Um, just out of idle curiosity, what exactly makes a disk containing illegal movies smell different from one carrying legal ones? From data disks, video games, etc? Can the dogs smell illegality in the disks along with the chemicals?
Will the next step in all this be DVD sniffing dogs at airport security? Will they be sent through school halls and dorm rooms? Will the MPAA and the RIAA be setting up roadblocks to check cars for carrying contraband? Sure, this sounds ridiculous now, but could you have imagined the dogs or some of their courtroom actions before reading about them?
We have a War on Terror and a War on Drugs. Isn’t it time to start a War on the MPAA and RIAA? Stop them from becoming the American Gestapo, rooting into every facit of our lives, using terror tactics like hauling the weakest of us into court with scant or no evidence to induce fear of prosecution into others so they believe it could happen to them. I say take back our country from the terrorists within!
Hollywood unleashes dogs in war on movie piracy
This time, Hollywood really has gone to the dogs.
The Motion Picture Association of America on Thursday unveiled its latest tool in the war on movie piracy: a pair of DVD-sniffing Labrador Retrievers named Lucky and Flo.
[…]
The job for Lucky and Flo will be to sniff out optical discs in luggage or other containers, and stop the discs from getting to manufacturing plants where they can be reproduced.But before they begin their new job, Lucky and Flo will go on a world tour of cities such as Hong Kong and Singapore, just as movie stars go on tour to promote their latest films.
They will travel throughout the United States, United Kingdom, Mexico and even visit Dubai in the Middle East to showcase their talents to customs agents and other officials.
And, of course, they will make a stop in Hollywood.
These DVD-sniffing dogs are a surreptious tool to illegally search people who the dog-handlers find suspicious by “hunches”. This is the same technique that dowsers and pychics use to make personal gains through a belief that is not real. As famous skeptic, Michael Shermer, has said “people remember the hits, and forget the misses”.
The criminal thread running through this whole sleazy scam is the collusion between corporate cowards like the MPAA and our regal government.
When we have discussions about what is “proto” or “neo” fascist, this sort of pattycakes-in-bed relationship is key to establishing the ground rules. Whether it’s Enron bringing snacks to Cheney’s office, the FCC scraping their administrative forehead on the toe of RIAA jackboots — or silly bastards putting even more time-wasting into the “approved for travel” process — our government functions at the beck and call of Corporate America.
The sad bit — as ever — is that both of the Tweeedle/Tweedledum parties don’t give a damn. It’s like the electoral college. They both figure on getting a piece of the action; so, they won’t do anything to reform or counter jive practices.
Uncle Dave,
In a word, no. Corporate America, as god pointed out, IS the government. A democracy is just a word now. It’s what Mussolini declared a corporatist state. Merger of state and corporate power. Fascist is such a dirty word, and as soon as you use it, the response will be that you’re comparing the US to NAZI Germany. But, use corporatist, and it makes it much clearer and recognizable.
Interesting story – but where is the Irish angle referred to in the headline.
Then – the dogs are going on a world tour. Dont these countries have quarantine laws. Could be a protracted journey. (I wonder are they going to Korea?)
#4: The Irish part was from another source, in Britain, that mentioned that’s where they’re from.
This is obviously for the persone with 2,000 DVD’s in his luggage, not on his person.
Geez, all he has to do is use FedEx…who has ever heard stories of illegal stuff sent in nondescript boxes filled with popcorn? I sure have.
MMmmm popcorn….to go with the 2,000 movies!
I say let’s help them by adding a recordable DVD or whatever it takes as standard part of any luggage.
Of course, an even easier way for them is to add an automatic indictment to any DVD or CD sold in stores. We are all a pack of criminals, aren’t we?
This is definitely THE SOLUTION. The bad guys would never think of posting and downloading the content thru the internet and thus bypassing the dogs…….
What Ravantra said…
Are they going to start adding doggie pheromones to DVDs now?
Assuming this works at all…
Take a DVD-R, burn porn on it, and let the MPAA capture it as “pirated.” It might be good for them.
I know, pirate DVD’s must smell like Guiness, thats how the dogs can detect them!
With a little patience, the pirates can distribute a 4.5 GB or 8 GB DVD via Internet broadband, and encrypted if need be. The MPAA has its pants down and its ass is slapping in the wind.
Maybe it’s time to just donate all privately owned CDs and DVDs to libraries, by the millions. Then let them try to lobby for restrictions on city and state governments library practices. That’s a fairly litigation resistant target. Or just don’t buy any of their crap for six months and watch then come crawling back to reality with their new $5 dollar DVD “oops, our bad, we f-ed up” specials.
Or just don’t buy any of their crap for six months and watch then come crawling back to reality with their new $5 dollar DVD “oops, our bad, we f-ed up” specials.
Comment by Ballenger — 9/28/2006 @ 12:30 pm
I don’t think your idea is bad, just unworkable. Unfortunately, consumer boycotts very seldom work as intended and only occasionally have much of an effect on business practices.
The only one that worked recently was Sony’s failed attempt with a trojan DRM protection scheme. But that was probably more because of the class action law suits then any announced boycott. With large corporate marketing practices, there are always those that just don’t care about the politics and then there are those that will buy the product simply because they disagree with the anti politics. So even if you got every aware and caring consumer to stop buying DVDs and CDs for six months, you would only get maybe 10% of the buying public to go along with you.
In other words, there are too many sheep to make it work.
OK, I want you to think for a second…
Have you noticed that a NEW batch of DVD/CD do smell funny??
Its nothing to spay a batch of disks with a sent..
Me thinks that a couple of Irish Dogs are going for an extended world wide vacation, expense free and an Irish dog owner is laughing all the way to the bank.
What are the chemicals that the dogs are smelling? The mainstream media always fails to mention, so that is a red flag that something unneecessary is being added to the process. Are there any brands that don’t have these chemicals?