kane

You just made my point for me.

First, I won't argue fair use with you. We clearly have two different opinions on what that is so that is a moot point.

As you posted: "The granting of such exclusive rights, under the proper terms and conditions, confers a benefit upon the public that outweighs the evils of the temporary monopoly."

I can make the argument that by granting the movie industry a temporary monopoly (which BTW I still don't believe it is) it is actually benefiting the public. How? Simple. Many movies will play the festival circuit before getting a wide release. During this time many people have a chance to see it and write about it. It builds a word of mouth and puts more information about the movie out there for the general public. So when the movie is finally released wide people have enough information about it that they can make an educated decision as to whether or not they want to see it. Secondly, If the movie is a hit at the theater it will get a bigger DVD release so the chances are the DVD will be on sale the first week of its release and save people money. Add in that the video stores like blockbuster will buy more copies of it so the odds of you being able to rent it are greater.

Sure, these are small benefits, but they are benefits. If the producers was forced to release the movie in all formats at the same time they may choose to charge twice as much for the DVD upon release. Blockbuster may have no idea that a particular movie is going to be a hit and under order so renting it could be difficult. Not to mention the reality that some movies rely on the festival circuit to build an audience because they are low budget independent movies. Without being able to take advantage of that marketing tool the movie would hit its release as a complete unknown and likely fail.

We aren't talking about monopolies that last 5 years, 10years, forever. We are talking about 16 weeks. 16 weeks is about the average time it takes for a movie to shift from the theater to DVD. Your life isn't going to be destroyed if you have to wait a few months to get your DVD.

And as I posted above once you have brought the socialist hand of justice down on the movie industry and forced them to distribute to your model are you then going to clean up those other industries I mentioned?