60 Minutes: The Mexican Mafia & BitTorrent? : How 60 Minutes Connects The Dots
Source: Tom's Guide US | Keywords: editorial, 60, minutes, mpaa | Themes: Digital Entertainment
- 1. How 60 Minutes Connects The Dots
- 2. BitTorrent: Fancy Tech That Powers Organized Crime?
1. How 60 Minutes Connects The Dots
Editorial: Seriously? A report better suited for a comedy sketch on “The Daily Show” than a news piece on 60 Minutes aired Sunday. Get with it CBS!
The Nov. 1 report started out normally enough, with 60 Minutes reporter Lesley Stahl asking the audience, “Where do you think organized crime is making its money these days? With drugs, gambling, and prostitution? Yes, but also - and this may surprise you - the movies. Mobsters have moved into the movie piracy business and it’s bleeding Hollywood to the tune of billions of dollars a year.”
Stahl then went on to examine the pirating procedure: “The DVDs are made by pirates who often sit in the back row of theaters and record movies with tiny cameras. Illinois police say Gerardo Arellano did just that… Police say Arellano worked out of his home, where they found more than 13,000 DVDs he had made from his recordings, along with the computers he used to upload the movies onto the Internet.”
That was when I almost choked on my dinner. Mr. Arellano allegedly went to movies and recorded them, spent the time and money to duplicate 13,000 copies, and then he gave them away online? Since when did organized crime bosses give stuff away for free?
So, the people who illegally record movies in cinemas and sell them as DVDs, are the same people that upload movies from their homes? That is what this 60 minutes piece implied, and that kind of logic required some backup, preferably from an independent third party. So, who did Stahl turn to for backup? The MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America).
MPAA “investigator” Gary Kissinger chimed in: “Rarely do you see an individual that's involved in all three major components of the piracy activities: in other words, camcording, Internet piracy activities, and also selling the movies on the street as well."
Oh, the people who record the movies aren’t the same people that do the uploading? Or they are? If I—a technology writer by trade—am confused by the assertions here, what sense are grandma-and-grandpa 60 Minutes viewers making of it?
- Next page BitTorrent: Fancy Tech That Powers...
it does sound stupid, organised crime giving stuff away for free, those are everywhere they are called CAM's or TS
They ran a simular story in Australia about 6-12months back, on our program A Current Affair, except instead of the Mexican Mafia, they were saying that Terrorists were profiting from Pirated movies and software.
Its just a bullshit scare campaign from the Music and Movies industry to try and scare people into not downloading stuff.
Unfortunately you'll often find that when mainstream media talk about a subject that you know about, their level of knowledge is abysmal. Makes you wonder how reliable they are on the subjects that you don't know about....
Typical of the mainstream media. They could go to the trouble of researching their stories or providing multiple viewpoints, but they know their audience. They know that the majority of their audience is ignorant about technology beyond how to use email, so they're not going to waste their money providing an in-depth look at a technological matter.
But tying Internet piracy to organized crime is just ridiculous. Torrent piracy consists of a bunch of computer nerds providing content for no profit beyond the perceived size of their e-penis.
Seriously! I love toms hardware! I didn't think you were into comedy, but I just finished watching the clip! Wonder what she would call TCP/IP technology!?! That was seriously entertaining. Thank you!
Shows you how technically literate the MSM really is.
Well, i dont really think that Mafia boss would do jobs on its own.. at least not in movies...
It's not just CBS and 60 minutes, it's pretty much all the news outlets nowdays that cater to the lowest denominator instead of journalistic integrity.
My advice? Ignore the (mainstream) news and current affairs. Seriously. I did this 5 years ago (when I was 21) and let me tell you it has done me the world of good. Less bullshit = less stress = more time for useful things.
Typical mainstream media crap. You are suprised? I have known this for years, they arent mainstream anymore they are the "Fringe" media. I know I will probably get some hate for this but its true. Fox is much more balanced, they typically give you multiple views from multiple people/sources. Helps to get an fair and balanced news.
Its true. Only old people watch 60 minutes.
All the mainstream media, as others put it, are owned by huge corporations that also have interests in the movie business as well. Of course they use one outlet to help protect the profits from another. News, at least in most countries, is controlled by money (BBC is actually pretty good because it's subsidized).
When I watched it, I just kept thinking - they're whinging about all this money they're "losing" to the pirates. Its total BS. The people who buy bootleg dvds / share this media over the net were never going to pay the price of a cinema seat or an official dvd purchase. This industry needs to get their heads out of the sand and move into the 21st century. Hell, joining the 70's would be a good start.
On another note, where is Axxo?
in my country a new seat for a new movie cost around 500 money units (Rupees), pirated movie cost 100 units, 512 kbit/s unlimited ADSL is 2000 units, original movie DVD around 1000-2500 units
and my monthly salary around 12000 units,
average daily living cost exceed 400 units.
what an i going to do? either download or buy pirate.
Wrong Mr. Celeste. Organized crime is the number one purveyor of trojans and other malware. You think all your precious little torrents are free of malware? There is tons of money to be made by slipping trojans into movies and other torrents. After the empire of bots is completed they sell the rights to control the computers to others.
I love how our generation will say anything to justify the theft of intellectual property.
I didn't know that people still pirated with cams at theaters. All the pirated movies I've seen in the last fewyears have been digital promotional DVD copies of the movies sent to the theaters. Good theater employeess take the copies and sell them to pirates for a couple grand and its distributed at flea markets, and the police watch and buy those movies too.
I think it was intentional scary campaign. Probably trying to move public against bittorent and internet piracy. Actualy torrenting is easier if you don't need to hide it, then if everyone thinks you are mafia and earning milions out of it.
Darn, still can't speak/write. x_X
Wrong Mr. Celeste. Organized crime is the number one purveyor of trojans and other malware. You think all your precious little torrents are free of malware? There is tons of money to be made by slipping trojans into movies and other torrents. After the empire of bots is completed they sell the rights to control the computers to others.I love how our generation will say anything to justify the theft of intellectual property.
If by "organized crime" you mean merely that the people put malware on the Internet are "organized criminals" you'd be right--but clearly that's not what and who CBS meant. They meant actual mafia that has existed for years...not new upstarts.
Unfortunately you'll often find that when mainstream media talk about a subject that you know about, their level of knowledge is abysmal. Makes you wonder how reliable they are on the subjects that you don't know about....
+1 to that
This story makes no sense at all, it's obviously a scam.
IMO the worst thing is the lack of professionalism of journalists these days, they often present poor stories, with lost of holes in it, and some times completely biased
one more thing, i was always told that journalists should be impartial...
But here, as is becoming generalized, Lesley Stahl reacts to the story expressing (literally with the facial expression) her opinion.
TH editors are always criticized about giving opinion on news... Seems like CBS's 60 min, a supposedly good news program is doing worse...
sorry for the double post