Re: [dvd-discuss] Distribution (Was: Eldred Being Argued Today)

[Jeremy Erwin <jerwin(at)ponymail.com>]

On Friday, October 11, 2002, at 11:16  AM, Michael A Rolenz wrote:
> Futhermore, the whole "preservation" mantra is total BS. If I get my
> directors copy of Buster Keaton's "The General" (Which is not in the
> public domain I believe since it was made in 1927), convet the video to
> digital and burn it onto a CDR, then the loss of quality from a master
> film print  may be negligible and the work has been preserved digitally
> and distributed increasing its chances for preservation, distribution.
> THere is nothing in the Consitution regarding rights for distributers 
> and
> that argument is self serving nonsense.  And that giving distributers
> monopoly rights so that they can distribute pristine copies ad 
> infinitum
> is Constitutional is so bizarre that one can only hope they advance to 
> the
> final rounds of the Darwin Awards forthwith.
>
Actually, the difference between a fully restored print, and one that 
is in need of restoratioin can be quite dramatic. For instance, both 
Criterion and Laserlight have released copies of early Hitchcock films. 
The Criterion editions are 3-4 times the price of the Laserlight 
versions, but the resolution is much improved. You might think that 
degradations in quality are to be expected, but a number of DVD's of 
old films belie this assumption. (North by Northwest, for one).
Some dvd's in my collection (a cheapie copy of Theatre of Blood) look 
like they might have been duplicated from an ancient VHS tape,

For all the talk of digital copying and intellectual property, the fact 
remains that the only really suitable sources for publication to DVD 
remain _physical_ property, locked, and possibly ignored in someone's 
vault.

Jeremy