RANT BOX: Regional Distribution.

One thing that has always bugged me about the media industry's call for reducing piracy, is the fact that they still haven't woken up to one simple truth; namely that if you stop someone from being able to legally purchase something, there is a faint chance that they might just look for it illegally, because they want it.

In the days of a global economy, global industries and global downloads, there is absolutely no excuse for releasing media (music, films, DVDs and games) at different times - or indeed not at all.

Example 1: Films. Sometimes films are released in the U.S. anything up to three months before they are released elsewhere in the world. This means that anyone not in the U.S. knows it is available but can't get it legally. Why do they do this?

Example 2: Games. It isn't uncommon for games to be released in the U.S. a month before they are released globally, or even a few days before. Freelancer 2 was a month late in the U.K. (frustrating) and Battlefield Bad Company 2 was released three days later because traditionally U.S. retailers release games on a Tuesday and UK retailers on a Friday. Sorry? It is 2010 for crying out loud!

Example 3: I decided I wanted to obtain a music track. I searched for it online and found (along with the usual bit torrent sites) that it was available in Amazon.com (U.S.) as a download, but not in Amazon.co.uk. And because of whatever bizarre rules the media industry have in place about purchasing MP3s, I can't buy the MP3 from their U.S. site. Of course, if they actually had it on a CD, I could quite happily purchase the CD, but not the MP3.
Worse yet, another international download site (7 digital) has it for sale in the American, Swedish, Norwegian, Canadian and Finnish versions of their site, but I can't purchase it from them. Oh no, I have to purchase from their UK site - which of course doesn't have it.

AAAAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH.

I want to buy it! Please let me buy it! Don't force me to break the law by putting in completely unwarranted restrictions on digital downloads!

On a sadly related matter, Lord VoldeMandelsson is currently trying to push through a bill about digital distribution that he dreamt up with his media buddy, billionaire Mr Geffon. The bill is wrong. It has not been properly debated and common sense has not been applied to it. For instance, if it is believed that you are downloading illegally, the bill will allow your broadband to be disconnected without requiring any proof. It doesn't stop there though.
Read this: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2010/mar/17/digital-economy-bill-twitter-outcry