Saturday, December 3, 2011

Anti-piracy group under fire for piracy themselves

Sometimes, the world presents you with a piece of news so drenched in irony that it’s a joy just to write about it. Anyone familiar with those anti-piracy ads that play behind some major motion picture DVD’s? They’re annoying and you cannot even skip them. But turns out that they’re more than that – the makers of the ad have been pirating something themselves.

Torrentfreak gives us this scoop that a composer from Netherlands Melchior Rietveldt purchased a Harry Potter DVD and realized that the anti-piracy group BREIN have been using his music in the ad campaigns without his permission or payment. He had created the music with the group under the agreement that it would be used strictly for a local film festival but that clearly wasn’t honored. As a result, the guy is now asking for €1 million in return. But that’s not the end of it.

When Rietveldt approached a local music royalty collecting agency Buma/Stemra to help him out, the board member Jochem Gerrits threw an interesting proposal at him – he would help him get the money he’s asking for in return for – wait for it – a whopping 33 percent of that share. The conversation they had was recorded and you can check it out at the link above. Riveting stuff. Gerrits has temporarily resigned after this.

It’s a great case study on double standards that companies like these have and I’m glad it’s now out to the public.

What do you think?

Artikel yang Berkaitan

0 komentar:

Post a Comment