Boy, the MPAA is sure full of it.

You know…

I just got around to reading up on some news here, and how the MPAA is targeting torrent sites that share television episodes.

I thought to myself rather quickly, “My god, that’s dumb.”

I read a forum comments section on one of the sites mentioning this, and they brought up some good thoughts.

The most prominent one was, “It’s pretty much like taping a show on TV.”

To me, this is doubly true. We have Bright House Networks Digital Video Recorders on all televisions linked up to the cable service. The cable box is a digital recorder, ie a computer, which has its own Operating System, and a GUI for recording movies on a built in (40 GB, I believe) hard drive.

I use the DVR like one uses a blank tape and a VCR Commander, or an actual programmed VCR.
The difference between the VCR and the DVR?
I can loan a friend the VCR tape if he or she too missed the same show that I recorded; I can invite friends over to watch it on my DVR. Essentially, none. In fact, the DVR takes away my ability to be mobile, but I still like it.

When I download a television episode from the ‘net, it’s usually something I was already watching, and missed it on my DVR — drive full, show’s slot moved (ADULT SWIM, YOU ARE GUILTY OF THIS CRIME. A LOT. STOP IT.) or was even cancelled without notice (AGAIN, ADULT SWIM, YOU ARE GUILTY OF THIS CRIME. GITS:SAC, SAMURAI CHAMPLOO, WHAT NEXT?) without me having seen everything.

What should I do? Wait 6 to 8 months or longer for box sets, when I only had a passing want to watch these shows? Pay $50 to pick up a box full of DVDs that I probably STILL CANNOT WATCH without going through extra trouble because I use my PC to watch DVDs?

No, thanks. I’ll just download my eps from BitTorrent or other p2p services. That’ll be my “friend loaning me his tape so I can catch up” service until the MPAA bans the Internets for the win.