Re: [dvd-discuss] Fwd: Australian Court rules: Films aren't software

[Tom <tom(at)lemuria.org>]

On Fri, Feb 08, 2002 at 10:30:40PM -0600, John Schulien wrote:
> So, is Dragon's Lair properly classified as a movie or
> as software?  

as a computer game, obviously.

what I want to get at is looking at the *core* of something. using
movie sequences instead of a realtime render engine does not change the
fact that you're playing a game. using binary data on a DVD instead of
analog signals on a VHS tape does not change the fact that you're
watching a movie.


> Is it legally or socially useful in any way
> to differentiate between DVD "movies" that utilize only the
> most primitive, non-interactive operational modes of the
> DVD engine, and DVD "software" that utilizes the more
> sophisticated, interactive capabilities of the DVD
> specification?

it is, IMHO, useful to see the things as what they are. we punish
murder, regardless of the weapon. we consider the content of a
handwritten manuscript, a printed book or a digital text file
equivalent, even though the medium changes quite significantly. why
can't we simply realize that we're talking about movies, no matter
whether they're on DVD or not?

if we have a borderline case, the discussion makes sense. in the DVD
market, in 99.9% of cases we have an extremely clear cut case, so let's
keep it simple and to the point.


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