Once again reminding the public that Hollywood will go to great lengths to fight piracy, six movie studios are suing Seattle-based digital media company RealNetworks over new software that allows people to make digital copies of their DVDs. Studios see the software as a threat to payment for digital downloads, a crucial yet still experimenting market. In legal filings, studios claim the software violates the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act because it bypasses the anticopying mechanism built into DVDs.
From the New York Times:
“RealDVD should be called StealDVD,” Greg Goeckner, executive vice president and general counsel for the Motion Picture Association of America, said. “RealNetworks knows its product violates the law, and undermines the hard-won trust that has been growing between America’s moviemakers and the technology community.”
Stories You Might Like
There’s a lot happening in the world. Through it all, Marketplace is here for you.
You rely on Marketplace to break down the world’s events and tell you how it affects you in a fact-based, approachable way. We rely on your financial support to keep making that possible.
Your donation today powers the independent journalism that you rely on. For just $5/month, you can help sustain Marketplace so we can keep reporting on the things that matter to you.
