Creating retail demo dvd's, legality question

[vulcan4d]

I work in a electronics store. It's not a big retail store so managment doesn't want to spend the $$$ on powered component splitters to show HD content on all HD capable TV's. So instead we are running DVD's on such TV's. Each brand TV is running it's own brand demo disc. It sure looks nice but it makes comparing TV's impossible. We once bought a dozen copies of the same movie to show them off but the damn discs keep getting stolen, therefore it's too much of a hassle. So I decided to create my own demo discs containing several different clips to show off the potential of these TV's to the customers and making it possible to compare the TV's without too much of a hassle.

Problem is the content. Copying the branded demo discs is pointless because they have their own brand logo in the corner and it confuses customers if you play lets say a hitachi demo disc on a sony TV ^^. Also I can't copy movies because it's obviously illegal. Actually when it comes to legality, I wonder if I can actually just use clips from actual movies. I seen it done on some of the different brand demo discs which use clips from movies. Does anyone know if this would be allowed if I did it myself, and what would be the limitations and/or restrictions to doing this? I guess if all else fails I can always download some high resolution trailers and stick them on a DVD ^^.

[kirky99]

If it were legal to play bought DVD's to demo the TV's, there would be nothing wrong with making backups of those disks to play. That's the whole reason for creating a backup, so nothing happens to your originals.

Not sure if that's a grey area, BUT that sounds doable. I'm not sure what rights you have to create your own demo reels with other's movies.

I would maybe create the backups on printable DVD's with a big red X on them and in big letters put the words, "This disk was stolen from XXXXXXX store!"

Might prevent some people from walking with the backups.

[crazy14muzic]

In addition to the red x deal, I would go as far as adding a static subtitle saying that it is a backup and who it belongs to.

[guns1inger]

For some brands it is easy - I bet the Sony disks have clips from Sony films, but no-one elses. Any brand that does not have a movie production arm will have paid for the rigths to include clips from actual movies in their demos. There is no way to even begin to try and fit this under fair use. It is clearly purely for commercial gain - not to sell the disk, but to sell the equipment it is playing on. It is also a public performance if these TVs are on public display, another breach of copyright.

It would be cheaper for your bosses to lock away the players so the disks don't get stolen than to pay the fines for breaching copyright.