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Media
Information > Media DVD Coverage 
Archive
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| Updated June 9, 2005 DVD
NEWS DIGEST
1 -
National Treasure (Full Screen) Dimension Home Video
The industry group representing the major Hollywood studios said it has warned Beijing of an increasingly restless U.S. Congress and possible trade consequences if China doesn't do more to fight piracy. Dan
Glickman delivered the message to heads of various government departments
in Beijing during his first visit to China as chief executive of
the Motion Picture Association of America. The Motion Picture Association estimates about 95% of all DVDs sold in China are pirated, costing the industry $280 million last year. It has been working with Chinese law-enforcement authorities for several years to close factories that produce pirated DVDs and stores that sell them, and has generally praised the level of cooperation it receives on specific enforcement cases. More recently, it has also begun taking on offenders in China's relatively new court system, winning all 10 of the cases it has brought to date against various factories and stores. It is in the process of preparing a new round of such cases, said the association's Asia director, Mike Ellis.
Shipments of DVD recorders in the USA, including combo units that feature built-in VCRs, will reach 3.4 million by the end of this year, says an analyst with research firm In-Stat. By 2007, it estimates shipments will reach 11.7 million. DVD recorders can save TV shows on DVDs, transfer home movies from videotapes to DVDs and can, of course, play DVD movies. Some models also come with hard drives, giving them powers to "pause" a live show. Sales of DVD recorders topped 940,000 in February, a 166% gain from February 2004, according to Ross Rubin, an analyst for The NPD Group. Sales of DVRs in the same period reached 476,000, up 72%. That figure doesn't include DVRs leased from cable and satellite providers.
In Denver, more than 100 fast food outlets offer DVDs for $1 from vending machines. And now DVD rentals are going 24/7. In April, New York-based MoviebankUSA, backed by private investors, opened a storefront ATM stocked with more than 2,000 DVDs in Manhattan's SoHo neighborhood. The
kiosk rents video hits such as The Incredibles for as little as
99 cents for six hours; returns are just dropped into the machine.
The kiosk is getting about 100 renters a day. The developer plans
to have 3,000 kiosks running in three years.
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