoken about what it wants, and the RIAA is stupid enough to try to fight it. The movie industry is going to learn a harsh lesson too if they follow suit. People want to rent DVD's instead of buying them. Their best bet is to make the content on the DVD's worth owning. Compete with the rental companies by being better than them. Man I'm so glad Warner Brothers lost that case.
  • It seems pretty strange to me since DVD is an acronym for Digital V ersatile Disk...
    Classifying it as film only goes against the very name of the medium :)

    Versatile: adj.
    1) Capable of doing many things competently.
    2) Having varied uses or serving many functions.

    SYNONYMS: All-around, many-sided, multifaceted, multifarious. These adjectives mean having many aspects, uses, or abilities.

    But ok, reading the article makes it much clearer, and I fully agree - Just because the medium is digital doesn't make it software!

    :)

  • Read what the judgement says (Score:5, Interesting)

    by x1048576 ( 268000 ) on Sunday January 27, 2002 @12:44AM (#2908564) Homepage
    Please read what the judgement [austlii.edu.au] says before posting. DVD videos certainly contain computer programs that create the interactive menus. However, that doesn't mean that the whole disc is a computer program, any more than then software inside a car makes a car a computer program.

    I was involved in this case as an expert witness, so, if anyone has questions I'd be happy to answer them.

    • very interesting - I am wondering how did you determine (and what are) the "commands" the section B lists ? .. did you disassemble the code ?
      • how did you determine (and what are) the "commands" the section B lists ? .. did you disassemble the code ?
        I used the ifo_dump utility that is included with the ogle [chalmers.se] player to find the instructions in the IFO (info) files. The only instructions in the VOB (video object) files are on menu buttons, so I just had to count the number of buttons on all the menus for those.

        The DVD FAQ has details [dvddemystified.com] about the nature of the commands on DVDs. The commands that were on the Warner DVDs that I looked at did not do anything very exciting - it was stuff like setting the audio language to match the setting on the player.

    • Please read what the
      judgement [austlii.edu.au] says before posting. DVD videos certainly contain computer programs that create the interactive menus. However, that doesn't mean that the whole disc is a computer program, any more than then software inside a car makes a car a computer program.
      In particular, the relevant phrase for most people is essential object of the rental. I.e. both parties agree that the software on the DVD belongs to Warner, and if consumers were renting ththis to get the software, then Warner could charge more.

      However, since the essential object of the rental, i.e. the reason for renting the DVD, is not the menus and language selection (which is what the software provides) then it does not matter, and the DVD can be rented just as a normal video tape.

      As always, IANAL, and this is a five minute summary of a 10+ page document....

  • yawn... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by supernova87a ( 532540 ) <kepler1@@@hotmail...com> on Sunday January 27, 2002 @02:43AM (#2908801)
    At first glance, I found this to be an interesting story on its own, because of the way it addresses the boundaries that the digital world is creating as it goes. But in another way, it's also the most boring story I've ever heard, in that this is the most predictable storyline you could come across. It's being repeated all over the industry:

    1. New format for distribution threatens company that used to make easy profits without much innovation.
    2. Company seeks to sue/tax/threaten promoters of new technology for infringing on its rights to make a profit.
    3. Consumers/users actually like new format, saves them money, time.
    4. Company actually ends up shooting self in foot, because its entrenched in old technology, refuses to embrace new opportunity. 5. Users adopt new technology anyway, leaving company in the dust.

    I mean really, can't we do something different for once? Let's get over our petty interests, and have some vision, maybe? This has been / is being repeated everywhere you look: Napster vs recording companies, internet phone calls vs telecom companies, hybrid cars vs US car companies, xerox copiers vs carbon paper manufacturers, robots vs assembly line workers, Gutenberg vs monks...

  • Underlying issues of the court case (Score:3, Informative)

    by _wintermute ( 90672 ) on Sunday January 27, 2002 @04:06AM (#2908990) Homepage
    DISCLAIMER: i am australian

    The real issues in this case was that Warner decided to create a tiered system for DVD rental. Retail DVDs where marked as such and sold for standard prices (around $30 or so AUD, which is quite reasonable). Rental DVDs were at least double the price, and the publisher said that it was illegal to use retail movies for rental purposes. Big copyright notices and disclaimers are places in all retails movies to ensure that consumers are alered to the legalities if they rent one.

    The effect of this was that the big coroprate rental shops (Blockbuster and VideoEzy among very few others) bore the cost, but the smaller and local rental places could not afford the new system and their business was threatend.

    This smaller rental shops are the ones who took legal action.

  • DVD Purchase vs. Rental (Score:3, Interesting)

    by seaan ( 184422 ) <seaan@nospAm.concentric.net> on Sunday January 27, 2002 @04:31AM (#2909014)
    I'm a solid opponent of the current tactics used by the recording industry, but let me kinda-of-sorta support what Warner Brothers was trying to do in Australia. I strongly deplore the attacks against fair-use, reverse-engineering, and free speech.

    The reason I could support something similar to what WB was trying to do, is that I could support the concept of limiting some of the traditional rights during a rental "situation". This was what Rep. Boucher was trying to accomplish with his DMCA clause.

    Of course the actual result of that DMCA clause turned out to be another total victory for the recording industry. It was supposed to protect rental movies from being copied, by making it mandatory for all VCR's to recognize MacroVision/CopyGuard. The industry promptly screwed the consumers by using this copy protection in all movies sold, not just the rental versions.

    Still, I could almost support the scheme of two types of movies: bought and rental. The reality is that this probably won't work for a number of reasons, the classic reasons cited in the article is that the "rental version" ends-up being more expensive, so rental stores use consumer versions instead.

    Another practical reason why this would probably not work, is that the recording industry has proved time and again that they are totally untrustworthy! I have to stretch to come-up with an example of an industry that is more sleazy (have to drop into organized crime like loan sharking and illegal immigrant smugglers).

  • The subject of this judgement was not whether a dvd is a movie or software, it is about Time Warner using its larger size to extort extra money from the movie rental stores. (ie not allowing video stores to rent out the cheaper DVDs, but selling them others DVDs with the same qualities for a greatly increased price)
    In Australia it is against the law for a company to interfere with any retailers pricing schemes. This is in order to encourage competition, and prevent price fixing, and also gives the same power to any individual that would be given to a company.
    In Australia we have an Act to ensure the rights of all parties in any agreement are all an the same footing, and can be found here [law.gov.au]
    To my knowlegde this exists nowhere else in the world, so it seems, once again that Australia is the fairest country in the world.
    • The subject of this judgement was not whether a dvd is a movie or software, it is about Time Warner using its larger size to extort extra money from the movie rental stores.
      You are wrong. This was a copyright case. You can find a good summary of the judgement here [digital.org.au].
  • I mean there's a long way between

    - DVD with nothing but menus
    - DVD with some add-on apps (screen savers etc.)
    - DVD *and* a solid app. Harry Potter DVD + Harry Potter game? Could have happened. Won't, but could be.
    - DVD wtih an application like Premiere, with some example trailers
    - Pure application DVD

    Where does it stop being a movie and start being software, when can you sell it under the first sale doctrine, when would an EULA of no resale be binding? I'm curious at least.

    Kjella
  • IIRC, the U.S. has this. There are tiered VHS tapes, one set that sell at your local store for $10-20, and another for the movie rental stores that cost $100. I know that there was a big uproar over The Matrix - if it didn't clear 200$ million, the only VHS copy would be available for rental stores, so you'd have to pay $100 for it. The only difference between the tapes, I believe, was that one had a different "don't show this in public" warning or something like that. Would someone who work(s|ed) at a movie store like to join in?
  • We'll have more crappy software packages on DVD's that refuse to give bonus footage unless we install it on our PC's?

    Take the Phantom Menace DVD for example, where you have to either search around for a copy of the quicktime video of the Ep 2 trailers, or install the crappy Interactual software that comes with the DVD in order to access the Starwars.com site preview (of course this also axes Mac/Linux users)...

    Since this is a growing trend with any movie company that wants to make the buyers jump through hoops just for a crummy bonus footage shot, I think that the Australian courts should reexamine their stance... Since the DVD holds software *on* the media itself, along *with* a movie, it counts as software *and* video media...
  • Why is the Herald only reporting this now? And why is Slashdot only accepting the submission now? This was reported in Australian IT on December 10 (Films aren't software, court rules [news.com.au]). It was also submitted to Slashdot, but rejected. Why? What's the bet that this comment gets censored too?
  • Exactly how these things are defined in law is to a large extent pretty unexplored territory; and nobody should assume it won't change even if an attempt to define it has been made.

    But, to put a little perspective on things referred to in this discussion...

    If, by "Software" you mean "a computer program", I suppose a DVD-Video disk is software. Exactly where "computer program" begins and "useful information" ends is basically undefined in most jursdictions, so far.

    If you take the "digital is special" arguement out of it, you come up with a few conclusions:
    A movie is information encoded in a retreivable storage form. So's a book, so's a photograph, so's a sound recording.

    To stick with the Movie analogy; a movie is not actors, dialog and a stage; it is information about these things. It is essentially irrelevant what medium is used to store the information. 70mm film, videotape, DVD-Video disk; all the same, whether digital or analog.

    Now, if you think all things digital automatically encompass a magical transformation to something MORE than information about other information, you might, like WB, try to change the way the courts view it and probably to increase or change your revenue model. If you think it just a damn movie, obviously this approach won't work.

    Clearly the Australian Court decided it was just a damn movie.

  • I am not a lawyer... (Score:3, Informative)

    by gordguide ( 307383 ) on Monday January 28, 2002 @02:41AM (#2912366)
    But I did read the actual decision provided by another poster (earlier in the thread).

    My interpretation could be off (I always seem to read legalese different from real laywers) but...

    The Judge defined software, copyright, etc as it applies in Australian Law.
    Both parties agreed you could rent DVDs.
    Both parties agreed to the study of 2 titles as representative of all video DVDs.
    Australian Law prohibits the rental of software.

    The Judge spent some time going over the definition of software, and in particular that it is a set of instructions which produces a result.
    You must be able to define the result; for example it does not follow that every result is protected by the same license/copyright. An analogy might be "Adobe doesn't own every work created in PhotoShop".
    He found that the SW is nothing more than what is encompassed in the DVD-Video specifications, and controls play, stop, etc. He also found that if there is no movie, the sw does nothing (no result). I think this might have been the case-breaker for WB, but I'll leave that to real lawyers. He therefore concluded that it is the movie and not the sw the consumer is intending to rent.
    He found that storage of data in memory (what a DVD player does) did not constitute copying of SW because the data is not normally accessable; is briefly stored and constantly replaced over the course of watching the film in real time. He agreed a computer along with additional SW (ie. SW not used to simply view the movie on a computer) could be used to do so but concluded it did not represent the intended use of most consumers when they rent.
    They also analized the data and determined how many bits were sw and movie (about 5/95); and concluded the sw component is incidental to the use by consumers.
    He considered the many additional features of DVD over VHS but concluded it was merely part of the format. The format allows for all kinds of information to be stored, and they defined DVD-Audio, data, MPEG-2, and others.

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