Piracy has long gone beyond just the seven seas, and the digital world does have its fair share of Blackbeards. In fact, records have been set and broken where online piracy is concerned, and in the latest bit of news concerning piracy, a British man was sentenced to jail for close to three years after he recorded a movie in a cinema (which is illegal, of course), followed by distributing this online.
25-year-old Philip Danks’ claim to “fame” would be being the first person out of close to 7 billion people to record as well as seed Fast & Furious 6 so that the masses will be able to download it through a torrent site. In fact, Danks even boasted of his action to those who can see his Facebook account, “Seven billion people and I was the first. F*** you Universal Pictures.” Famous last words, huh?
It was at the back of a cinema in Walsall, United Kingdom, on May 17th last year, when the movie was recorded in the dark hall, before it was subsequently uploaded and seeded by the masses. The result of this offence? 33 months in the slammer, and the court’s Sentencing Recorder, Keith Raynor, mentioned, “This was bold, arrogant and cocksure offending. Your approach to the film industry was made clear in the posting you made on Facebook two days after your arrest. I accept the personal profit was modest but the real seriousness of this case is the loss caused to the film industry as a whole.”
Fast & Furious 6 happened to be one of the top-three most pirated movies in 2013, with an estimated 7.9 million copies downloaded. I still wonder why there are some who would want to settle for a subpar quality recording where movies are concerned – it simply isn’t worth the experience.