Word: warner
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...that they do not even like to dignify it with the word. "It's a word that has a swashbuckling, cool kind of feel, and that's not what we're talking about. This isn't Johnny Depp on the front of a boat," says Barry Meyer, chairman of Warner Bros. "It's theft. It's shoplifting. It's grand larceny...
...online, just one day after its release in theaters. In this day and age, that is a victory--which reflects how badly the studios are losing the war. That first pirate of Samurai was from a camcorder copy made in a U.S. theater on the day the movie premiered. Warner Bros. has identified the theater using tracking codes hidden in the film but declined to reveal the information, citing ongoing legal investigations. After years of resisting the hard line taken by the music industry, the studio recently decided to take off the gloves and pursue civil litigation against pirates...
...they're usually out in 48 hours. On Dec. 13, a TIME reporter bought Samurai from a stall along Taweewong Road in Phuket, Thailand. "We've had Last Samurai for three days already," said vendor Nook (not his real name). At his booth, just 50 yards from an official Warner Bros. store, Samurai was available with Thai, Chinese or Bahasa Indonesia subtitles. Business has improved, Nook says, since police stopped shaking him down for a monthly $60 payoff. Now he pays just $150 a year for an official ID card. Piracy has become so normalized that...
...Christmas Eve, another copy of Samurai appeared online and was traced back to a screener that had been sent to Oscar voters. Since Warner Bros. gave out only VHS copies, the bootleg was not of great quality. But its existence is an embarrassment after a year of high-profile debate over the risks of screeners--a beloved industry perk. Valenti of the M.P.A.A. had pushed hard to fight piracy by banning all screeners outright. But independent studios complained the ban would penalize small movies trying to get award nominations. In December the U.S. district court overturned the ban. Last week...
...Warner Bros. has traced thousands of online Samurai copies and 25 bootlegs from 12 countries to one screener and two camcorder copies. That is not a lot of leaks. But it takes only one. As downloading speeds increase and camcorder technology continues to improve, studios will be forced to put down the night-vision goggles and invent a new business model for a new world. "Nobody believes you're going to dissuade people from downloading," says Garland of BigChampagne. "It's all about co-opting that content and building businesses around...