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MPAA Responds to Harry Potter Leak

MPAA CEO Dan Glickman was devastated by the leak of the last Harry Potter book. Ironically, the MPAA has been caught pirating others work more than once. So who’s the real pirate here?

mpaa piratesIn an official MPAA press release Glickman states:

“Reports on the theft of the latest installment of Harry Potter underscores that robbery of intellectual property extends far beyond the movies, to music, publishing, computer software
and other creative outputs that are the foundation of our modern information economy.”

Glickman then goes on summing up the familiar made-up statistics we read in every MPAA press release. Nothing spectacular, just the regular anti-piracy propaganda piece.

They seem to care a lot about copyright, but we’ve shown that the MPAA is not that concerned with others’ copyrighted works at all. In fact, they have been caught “robbing intellectual property” several times.

Earlier this year we reported that the MPAA used “Forest Blog” software without authorization. It had been completely stripped of his name, and links back to his site, thereby violating the linkware license. The MPAA later said that they were only testing the software. Not that it makes any difference, but why should one (willingly) remove all credits to the developer if it’s only a test?

But the MPAA doesn’t only steal software, they also pirate films. For those who haven’t seen the great documentary “This Film Is Not Yet Rated“, the MPAA openly admitted that they made unauthorized copies themselves. Kirby Dick, the producer of the documentary found out that the film that he submitted for screening purposes was copied without his permission. Say what?

I guess there’s an inner pirate in all of us.


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