Free Tee Vee

Ah har me hearties, avast behind! That’s right culture fans, piracy has once again reared it’s eyepatched head. This time it’s as the result of an illuminating article I read in the paper about a site that directs you to where naughty people have posted streaming video.

Corking, you don’t actually have to download anything, just click and watch.

You can see why television and movie companies don’t like this. There are no ads and so no revenue. Maybe the television companies should do it themselves, with ads?

What occurred to me though was how much we are used to paying for our entertainment. A DVD is around a tenner - and a cinema ticket is about six quid (before popcorn too!). How can that be? They GIVE DVDs away for free with the Saturday newspaper, how can it cost more to buy a DVD than it does to go to the cinema, where they have all sorts of overheads to cover?

Possibly that’s why so many people go to these sites with a clean conscience, they don’t feel they are ripping anyone off, they feel that they are getting even.

Certainly if the entertainment world wants to make an argument about paying for a product, it should work both ways - case in point: I went to see ‘The Horse Whisperer’. Shite. If I had had any sense at all I would have demanded my money back, because it was so bad. But I stayed, watched the whole movie and only a couple of days later realised that it was unmitigated crap. So, I want my six quid back and I want compensation for those three hours and the flashbacks. Then we can talk about ‘fair’.