Since iTunes isn’t even available on the platforms where I spend most of my time (Ubuntu, Android), Amazon and other DRM-free MP3 file retailers just make more sense.

Then again, I’m not sure I understand it, but at least I have a brain injury to explain why. What’s their excuse?

For any movie or TV show I search for, pirated content aggregators consistently show up in the top search rankings. It is perfectly possible for a person to download pirated TV and movies without even being aware that the content is illegally distributed. All that is required is that they not be particularly savvy about the ubiquity of pirates. I’m sure there are tons of people who watched content on Megavideo without even realizing it was illegally distributed. After all, being offered openly and effectively advertised on the most authoritative search engine in the world would tend to make the content look legitimate.

The motion picture and television industry might be a sack of assholes, but no one is better served by letting an openly criminal sack of assholes take over from them. Google may not be criminal, but they are willing facilitators of criminal action.

edit: no it’s not spam, it’s an article written by a friend of mine that is quite on topic regarding piracy, MAFIAA etc

Still, it feels a bit like Google’s saying the distributors need to buy Google Ads to tell me that it’s on iTunes – the two ads at the foot of the page were for cable pay-per-view platforms. In other words, if you want to sell your film, buy an ad from Google to compete with the rest of the search results for sites that are working against that.

Isn’t that a little like the old racket? You don’t have to pay us a fee, but if you don’t want these heavy guys we know to come and ‘disrupt up’ your business…

Yet it looks like instead we’re just getting newer, fewer and more powerful gatekeepers. Apple locks users of their eBook creation software to their device and marketplace, Google can demote legit content in favour of ripped content serving ads, and doesn’t seem to respond to infringement take-down notices from indie ‘I don’t have a legal department’ filmmakers on YouTube, from those I know who’ve tried.

And most debate on the subject seems to lump filmmakers and creators trying to fund their work with the totalitarian and tech-ignorant approach of the MPAA. Of course if it’s 37 Signal’s creations that are being ripped, that’s a different matter.

I think you’re doing it wrong. You should go to one of the fairly small number of legal online distribution channels for major movie releases (say iTunes, for instance), and see if this movie is available for download in your territory yet. It’s not in mine, which might help explain why you only found illegal download options.

I still find it amazing that in a world were kids can see almost unlimited online pornography, we still have rating systems that prevent nipples from being seen on network TV.

AAhhh! Dungeons and Dragons will drive all our children to suicide!

Also, why would Google give you links to IMDB or Wikipedia when you specifically wanted “watch Malancholia online”?

I wouldn’t say iTunes is doing something stupid but rather it is doing it a different way that is not conductive to your media usage. It does suck as a standalone player because it’s not a standalone player. If you’re not going to use it as a media player/library as it’s intended, which you’re not since you are using Media Player to play something, then you are correct in that you’re better off not using it. 

Don’t use a screwdriver to hammer in nails and don’t use iTunes if you’re not going to use it as a complte media library solution.

Heh, reads like a pre-web domain grab…

Heh.  :-)

Yeah, Edison prefigured a lot of today’s IP wars – his early cylinder recordings came with a rather restrictive EULA.

(In all fairness, though, copyright at the time didn’t cover sound recordings, so Edison resorted to the EULA to try to gain some leverage over piracy.  Even so, the ban on discount resale of used copies was a bit of overreach.)