Don't Copy That Floppy sequel promises prison beatings for copying
The sequel to the venerable Don't Copy That Floppy video (an embarrassing 1992 rap video about the evils of software piracy, produced by the Business Software Alliance Software & Information Industry Association ) is apparently ready to ship, and it's a doozy. Taking a page out of The IT Crowd's playbook, suggesting that copying your friends' music, movies and code will lead to you being imprisoned and then forced into brutal slavery by other cons (seriously).
The BSA are, of course, big proponents of the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, which would require signatories to send noncommercial copiers to prison, so I suppose that there's something to this threat.
I wonder if anyone at the BSA ever sits down and says, "You know, if we keep making stuff like this, eventually people are going to start thinking that giving us money for software only funds more efforts to imprison their loved ones, and thus they should really pirate stuff, if only to starve us of cash for these batshit excursions into private law."
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Hehe, that is cool.
We can copy that! Cooooppppyyyy ttthhhhaaaaatttt! omg
And I really like the Urd tattoo in the prison. That is perfect! Half-demonic goddess from the heavenly computer system, if you don't know her.
And the unbelievable Klingons *rofl*
"if we keep making stuff like this, eventually people are going to start thinking that giving us money for software only funds more efforts to imprison their loved ones"
Hell, they're using the money to make videos like this.
Lennstar: You need to go and read/watch Aa! Megami-sama again, that wasn't Urd. Or any other character from the series.
I pray to Cthulhu that the people behind Star Trek sue this guys for copyright infringment for using Klingons in this.
I know I'd be laughing my ass off.
Why do all these adds have to make you hate them even more? If I see one more of these were the argument is basicly "We're a police state, we don't like what you do, we will attack you", I will hurl.
I would say more but really "We're under attack... by our children" and "copying data is dishonest" says enough.
"Why did Cory link to a parody, and not the real video?"
*sound of a dawning realisation*
Really, that'd make a great slogan for the Pirate Party - " 'cos it's not just a copy - it's a crime"
13tales: I was totally unsure if it was a parody, or wtf was going on. But I laughed...so, so hard. Did they just think "We'll be parodied, so lets make something better than any parody, ever..."
And they did. Awesome.
Awful, but awesome.
I thought it might be a parody too, that montage was pretty much the limit of what a parody could be, but when the rapping started there was no doubt in my mind that it was genuine.
If you haven't watched IT Crowd yet, you are missing one of the best things to come out of Britain in years. It's three short seasons of pure genius. The whole series is available online.
Check out their parody of social networking- "Friendface":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6rNgCnY1lPg
I love that scene where the SWAT team takes out the cookie-baking mother: very Michael Mann with the digital photography!
If you like the IT Crowd's spoof anti-piracy ad, you'll love Adam Buxton's anti-piracy song.
Sample lyrics:
"That's the mind of a pirate /
Did you hear the hate and greed? /
And our beloved entertainment biz is where those dirty pirates feed /
And I don't mean terrorists and their Golden Compass knock-offs /
I mean you and your downloads /
Grr, I ought to knock your block offs"
Brilliant.
Sorry, here's a link to the Adam Buxton song and vid:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLZpxVI7Pa8
Working with young adults in libraries, I can tell you that the painful overstatement of penalties like this is one of the greatest sources of amusement for kids.
Case in point, the local police tried to encourage curfew by putting up posters stating that curfew violation was "A Serious Crime" and pointing out that kids "Could Spend the Night at Home...Or in A Cell!"
Needless to say, kids started taking the posters and the whole thing became something of a running joke.
If you talked to any young adults in our community they knew that the worst the police ever did was take a kid home if they found them out past 10:30. It was a pretty small community and if anything the cops were happy to give the kids a ride home.
Turned out the poster was a push by the state police and the local cops ended up apologizing for the scare tactics.
Fear is no way to protect your business.
Am I hallucinating due to an acute lack of caffeine this morning, or is "DP, the Digital Protector" played by Samwell?
That would usher a whole new era of openness to the BSA's efforts.
Nevermind the sampling (stealing?) of the Samwell What What in the Butt meme which is a strange reference for the anti-copying crowd...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fbGkxcY7YFU
Because 'This is Your Brain on Drugs' worked sooooo well?
It seems designed to generate Internet buzz.. it is a ready-made Internet meme, and unlike most corporate-made Internet Meme[tm]s, it has actually generated traffic.
The problem for them is that nobody will take this seriously; it will generate talk, but the talk it will generate will mostly be pro-piracy.
Anyone know where I can download this for free?
No way that's real.
SWAT team takes down pasta-cooking mom? After being held off briefly with a wooden spoon? No frakin' way.
I damn well would shoot a cop, steal his helmet, and poop in it. Where's the anti-piracy commercial for me??
Uh, this is a spoof; a satire.
This is quite obviously not a real anti-piracy campaign.
If you haven't watched IT Crowd yet, you are missing one of the best things to come out of Britain in years.
At least since Red Dwarf, probably since Fawlty Towers. It's better than both.
Ah, you better not download by bittorrent or they'll
chase your ma in the backyard and push her down
in the mud. And then ol' DP is going to tell it to
you from both ends. At least you'll get a cool tattoo in prison.
It sure looks like a parody. But it's linked from the SIAA homepage!
The whole thing is stupid (and possibly insane) but the Klingons may be the stupidest of all. I don't see much chance that a production that crappy got permission for the Klingons.
Cory -- Don't Copy That Floppy and its sequel were produced by the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA), not the Business Software Alliance (BSA). And contrary to your comment, what's really notable is that most software companies invest a double-digit portion of their revenues in the development of next-generation solutions, which generates jobs and productivity throughout the economy. However, software companies could invest a lot more in new jobs and product innovation if piracy weren't so rampant around the world. Check out www.bsa.org/faces for a more realistic portrayal of what happens to software pirates. Dale Curtis, BSA
Cory -- You didn't watch the video to the end? It's the SIIA, not the BSA.
Dale Curtis -- The money they spend on "next-generation solutions" could have been spent on developing better products and it still would have generated jobs and productivity. In fact, people might be less willing to pirate and more willing to purchase if companies spent more money on quality and less money on crippling DRM.
Don't forget; the money that pirates don't spend on software will end up being spent somewhere else. One company's loss is another's gain -- that money will still be used for jobs and innovations.
I wonder, do you have any numbers on how much ROI software companies get from investing in "next-generation solutions"? Does spending years developing the next version of SecuROM actually reduce piracy, and more importantly, increase sales? What about lost sales due to the incompatibilities and inconveniences caused by DRM? What about the liabilities to lawsuits when rootkit-laden DRM causes damage to users' devices?
Sorry, but I don't buy your self-justifying argument that companies spend double-digit portions of their revenue to make up for piracy. Surely they would get a better investment by just improving their products.
Dale Curtis:
There is a fixed amount of money that will be spent on software/music/movies in any given year, since people have limited means. There is no way to increase that amount except by reducing spending in other areas. Just because some of it is spent on pizza and beer instead of software doesn't mean that the money vanishes from the economy, either. It is true that other countries keep their money local instead of funneling it into the U.S. for copyrighted products, but I imagine that's probably healthier for their economies anyway. Good luck trying to convince them otherwise.
Also, my guess is that marketing costs outweigh any real loss due to piracy. So just roll piracy into the marketing budget and stop wasting time on lawsuits, DRM, copy protection, and other things that annoy legitimate customers.
My dad's on the board of the BSA.
...this is awkward.
when he said "what what.." i think he was going to end the sentence with "... in the butt"
I wonder how Melanie, Stephen, and Desi are going to feel about this video hittin' the ol' Internets.
Also, nice shot of the scrolling marquee near the end, letting us know when then were shooting video for this... production.
They're extorted and reduced to bankruptcy and indentured servitude, forced to be pawns in promotional materials, working off the debt that an interest groups' lawyers manage to inflate 100 fold beyond any reasonably provable damages?
Videos like that paint the industry as what it is at heart: a malicious coalition of opportunists with delusions of becoming a privately-owned police state.