ebay bootlegs

topic posted Sun, May 8, 2005 - 12:26 PM by  Tree
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recently a number of cremaster bootlegs appeared on ebay -- i just noticed this morning that ebay yanked them. i wonder if it was per barney & co's request.

which got me thinking. how do folks feel about bootlegs of barney? it's not like he's a record company wanting to shut down filing sharing . . . it's per the artist's wishes that only 10 authorized copies of each film exist on the art market.

on the other hand, i imagine barney's not exactly a starving artist and the idea of making films exclusively for the wealthy rubs me the wrong way.

on the other hand again, the films probably couldn't have been funded if the artist hadn't promised to enforce this artificial scarcity. (i'm assuming the way it works is that barney gets loans to make the films then pays back the loans with proceeds from the exclusive sales).

but on the other hand one last time, there was probably enough demand for the cremaster films by the time 2 came out that the money used to shoot 2 & 3 could have been recouped by DVD sales alone . . .
posted by:
Tree
SF Bay Area
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    Re: ebay bootlegs

    Sun, May 8, 2005 - 1:05 PM
    I'm all for bootlegging of these films - although I disapprove of selling pirate copies for the profit of the bootlegger - I've acquired pirate DVDs of all five movies without having to pay for them, just through meeting people online who were willing to share or trade - And I'm one of the lucky ones who live in a city where I (once) had the opportunity of seeing them all on the big screen (San Francisco), what about those who live in areas where the movies were/are never shown and who aren't filthy rich enough to be able to buy legit DVD copies?

    If the artist is willing to offer these films to the general buyer in legit DVD copies, I might want to refrain from dealing in pirate copies - Hell, I'd gladly pay $100+ for a nice boxed DVD consumer edition of all five movies IF it were available (I bought official Cremaster products from the Guggenheim and Jonathan Bepler when they were available) - But I want the opportunity to study and enjoy these films with repeated viewings, and if the only way to do that is by owning pirate copies, so be it - And if I had a DVD burner and were able to burn more copies and give them to friends or trade (like I said, I wouldn't sell them), I would do that too...

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