Is there anybody out there who hasn't seen this message or something like it? It's what your DVD player tells you if you try to fast forward through the previews at the beginning of a DVD or if you try to do anything that the creators of the DVD decided is a "prohibited user operation." Apparently none of the folks at the MPAA are parents - otherwise they would have seen the error of this scheme right away. As soon as you tell a kid not do something that is guaranteed to be the first thing they'll want to do. Maybe they've heard of the term "reverse psychology." Guess not.
For those that just tuned in, let me outline the history of DVDs for you and see if this is how you'd do things. Say you want to sell your movies so people can watch them at home. Right off the bat your not sure if this is a good idea because maybe it will take away from your sales of movie theater tickets. Still, you decide to give it a go and sell your movies on CD-sized discs. Yo...
ou're pretty sure there won't be much competition because copyright laws prevent anyone else but you from selling your movies for a really long time. But is that really good enough? What if other people don't sell the movies but copy them and give them away to their friends. Well that would be just as bad wouldn't it? OK, so you have to come up with some way so that people can't copy their movies for friends. Here's an idea, you can use a "secret code" to scramble the movie up. Then only people with the "secret decoder ring" can unscramble it. Then, you will only give the "secret decoder ring" to the companies making player devices for the movie discs. Oh yeah, it's so simple it's brilliant. Wait a second, what if someone takes an afternoon and figures out your secret code. Oh, that would be bad. That would ruin the whole scheme. Hmmm.... What to do? I've got it! You can spend a whole bunch of money to get the government to make it illegal to figure out your secret code. Oh yes, it's perfect. You can name the scheme the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. That sounds very grandiose. People will respect that name. Hold on again, I just thought of something else. This scheme means that you've got a deal with the companies that make player devices for your movie discs. So even though customers will be paying money for the movie, you can determine what people can and can't do. Ha ha, suckers! You should rub it in their faces everytime they turn on a movie by showing that silly copyright law and then not allowing them to skip it. Can you get away with that? Are people really dumb enough and lazy enough to accept it?
The answer of course is no - people are not that dumb and lazy. Someone did figure out their silly secret code very soon after it was released. Unfortuntely, laws in the US often favor the side with the most money so the DMCA is still being enforced here. But you can get the secret decoder ring from people in other countries. Do a google search on "DVD Shrink" or "DVD Decrypter".