Stop the Anti-Divx Madness!

Posted by David [IP: 207.235.31.207] on November 15, 1998 at 06:53:05:

In Reply to: Stop the Anti-Divx Madness! posted by Chris Williams on November 14, 1998 at 18:44:40:

: 1: The vast majority of the money and control of the system is in the hands of one company and a group of lawyers. If they succeed in pushing this, and killing the VHS rental market and DVD rental market, they can start raising prices...even on the discs you curently have in your "library". Cheap initial rentals are like "free" software from Microsoft.

No, they CAN'T raise the prices; you can only charge what the market will bear, and NO ONE will watch Divx for more than $4.50; it's a tough sell at $4.50.

: 2: It allows one huge marketing machine to have far more information about one's viewing habits than any reasonably prudent person would wish. When you combine the information in your credit report with all this info about what you watch, the value is so high to them they could give you the films for free, and still make money.

Actually, they can be sued for selling that information w/o permission.

: 3: It's the proverbial "camel's nose". If they can succeed in getting the public to accept the idea of a Pay-Per-View disc, they'll try for a Pay-Per-Listen audio format next. Don't think for a minute they haven't considered this. What's next? Pay-Per-Read books?

Again, the market will not bear the concept of pay-per-listen audio unless it's for pennies per song. Pay-per-read won't fly because library cards are free.

: This is a canard. If DIVX succeeds, DVD will be killed. If Hollywood studios can get money from every play, as opposed to selling it once, they will not release anything on open DVD.

I don't agree. There's something attractive about the lump sum of an outright sale. There will always be a sales market and a separate rental market because some people rent once and never again.

: : Let's not force people to choose between VHS rentals and DVD purchase. Divx is a nice happy medium between the two for many people. Isn't this a country whose founders came here to avoid having the views of the majority forced upon them?
: You don't know how nearly right you are. Opposing DIVX is a civil liberties issue that would be very clear to our Founding Fathers. The Copyright Act included the "Doctrine of First Sale", specifically authorizing one to re-sell an issue of a copyrighted work, like a book. I can re-sell any of my books, DVDs, Laserdiscs and VHS tapes. DIVX is an attempt to gut First Sale. If we have any respect for the wisdom of the Founders, we cannot let them succeed.

You can't resell a Divx disc because you don't own the copy, not because Divx is somehow cheating the system. You should be able to sell a silver or gold disc; if not, then THAT'S a travesty that cannot be tolerated.

Follow Ups:

• Stop the Anti-Divx Madness! Chris Williams 19:15:41 11/15/98 (6)
  • Stop the Anti-Divx Madness! David 03:18:14 11/16/98 (5)
    • Stop the Anti-Divx Madness! Bryan P. 22:47:30 11/18/98 (4)
      • Stop the Anti-Divx Madness! David 03:08:02 11/19/98 (3)
        • Stop the Anti-Divx Madness! Bryan P. 00:03:07 11/20/98 (1)
          • Stop the Anti-Divx Madness! David 02:02:51 11/20/98 (0)
        • Stop the Anti-Divx Madness! Bear 13:20:45 11/19/98 (0)

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