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Media
Information > Media DVD Coverage 
Archive
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| Updated April 11, 2008 DVD
NEWS DIGEST
1 -
American Gangster Universal Studios
Eros DVDs will be available in 27 Wal-Mart stores in Canada for starters. The distribution will subsequently be extended to the entire Canadian Wal-Mart network to service both Asian and non-Asian markets. Eros, which has more than 1,300 Indian films in its catelog, plans to release at least 30-40 new titles every year. In July, Eros announced a deal with New York-based TitleMatch Entertainment to make Bollywood titles available via the TitleMatch DVD On-Demand service, which lets movie studios and retailers burn video content directly in stores and at Web site distribution centers at the time orders are placed.
European Commission president Jose-Manuel Barroso warns that fake copies are undermining the EU's economy. Speaking at a summit organized by the Authentics Foundation, Barroso said that the counterfeiting of such items as DVDs and CDs, now taking place on an industrial scale that involves the Internet and organized crime, threatens Europe's economic recovery. Barroso warned that campaigns against piracy would have to do more to focus on demand, as consumers still assume that buying fakes is a victimless crime. "IP protection is no longer just a question of safeguarding an economy. It is no longer just a question of clamping down on crime. It has become a question of consumer health and safety," he said. Seizures of counterfeit movies, music and software leapt 139% in 2006, according to the most recent commission figures. EU customs authorities seized 23.2 million DVDs, CDs, cassettes and software items in 2006, up from 9.7 million in 2005, with 93% coming from China.
Millions of dollars worth of pirated DVDs and DVD burners have been seized from a house in the Melbourne suburb of Sunshine North. The Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft says the haul includes more than 7,000 DVDs. Among them, were copies of just-released movies and television shows and were being sold for between $3 and $5 a disk. "Those burners working a 7-day-week, a 10-hour day, have the capacity of producing over 1.5-million pirated DVDs," he said.
The Canadian Recording Industry Assn. said that police seized about 200,000 illicit CDs and pornographic DVDs and brought criminal charges against Audiomaxxx owner Raj Singh Ramgotra and three employees. The police seized five CD/DVD burning towers, each with 12 burners to produce in 10,000 CDs and DVDs a day. The raid also netted several computers and hard drives as Audiomaxxx has recently begun to make illicit digital downloads, the CRIA said. The raid by 10 officers followed a yearlong investigation into Audiomaxxx and its pirate operation.
It was in the cafeteria of a hotel that Bob Newhart got the inspiration for his second sitcom, the follow-up to "The Bob Newhart Show." Hotel guests, he observed, are much like the patients of psychologist Robert Hartley on that 1970s small-screen classic -- not to be argued with, no matter how nonsensical. As Newhart put it in a recent phone conversation, "I function well with a bunch of crazies around me that I can react to." Playing Dick Loudon, New York writer turned New England innkeeper, Newhart was once again the deadpan Everyman at the center of a gentle storm of character-based absurdity. "Newhart" hit the air in 1982 and took its famous final bow eight years later, with a crucial cameo by Suzanne Pleshette, the friend and former costar whom Newhart eulogized this year. Beginning with the 22 Season 1 episodes, the show made its DVD debut last week.
Malaysian authorities said they hope two specially trained dogs will help police sniff out pirated DVDs and clean up the country's reputation as an abuser of intellectual property rights. The two male Labrador retrievers are trained to smell chemicals used in DVD production. They will become the world's first permanent, national anti-piracy canine unit when they go into action next month, according to Malaysia's Ministry of Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs. Malaysia decided to establish a dedicated DVD-sniffing squad after a visit last year from a traveling canine sniffer team on loan from the U.S. Motion Picture Association. The dogs helped authorities unearth 1.6 million pirated DVDs and other optical discs and equipment worth $6 million over six months. end
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