US Politicians Want To Raise Broadcast Flag

[Wilbert]

@Adam,

The flag is not intended to take away your rights, its intended to restrict your activities to only those that you have a right to do.

That's one way to put it. How about the following way. During the years the rights of the consumers have been restricted very much under new legislation. The flag is one of the measures to enforce those restrictions. So, it's basically taking away rights you once had.

@ROF,

These broadcast flags, as I read them, will deny us this capability which I'm not happy about, but my anger isn't with Congress, the MPAA, or any other organization. It's the pirates who have forced the issue and it's the incapabilitiy of stopping these pirates that has caused me undue harm in my television viewing habits.

C'mon, it's so cheap to blame the pirates for this. They were always here, and will always be here. It is just the ever expanding greed of the movie companies and their ever growing influence on the Congress which is causing this.

[ROF]

@ROF,

These broadcast flags, as I read them, will deny us this capability which I'm not happy about, but my anger isn't with Congress, the MPAA, or any other organization. It's the pirates who have forced the issue and it's the incapabilitiy of stopping these pirates that has caused me undue harm in my television viewing habits.

C'mon, it's so cheap to blame the pirates for this. They were always here, and will always be here. It is just the ever expanding greed of the movie companies and their ever growing influence on the Congress which is causing this.

No way. Is it greedy to make people obey the law? That's all a broadcast flag does. Just because you can openly violate the law today doesn't mean you'll be able to get away with it forever. It's a violation of the law to record a television program and watch it more than once. That's called archiving. It's a violation of the law to record pay-per-view broadcasts. There is no greed involved. If piracy, as you say, would go away there might be no need for this. Unfortunately, certain segments of soceity can not seem to control themselves which in turn causes those who can grief because we have to abide by new laws and restrictions. Seatbelts and smoking laws are two perfect examples. People are asked to wear seatbelts, they don't so now it's the law. People are asked to reduce their smoking and public places are asking to install air filters, they don't so now we have laws. People are asked to not archive television programs, record pay-per-view broadcasts, or share their time shifted broadcasts, they don't and now new restrictions are going to be implemented.

It's piracy and nothing more.

[ROF]

@Adam,

The flag is not intended to take away your rights, its intended to restrict your activities to only those that you have a right to do.

That's one way to put it. How about the following way. During the years the rights of the consumers have been restricted very much under new legislation. The flag is one of the measures to enforce those restrictions. So, it's basically taking away rights you once had.

It was once a right of every land owning citizen to own slaves, but I don't see too many people complaining. Shall we bring back all the rights we had in the past? I don't think so.

[ungamunga]

Well if using the USA goggles, Hollywood falls into sort of a left speaking, oligarchic acting hypocracy, where power and influence is sought, but wealth is not to be actually shared except for left Democratic Party political contributions and limited funding of the "loonie left". They feel that is enough of sharing thank you.

"Hollywood" is made up of a few medium sized corporate divisions and many small to medium businesses plus a phone book of individual contractors. It's a relatively small project oriented specialty business.

The video game industry generates more revenue than the production side of Hollywood. The TV networks are all owned by the east coast financial interests except for Disney. Hollywood isn't that much of a big deal in Corporate America. Agriculture is the main California industry. As for exports Entertainment products aren't even in the top 10. Electronics and Industrial Equipment come first in exports.

So much for political camera positions.

Interesting. So contributing to specific political parties and having some of their big names publicly espouse left-wing causes are key elements in establishing Hollywood's left-wing credentials. Always seemed like self-serving business decisions to me. As for the artists, well artists traditionally tend to publicly espouse populist/leftist views (sometimes honestly and sometimes because it makes them look sensitive to the plight of the common man).

In short, Hollywood's left-wing status seems manufactured for business reasons to me. It's a feel-good/we're-champions-of-the-little-guy thing. Besides, the public loves seeing the hero face down heartless/inflexible reactionary authority figures on screen so that stance sells movies. It's a David and Goliath thing. Still, it all seems like phoney leftism to me.

If the studios contributed generously to efforts to alleviate poverty, to improve healthcare and education fought undue corporate influence in politics and worked to reduce the gap between rich and poor, then yeah, they'd be real leftists. I imagine a small number of celebrities really do embrace those values but it seems like most just make a show of it or like the idea but go about it hypocritically.

Maybe I just don't get it. Most big media interests are pretty solidly centrist or right wing here. It's about profit after all. Our non-profit public media is centrist with some left-wing sympathies.

As for Hollywood's revenue relative to other industries, I don't doubt your stats. As a media industry, particularly as one with world-wide reach (unlike most US television or print media), Hollywood has a disproportiately powerful voice. They might not be the biggest corporations out there, but between the reach of their movies and the public fascination with their celebrities, they've got one heck of a megaphone to make themselves heard with. I'd be kind of interesting if they had something intelligent to say.

[edDV]

So well said. I have little to add.

...
I'd be kind of interesting if they had something intelligent to say.

Michael Crichton may be too right of center for you but his critques of conventional Hollywood political opinions have been priceless.

Crichton, the Harvard educated doctor turned author-film maker (e.g. Andromeda Strain, Jurassic Park, the TV show "ER") calls celebrities " the fabulously stupid"

The full quote was “Hollywood is just a bunch of fabulously stupid people working in a business of idiots.”

http://www.crichton-official.com/fear/index.html

[ungamunga]

I have no problem with reading intelligent commentary from anywhere on the political spectrum. My own views are typical of an old Red Tory voter here but in US terms I'd be all over the map.

I haven't read Critchton's comments but they ring true. A good point is a good point no matter who says it. The author's political views (or my own) don't change that.

[Wilbert]

That's one way to put it. How about the following way. During the years the rights of the consumers have been restricted very much under new legislation. The flag is one of the measures to enforce those restrictions. So, it's basically taking away rights you once had.

It was once a right of every land owning citizen to own slaves, but I don't see too many people complaining. Shall we bring back all the rights we had in the past? I don't think so.

Give me a break. Are you saying we only throw away bad rights? If not, then that argument makes no sense.