Sunday, October 21, 2007
I don't care if they track this down. I don't see much of a future for me anyway, so I don't see how they can ruin my future. So, I am going to say this.
MM Lee is either a confused ignorant fool, or he is an arrogant fool.Anyone with a brain can see that Singapore is a conformist society. And that is precisely because of the government's way of running things, and partially due to the education system. And God knows how he managed to confuse IQ with creativity.
Ah, never mind. Someday, all these "protecting-their-ass" business the government is currently engaging in will backfire and harm them. If it's not already doing so. Students are getting smarter you know. We can tell for ourselves. If the government goes on like this, they are just going to make themselves look ridiculous to the public.
Quote from ST.."accused Singapore leaders of breaching the rule of law in such areas such as freedom of assembly and defamation suits"....(we kinda realised the pattern for a very long time already? With the repeated suing and whatever. (But...singapore still wants to protect its ass...however unsuccessful.)..."Professor Jayakumar said Mr Chee was turning the conference into 'a theatre of Singapore politics". Just like that. Just like that you dismiss everything. How about we have an entire conference just to address th issue huh?
This reminds me of an incident back in RG..."In Conversation"..where you get to discuss issues with figures they invite in. They invited some ST journalist...and some girl asked something sensitive regarding government censorship. The journalist started getting defensive and avoided the question TOTALLY. Now, tell me how that is not conformist society. We are EXPECTED to be pro-government.
Regrettably, even if I were of voting age right now, I'd still vote for PAP. Why? We don't have good oppositions. If PAP is a fool, the opposition (with the exception of a few brilliant figures...the very few) are idiots. So yea, PAP is still our best bet I suppose.
Which is why I am waiting for Weizhong to get into the political scene. LOL. =P-----------------
Today's a very rebellious day. So, I shall post something I found on facebook, on the Anti-Odex group. (
http://hs.facebook.com/group.php?gid=17694629800)
Anti-Odex points..
"1. They took action against a 9-year old boy. Like WTF? He was fined up to $5000 for illegally downloading anime episodes. Come on! How can a 9-year old boy possibly fork out such a enormous amount? The company is obviously targeting his parents and expecting his parents to pay on behalf. They are making use of the fact that parents are downright afraid that their child will have a black mark and will hinder his opportunities in the future.
2. He posted OUTRAGEOUS comments in forums. The man behind all this sueing? SING! Stephen Sing. Of course some people might think that he is smiling his way to the bank. Each person sue get $3000, one thousand people get sued is like $3000000!!!)
He dared to post in forums claiming that “I was busy sueing people!” and many other dismissive remarks… It is apparent that he is just pitting himself against the anime community in Singapore.
3. Anime’s are geographically restricted. That means that anime addicts outside japan are not able to view them. From my perspective it isn’t illegal for someone to help you tape a show just because you have missed it.It is obvious that watching a sponsored and free show isn’t illegal as:- #1) the sponsor brands are not removed, #2)we are not selling it for profit. If it is a DVD-rip of licensed property(i.e a dvd-rip of Odex anime which is distributed), then the case is different because there is an actual company that licenses it and there are no sponsors and there is an actual infringement of copyright-laws.
In fact in Europe it is legal to download, but only illegal if you upload.
4. Link to the ODEX sample letter The letter was sent by the ODEX company itself. Not even by a law firm. They said that they have been authorized by their principles, licensor’s and AVPAS members. Man AVPAS is not even a government organization. Authorization can only be given based on laws. Not companies, and most definitely not by their principles.
5. They offer low quality VCDs and even ripped their subs off fansubs! They claim that they weren’t aware since they hired an external company to do the subbings for them. It’s THEIR responsibility to check! Shifting the blame only shows that they lack the discernment and wisdom to pick a good subbing company and not ensuring that they are doing their job.
6. Some anime titles are unlicensed while others are licensed. ODEX website is now under-construction. How can Singaporeans respect their copyrights when we don’t even know what rights do they have? There is a unofficial list compiled at Wikipedia but it maybe unreliable and inaccurate. If ODEX itself is not transparent about their rights, how can they gain the trust of the anime community?
7. As for downloading anime, pirates help by increasing the popularity of that anime. They may not pay for it today, but give them time to cultivate the habit and some of them will be legitimate consumers in the future! Even Bill Gates is smart enough to know the benefits of piracy and is using it to strengthen the windows brand. “Although about 3 million computers get sold every year in China, people don’t pay for the software. Someday they will, though,” Gates told an audience at the University of Washington. “And as long as they’re going to steal it, we want them to steal ours. They’ll get sort of addicted, and then we’ll somehow figure out how to collect sometime in the next decade.” That is the wise guy talking and Mr Sing has got lots to learn from him about doing business and PR.
8. Even if he wanted to start press charges, it should be done when anime was not so popular and it should be well publicized so that it will act as a deterrent to future anime dl-ers. However, he purposely chose this year when the anime dlers are at a all time high and those that download illegally are the majority of the anime viewers. Is it just purely coincidence? Yea… we’re stupid and dumb.. and gullible I might add.
9. They sell anime in volumes are mostly OUTDATED since in Japan a new episode of a anime is screen each week. By compiling them before selling, Singaporeans are not able to get instant access to the anime and it greatly kills off any excitement. Imagine having to wait months before knowing what happened to Harry Potter. (If it were available sooner, there would be no doubt that everyone would turn to that source). Hence, instead of the Mr sing “busy sueing people”, he should have thought about ways to make anime more accessible by demand, by episodes, and by offering the lastest and most up to date stuff… Sadly, he is too busy to think about all these."
FANSUBS FTW!
(wow. this is a long long long long post.)
Labels: thoughts
