Feb 09
12
The Cultural Lure of P2P
Or “No sir,
we cant sell you the movie – It’s no longer in Production.”
I was born in
1958 in New Zealand to
Hungarian Refugee Parents.
My first
English word was not uttered until in 1963, six weeks before my fifth birthday,
I was forced to attend St.
Benedicts School
in Khandallah, Wellington, where my
crying mother placed me into the hands of Mother Lucille, a penguin.
Yes of course
we went to the shops and church, and we had a radio set, that regularly made
announcements in English, so although I had heard English, there was no real
need for me to learn or speak it until I realised that no matter how hard I
tried to make her understand, Mother Lucille – couldn’t or didn’t want to learn
Hungarian.
So I learnt
English. This strange language where everything was in reverse, and ugly in its
brevity of expression. In Hungarian, every request is flowery with praise for
the addressee, the description of the request, the benefit to the requestee of
granting the request and the long litany of the many religious blessings that
would no doubt fall on the head of the grantee.
In English it
was “Give me the pencil”. Well, if you were polite and not just learning
English, you might add a please at the beginning or end to ensure that you
didn’t wind up in a punch up.
But I didn’t
quite Grok “please”. So I decided to omit its use entirely, which of course
meant that I became quite proficient with my fists – rapidly.
And Mother
Lucille and I learnt to talk in English. Well at least, there was eventually an
occasion where I talked and she nodded understanding.
Growing up in
a wog household teaches the children of immigrant parents an unusual lesson not
available to children in English speaking countries born of local English
speaking parents.
And that is –
your parents are fallible. Their English sucks. You always have to correct
them.
So I grew up
and learnt the mantle of authority by being an English tutor to my father and
mother.
And in
return, my parents tried hard to instill into me the historical culture that
came with being a Hungarian. I listened to Hungarian classical music, Hungarian
folk tunes, Hungarian Gypsy music and Hungarian cabaret (stand up comedy). Hell
I received so much culture at home that I didn’t
even know
there was such a thing as “pop” music until I was twelve and brought my first
transistor radio.
When I turned
17, I escaped from home to attend advanced education and ended up in
Australia and
from there eventually in
Hungary, the
land of my ancestors.
I was like a
little kid in a candy factory. I had relations, cousins, aunts, grandmothers,
great grandmothers, grand aunts, great grand aunts and more cousins and unlike
Mother Lucille, they all spoke Hungarian.
And I started
buying culture. Cassette tapes, VHS tapes, Books. I hoarded this treasure and on
my regular semester break trips home (to Oz), paid enormous sums for extra
baggage.
Unfortunately
I have discovered that Cassette tapes and VHS tapes have a maximum shelf
life.
Especially if
you live in the tropics. My experience is that cassette tapes turn gummy after
three wet seasons and 2 dry seasons. Quicker if you leave them in the car whilst
it is parked in the sun.
VHS tapes
turn similarly “sticky” after about twelve years if stored in a dark cabinet,
occasionally air conditioned.
So here I am,
living in Sydney with a collection
of gummed up music cassettes, records for which I no longer have the “humungous”
stereo system and VHS tapes that keep winding around the spindle of the player
and jamming.
The obvious
option is to jump onto Amazon and buy copies. – Nope – Titles not
available.
Ebay – nope –
titles not available. This shouldn’t be that hard. Some of these movies are less
than twenty years old. One of them is only ten years old. Why cant I find them
?
Because they
no longer exist. They have moved so far into Deep catalogue that the Hungarian
Production Houses cant be bothered to re-issue them for the small Hungarian
Population that might want to buy them.
In the
Western World both Sony Corporation and Philips realised this problem a few
years ago and started a Disk on Demand service for their deep catalogue items.
Both firms have since cancelled their service due to costs.
Who has
created a collection of these Historical Hungarian Movies for preservation?
No-one.
Who has made
these historical movies available for viewing by the public? No-one.
So what
option do I have to recover my lost content ?
According to
the Law. None.
Curiously, on
the P2P networks, almost every single one of my Hungarian movies and music
collections are available. Donated by kind souls who, with foresight digitized
their aging VHS tapes before it was too late.
The law
hasn’t been tested on this topic anywhere in the world.
I wonder if I
should just download them using P2P and ensure their safety.
My dilemma is
a moral one. I have no issue with the movies that I purchased in the eighties.
As far as I am concerned, I am replacing a faulty sub-standard manufactured product with a digital version.
(There was no warning on the label that if you lived in the Tropics the tapes
would turn sticky.)
My problem is
with all the new titles available. WOW. I could sit here downloading till the
cows came home and totally sate my cultural needs for a considerable
time.
How can I pay
for these new titles? In fact some of the companies that made some of these
titles are no longer in existence. Oh I’m sure that someone owns the copyright,
but how can I find out who? Oh, they’re in
Hungary. Oh,
it’s a lawyers office. Nope, they’re not interested in selling me a legitimate
copy. There arn’t any. The film is no longer in production. Could I send them a
cheque if I can get a copy elsewhere? No – they don’t have any system for accepting a cheque.
In other words, they dont want my money – this then produces a dilemma for the Copyright Industries.
Copyright was designed to protect the commercial interests of the inventor/artists.
Is there now an argument that if the copyright owner is no longer interested in selling the content, then he can no longer be afforded the protection of the copyright law ?