Hollywood Seeks Piracy Informers
from the need-a-little-cash? dept
On the whole, while I think the entertainment industry is making a huge mistake in going after file traders, I've been surprised that they've seemed less concerned with the "real" piracy problem - of people actually selling counterfeit music and movies burnt to CDs and DVDs. It turns out that now the movie industry has set aside a pile of cash to pay off informers about where these pirate factories are. Since so much of the hard goods piracy industry is now run by organized crime, they basically don't think the local police are trustworthy enough to crack down. So, they're resorting to bribing people to turn in their employers. Nothing too surprising here, but I'm wondering how long it will take Hollywood to shift that policy to downloading as well. Need some extra cash? Why not turn in your college roommate for downloading the latest hit movie last night?Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team