Piracy is a Crime
It is, you know. I know this. I know this for a fact.
How do I know it? Well, let me explain. You see, I bought the DVD of King Kong from Tesco last night. Unfortunately, before I can watch it, I have to sit through a three minute UNSKIPPABLE ‘Piracy Is A Crime’ FUD-commercial. Well, that’s fine. But hang on, guys – I’ve PAID for this DVD. Surely the best people to target with your annoying bloody rants would be the people who DON’T BUY THE BLOOMIN’ THINGS.
Course, there’s two courses of action I could take. First off, I could rip the DVD and remove the annoying unskippable bit. Which would kind of defeat the point a little, but never mind. Secondly, I could send Universal a bill for my time, to make up for the time I’m wasting in front of their poorly targetted FUD-missile.
Of course, if Universal decided not to pay, they’d be stealing my time. And as we know: STEALING IS AGAINST THE LAW.
Bah.
April 12, 2006 at 5:16 pm
I used to buy loads of DVDs.
Since they started putting those ads at the start of them all I’ve more or less stopped.
They’re so LOUD as much as anything.
I’m not pirating, mind, I’ve just not watched a movie in many weeks.
April 17, 2006 at 6:22 pm
I could have dressed for the occassion, but it was an unexpected event, and I have to remind myself that it was, every time that I remember it. They didn’t actually grab me, but rather, they herded me, after several minutes, into a roped holding area, while they took my papers and disappeared.
I was amazed that they walked ahead of me, when they had decided that I’d go into detention. They walked ahead, turning, every so often to see if I was following, as we went to collect my baggage. I was considering that my harddrive with all the evidence that I DO download entertainments, was in one of my suitcases, though I couldn’t recall which one. They lead me to the baggage claim, and waited for my luggage, but one bag was missing. THE bag!! I think we waited about twenty minutes, and then one of them said, after a quick phone call to his supervisor, We’ll put in a claim with the airline, and you’ll get that, later.
The inspection of all my belongings took nearly an hour. Fancy! Questions and explanations about the odd assortment of equipment that I carry with me. They were very focussed on a spatula that was in my checked luggage. That’s a SPREADER, I said, getting a little impatient, and wondering if I’d have a chance at a toilet soon. I’m an ARTIST, and that’s a SPREADER. They stared. Okay, I suppose that I might be able to kill an unconscious person with it, given hours of dedication to the task, and superhuman stamina. But I was still worried about the harddrive. It was somewhere.
After eight hours I was released to go to Scotland for forty-eight hours. I’m not certain why I was allowed that time, as it was scant for packaging up my life and saying goodbye, and it was long if the point was to get rid of me. One of the agents called a friend and said, If she’s got any influence, this is the time to use it, and we thought that must be a hint that a bribe should be offered. I was racing to protect things. I didn’t dwell on it.
After 36 hours, the missing luggage arrived, was emptied and repacked, Peace and Justice showed up and whisked me to a solicitor, statements were made, evidence copied and sent, and eventually I was saying goodbyes in my local, while I was still waiting for the call from the solicitor to tell me IF I actually should go to the airport. That came at 2 a.m. My taxi arrived two hours later.
My harddrive held six episodes of Still Game, and detailed financial records for the last five years, as well as correspondence that was strong evidence of what I’d been doing in that time. Probably would have been fortunate if my harddrive had been found. I don’t own an eye patch, or a flag with a Jolly Roger. I just had proof that I’m soft on Jack and Victor.