In case you were wondering, it seems the long dick of the law deals with piracy exactly the same way it does meth. They can't go after the users themselves because there's not enough time in the day or money in the judicial system to handle every two bit tweeker or casual downloader. They can't go after the producers of the problem because the large scale cookers and initial leakers are often protected by special interests. That leaves the poor bastards that whirl up one or two batches themselves or buy one five dollar import bootleg and stupidly upload it.
Two years ago, Gilberto Sanchez shelled out a sawbuck for an unfinished street copy of Wolverine. Against his better judgment, he uploaded it to MegaUpload, and now, after pleading guilty, he's likely to spend at least a year in jail. According to Torrent Freak, Sanchez is still the only one that's been charged in what could be the most famous movie leak of all time. But why? I'm not saying Sanchez shouldn't be punished. Studios invest hundreds of millions in summer blockbusters. They have every right to protect their intellectual property, but the biggest asshole on the block here is the employee who leaked it to begin with. Why is he not sitting in jail?
Let me put this another way. Let's say one of the assistant coaches of a football team sells his playbook to a random dude on the street. Then random dude on the street publishes that playbook on the internet. If I'm the head coach, I'm very angry with random dude, but I'm even more pissed off someone on my own staff betrayed the team.
We're only getting started with internet movie leaks. I suspect three, maybe four huge movies will end up on the web months ahead of the release date in the next couple years. Someone out there will always be stupid enough to upload copies he bought on the street. There's just too many idiots. The only real way to fight this is to go after the initial sources themselves. They're the ones with everything to lose, and they should be punished accordingly. A strong message would go along way. Looks like that punishment isn't coming this time though.
