But... But... Piracy...

from the just-having-some-fun dept

Fri, Mar 25th 2011 6:34pm — Mike Masnick

You've probably seen those XtraNormal videos going around these days, where you type out a script and some text-to-speech software and animation software create a short video. I thought it might be fun to experiment with this to see what came of it. Here's my first attempt at a short video that I call "But... But... Piracy."

Yes, some of the dialog is silly, but all of it is based on claims that I've seen people actually use in these discussions.

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Filed Under: piracy, time waster

52 Comments

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ChurchHatesTucker (profile), 25 Mar 2011 @ 6:54pm

Heh.
I just love actually hearing "but... but... piracy"
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- Anonymous Poster, 25 Mar 2011 @ 7:10pm
  
  Re: Heh.
  Agreed. That was just beautiful.
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  - Anonymous Coward, 28 Mar 2011 @ 7:02pm
    
    Re: Re: Heh.
    It's about time the net's biggest piracy apologist made his own propaganda video.
    
    I especially liked the part where he used "antiquated business models" and "little to back up" any evidence of harm.
    
    Of course if there is no harm from piracy, why is the business model "antiquated"?
    
    No one can talk out of both sides of his mouth better than Masnick, and yet still fail on both counts. Impressive.
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    - vivaelamor (profile), 29 Mar 2011 @ 1:16am
      
      Re: Re: Re: Heh.
      'Of course if there is no harm from piracy, why is the business model "antiquated"?'
      
      Because it fails to keep up with technological and social trends. Piracy may not be harming the business model, but it's still failing.
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      - Anonymous Coward, 29 Mar 2011 @ 9:12am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Heh.
        Because it fails to keep up with technological and social trends.
        
        You seem extremely confused. The music industry has always embraced technology and new social trends, and continues to do so today. Go to any of the social network sites, itunes, amazon, or some of the streaming sites and see for yourself.
        
        So care to try again?
        
        Maybe you can do a better job of explaining Mike's blatant and hilarious contradictions than he did, because all he did was punt and resort to personal insults. As usual.
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        vivaelamor (profile), 30 Mar 2011 @ 11:49am
        
        Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Heh.
        "The music industry has always embraced technology and new social trends, and continues to do so today. Go to any of the social network sites, itunes, amazon, or some of the streaming sites and see for yourself."
        
        Yes, I agree. The music industry has always embraced technology and new social trends. I'd like to see evidence that the recording industry has too, though. Even the smaller labels are a mixed bag when it comes to technology.
        
        You mention iTunes, which was originally crippled by labels insistence on DRM. Both iTunes and Amazon MP3 came years after the industry decided to sue Napster and neither originated from the industry itself. Prominent people in the industry express regret at how they handled Napster. The industry has done it's best to kill off popular streaming sites and has imposed region restrictions on many independent services.
        
        Even today, iTunes and Amazon MP3 offer inferior products to CDs and the industry is trying to extort money from ISPs for letting people access their content.
        
        "Maybe you can do a better job of explaining Mike's blatant and hilarious contradictions than he did, because all he did was punt and resort to personal insults"
        
        Personal insults like "no one can talk out of both sides of his mouth better"? Oh, wait, that was you. I notice that you didn't provide any actual information, data or evidence to back up your position this time either. Just as Mike observed.
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    - Mike Masnick (profile), 29 Mar 2011 @ 1:26am
      
      Re: Re: Re: Heh.
      No one can talk out of both sides of his mouth better than Masnick, and yet still fail on both counts. Impressive.
      
      I love the fact that you come here every day and bitch about my posts... and *not once* have you provided actual information, data or evidence to back up your position.
      
      What I find really funny is you think people take you seriously and don't take me seriously.
      
      By the way, how did your "overnight calls" to the record labels to get them to sue me for defamation go? I've been waiting.
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- Reply, 25 Apr 2013 @ 6:42pm
  
  Re: Heh.
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Nina Paley (profile), 25 Mar 2011 @ 6:58pm

I want to hear "but but piracy"
but the music track over the dialog was too distracting for me to parse the voices. Any way to can the music? I want to enjoy this!
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- vivaelamor (profile), 26 Mar 2011 @ 3:46pm
  
  Re: I want to hear "but but piracy"
  "but the music track over the dialog was too distracting for me to parse the voices. Any way to can the music? I want to enjoy this!"
  
  You might want to try the subtitles I made too. I can't get rid of the music, but at least you'll know what they're saying. I think I did a pretty good job of keeping the narrative flow, though being up against automated voices hardly proved a challenge there.
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sehlat (profile), 25 Mar 2011 @ 7:11pm

Subtitles, please?
For those of us with auditory challenges.
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- vivaelamor (profile), 26 Mar 2011 @ 11:13am
  
  Re: Subtitles, please?
  I've made some subtitles to go with the downloadable video.
  
  I'm disappointed that Xtranormal don't seem to have the option to do it automatically. On the grand scale of technology involved, automated subtitles seems kind of simple.
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ScytheNoire, 25 Mar 2011 @ 7:23pm

He's a stooge
I love it. Shows how stupid it sounds when you hear it. Maybe if they played something like this for the politicians... ah heck, who we kidding, they are bought and owned by corporations who whine about piracy and make up the bogus studies and stats.
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Capitalist Lion Tamer (profile), 25 Mar 2011 @ 7:42pm

About that character model...
He doesn't look... well... "anonymous" enough. Perhaps some sort of fake mustache is in order.

Other than that, I liked it. Someone once mentioned that internet fuckwad syndrome could be drastically reduced if the comment box ran it by as text-to-speech first. Hearing these comments out loud seems to confirm that.
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- Matt Jones (profile), 25 Mar 2011 @ 9:02pm
  
  Re: About that character model...
  Sounds like xkcd.
  
  http://xkcd.com/481/
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RadialSkid (profile), 25 Mar 2011 @ 8:20pm

Cue AC bitching in 3...2...1...
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Unanimous Cow Herd (profile), 25 Mar 2011 @ 8:36pm

But..
Butt.. Piracy!
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Jesse (profile), 25 Mar 2011 @ 8:37pm

Her expression at the end was priceless.
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- Robert Ring (profile), 25 Mar 2011 @ 9:21pm
  
  Re:
  Agreed. That was the best part.
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Unanimous Cow Herd (profile), 25 Mar 2011 @ 8:44pm

Arrgh!
Butt Pirates!
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- Hephaestus (profile), 28 Mar 2011 @ 3:34pm
  
  Re: Arrgh!
  "Butt Pirates!"
  
  Funny as all hell ... I read that and thought, that really does describe RIAA.
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2011 @ 9:38pm

I can't really distinguish this video from the real arguments. What's the difference? If Mike hadn't mentioned that it was a parody, I would have never guessed.
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Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2011 @ 11:20pm

I'm opposed to the protectionist laws being considered for reasons other than the debate over what constitutes privacy or it's *actual impact on the economy. I'm opposed to it on the grounds of human rights. The right to express one's self is more important than some legal pools right to prosecute anyone they suspect of violating their copyright. I'm concerned about privacy and most importantly I'm concerned about the inequitable penalties imposed upon individuals, for whats tantamount to trespassing. File sharers are not the only ones taking notes here. More and more mega corp. companies are getting into the SLAP game seemingly everyday. Deep corporate pockets are bulldozing citizens rights and the Govt. seems powerless to stop them. This has moved way beyond the internet...
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6 (profile), 26 Mar 2011 @ 12:13am

I liked the ending. lulz.
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OAKside (profile), 26 Mar 2011 @ 12:19am

TechDirt + XtraNormal = Non-Anonymous Coward. (AKA Thanks TechDirt, for everything, including this gay old time.)
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- Anonymous Coward, 26 Mar 2011 @ 12:37am
  
  Re:
  Are you concerned about the flash player?
  Noob I will help you.
  
  Here is the link to the direct video file that can be download from anywhere even if you are behind a proxy.
  http://newvideos.xtranormal.com/web_final_lo/0f0f3f5e-4ae0-11e0-8baf-003048d69c21_17.mp4
  
  No need to thank me, I be here all week LoL
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  - Anonymous Coward, 26 Mar 2011 @ 6:12pm
    
    Re: Re:
    Please don't pirate the video!
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Hiiragi Kagami (profile), 26 Mar 2011 @ 5:10am

Huh. This is interesting...
...the dialogue sounds identical in real life too: canned speech.

Funny toy. I'm going to go play now.
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Duke (profile), 26 Mar 2011 @ 5:48am

Copyright in the video
This is a little off-topic, but one of my first thoughts after watching the video was "Who owns the copyright in the video?" [Yes, I've been spending too much time around lawyers and copyright lobbyists]

...

Having now skim-read through the rather extensive terms and conditions on the website, I'm not sure they know the answer either, but it is an interesting question (similar to the question of who owns the copyright to save-game files generated by a computer game).
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proximity1, 26 Mar 2011 @ 6:39am

attention to detail...
The impression strikes me with some amusement that the video artists/programmers didn't spend anything like the same time, care and attention on the voice-quality of the characters as they seem to have on the way they filled out that blue button-up sweater the young woman is wearing.
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sumquy, 26 Mar 2011 @ 8:50am

good first effort. i think your missing an important point, though. what makes these things go viral is that they are funny. yours was just kind of dry.

think parody, mike, or satire! i've read enough of your posts to know your pretty good at both of those!
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Anonymous Coward, 26 Mar 2011 @ 10:21am

I struggle with how techdirt on one hand is against government regulation when it comes to music and movie protections because it is unduly influenced by corporate entities...but on the other hand generally endorses the government growth in all other areas. It is such a hypocritical take that only in this area is government influence bad. From the TSA, to health and welfare, to banking, to even energy policy, in every area that government influence is seen it is hi-jacked by industrial lobbyists. Locked down to prevent competition, over regulated to make it impossible for the small companies to compete, and loop holed into giving overly specific tax breaks to individual companies who happen to be large donors IE: GE, BP, and others. GE makes 14 billion and pays no taxes due to specific loopholes, the RIAA gets homeland security to bring its immense manpower out to tackle piracy. The more influence you give government the more it will be swayed by special interests to take advantage of the general populace. It was no mistake that the hollywood and music industry's love affair with President Obama is resulting in viewing copyright infringement as a terrorist threat, yet people continue to miss the connection because they refuse to connect dots where they do not want them to be.
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- ChrisB (profile), 26 Mar 2011 @ 10:27am
  
  Re:
  > but on the other hand generally endorses the government
  > growth in all other areas
  
  Really? I don't ever remember TechDirt advocating big government.
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  - Anonymous Coward, 26 Mar 2011 @ 10:03pm
    
    Re: Re:
    I do in one instance at least, when talking about the need of federal anti-slapp laws.
    
    Note that I'm all for the death of copyrights though.
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  - Anonymous Coward, 26 Mar 2011 @ 10:06pm
    
    Re: Re:
    That is the one quibble I have about Mike's position, because I like net neutrality and want some laws to come with it to guarantee that it won't be abused, but he keeps talking about unintended consequences which are a real problem and concern but so is anti-slapp legislation that could end up being something totally different if it was thrown to the wolfs in the legislative.
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- Anonymous Coward, 27 Mar 2011 @ 7:08am
  
  Re:
  I've been reading TD for some years now, and I can't' say I've found Mike to be a 'more government...except for copyrights!' promoter. More like a 'we need better/smarter/realistic law, not necessarily more law' type of mindset underneath an arch of 'stop crying and start working if you wanna make a buck these days' - adapt or die, in other words.
  
  That's not a catch phrase that applies only to copyright/patent situations, btw. Nor just business.
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ChrisB (profile), 26 Mar 2011 @ 10:22am

Xtranormal points?
Looks like fun. I went over there to try it out, and now it costs to use. You get 300 free Xtranormal points when you sign up, which will allow you to make about one movie. So what is their business plan exactly? Not only do the users who generate the content invest their time, but they also have to pay? Ya, that's going to work.
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- RobShaver (profile), 26 Mar 2011 @ 11:54am
  
  Re: Xtranormal points?
  BUSINESS PLAN: Provide a service that no one else provides (read that as a scarce product) and charge people to use it. Keep improving the service to keep ahead of competition.
  
  Why would that not work if it turns out people want the service for the price offered?
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Anonymous Coward, 26 Mar 2011 @ 12:09pm

The funniest part is that if this is what you think the debate is, then you really, really, are getting high on your own supply.
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- Atkray (profile), 26 Mar 2011 @ 2:40pm
  
  Re:
  no....
  
  What is the funniest part is that you do not realize that is EXACTLY what the debate is.
  
  Nice job Mike.
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  - Anonymous Coward, 26 Mar 2011 @ 9:21pm
    
    Re: Re:
    Again, if you think that is the debate, it is only because you are deaf to the other side.
    
    You can get your extra cup of koolaid at the door, you earned it.
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    - Anonymous Coward, 26 Mar 2011 @ 10:09pm
      
      Re: Re: Re:
      What is not about how piracy is destroying the lives of artists everywhere? or how the industry can't actually prove any harm but keeps claiming it anyways?
      
      I'm shocked!
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Jim, 26 Mar 2011 @ 2:02pm

Lol
"Sure, but can you send me the MP3's first so i can learn about the band?" the chicks reaction = hilarious
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DazzaJ, 26 Mar 2011 @ 3:16pm

Very good
Love it! "But but piracy" sounds like some politians in Australia
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Anonymous Coward, 26 Mar 2011 @ 4:26pm

You know what makes Charlie Laine sad? When people hurt animals and when people illegally download her movies.
So remember, every time you download a movie, you make somebody sad. And somewhere a puppy dies.
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- The eejit (profile), 27 Mar 2011 @ 8:21am
  
  Re:
  Every time you download a movie, God kills a middleman. Won't someone please think of the middlemen?
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okwhen (profile), 27 Mar 2011 @ 5:14am

Mike, hit the proverbial nail on the head with this video. Movie and music industries with their high dollar lobbyist have joined the energy corporation in using governments, military, laws, etc to insure their success. Well done in an honest and factual motivational article.
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Tom Landry (profile), 27 Mar 2011 @ 5:59am

1.) don't use human models

2.) don't use a music bed

3.) simply the speech. You want the one pontificating to sound like a 15 year old who just read a biased article. You want the other to ask simple logical questions with a few retorts.

4.) keep the text-to-speech less natural and more digitized.

A good effort but you're trying to fit too many bullet points of the pro/anti piracy controversy. Just concentrate on the most moronic and easily debunked aspects of the issue in the fore. Keep it light an humorous.
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- vivaelamor (profile), 27 Mar 2011 @ 7:23am
  
  Re:
  "1.) don't use human models"
  
  Why not?
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- Anonymous Coward, 27 Mar 2011 @ 9:20am
  
  Re:
  Appreciate the suggestions, but I'm pretty sure the TechDirt community doesn't need to be treated like incompetent adolescents, or your average Sunday newspaper comics reader.
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Cynix, 27 Mar 2011 @ 2:18pm

Brilliant, I really liked it. :)

Don't stop making these Mike!
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Anonymous Coward, 30 Mar 2011 @ 8:07pm

What's really amusing, and rather ironic, is that the video was made on Xtranormal, which, according to the TOS, owns all of the content created with their tools.
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