However the blog stuck around long enough for the following things to happen:

• For Lily to photograph news stories from newspapers and/or magazines (Copyright Infringement 1)
• For Lily to post an entire article from the techdirt blog without asking permission or giving credit to its author (Copyright Infringement 2)
• For the Internet’s amateur private detectives to discover that Lily Allen’s EMI run site had several ‘mix-tape’ downloads that included complete copies of other (non-EMI) artists work. (Copyright Infringement 3, not to mention making available to download on a massive scale)
• That the usually well written rebuttals and challenges to her posts become interspersed with the usual insults that are part of any well known internet discussion.

Now this becomes interesting when you discover that Lily Allen is all in favour of the 3 strikes and you are out method of policing file-sharing. This means that if you get 3 accusation of copyright infringement against your name you get you internet connection cut off. Notice it is not being found guilty by the courts, just 3 accusations from copyright owners. Now for someone so opposed to copyright infringement Lily Allen certainly likes to do it a fair bit. To the point it was suggested she should have her internet connection turned off. Naturally she didn’t take kindly to that suggestion.

For the record much of her blog and some comments can be found here. Turns out removing something from the internet is more than a little tricky.

Not happy with being labelled a gross hypocrite Lily started banding around the excuses that many a real pirate (as opposed to people who just dislike the 3 strike idea) offer up. She didn’t realise what she was doing was wrong. Everybody does it. She was being unfairly targeted. She didn’t mean to. It was all in the past before she learnt better. This of course only spurred on her critics he wondered why such defences shouldn’t apply to everyone if they were OK for Lily Allen. It was at this point Lily started to throw her toys our of her pram. She leaked to the press she was quitting music (and then wasn’t), stated she wouldn’t attend an industry meeting on the subject because she didn’t want the press to focus on her and not the issues (she went anyway) and finally she shut down the blog. She and her cohorts also modified their position saying that internet pirates should be bandwidth limited rather than cut off.

Naturally the UK tabloid press were on Lily’s ‘side’ and almost universally went with the “Evil internet pirate’s hound poor innocent Lily Allen out of music” angle. They glossed over the deeper discussions on whether it was right to allow copyright owners to be able to get people’s internet cut off purely by accusation, how the extra costs to ask ISPs to police their networks will cost more than the supposed loses to piracy (who will pay for that I wonder) and why everyone was listening to Lily “The Hypocriote” Allen in the first place. Naturally it would sell more papers to got with the evil nerds pick on the poor defenceless little girl. Of course the fact that Lily has made a name for herself making, often foul-mouthed, rants and attacking other artists on her blog and twitter is besides the point, apparently. Try not to notice which newspaper owning companies also own music distributors. The Internet’s publications were little better. The Register’s own Andrew Orwolski (I am not linking to that hacks story, he can find his own ad impressions) pretty much dismissed Mike at TechDirt’s commentary on the on the grounds that Mike knows what he is talking about. Entertainment sites pretty much went with the UK Tabloid argument as I guess they know what side their bread is buttered.

As a matter of fact a considerable number of professionals and journalists (notice I don’t consider journalists as professional, especially technology journalists) have really rounded on Michael Masnick over on TechDirt because of his coverage of silly Lily’s (I like that nickname) campaign. Which is totally unfair. Mike has been golden over this. He hasn’t threatened her or belittled her anyway. He has tried to explain to her what he (and many others) sees as flaws in her position as well illustrate to her the hypocrisy that position considering her own actions. Everything he has written has been measured, polite and even if you don’t agree with him fair and well written. Mike has posted what amount to summary and explain again that he meant no ill will. He has more patience than I. I’d have told the press to go fuck themselves in the ear. Plus it includes a fantastic parody song by Dan Bull that I’ll embed here:

If you like this free song you can download it here or you buy Dan’s music here.

When closing down the site Lily claimed it has served its purpose having bought together those who wanted the government to take a hard stand on internet copyright infringement. A position the government itself was opposed too until one of its own number had an expensive meal with a powerful individual in the the entertainment industry. Unfortunately her mistake of stealing (to use her term) content from TechDirt had the side-effect of bring together a lot of people who don’t share her opinions. The revelations of her own copyright infringement that came up later and her petulant attitude to being caught out gave her opponents much desired real world ammunition against an aggressive anti-piracy stance. If it is so easy to do accidentally or without malicious intent why penalise it so ferociously?

I have nothing against Lily Allen, I actually quite like her. She seems quite bright, for a pop star. Oddly something about her brings out my long dormant protective side and I’d certainly shag her given the opportunity. Though being in my early 30s I’m probably not old enough for her. Yes I’m crude and judgemental what of it? Have you not read my blog before? At least I haven’t posted topless pictures of her this time. While I don’t consider her a particularly talented singer or song-writer I have liked a couple of her tunes. I even paid for them too. Thanks to Amazon probably not as much as I should have though. Unfortunately for Lily this issue was far more complex than she envisaged and she simply wasn’t equipped to deal with the informed and educated opponents she butted heads with.  Her reaction was of course typical of someone in their twenties (I can say that now I’m older) and she got all petulant and defensive. Hopefully this will be a learning experience for her. I doubt she minded the insults as she has always seemed to be the kind of person who could take it as well as dish it out.

I’m flirting with the idea that she was encouraged to do this by someone within the industry. Not that she was put up to it so much as there may well have been someone who knowing her opinions and web-savvy nature encouraged her to do something. Then again she might just have acted on impulse and gone with something she later thought better of. Like I said I hope she learned something constructive from all this and doesn’t think we are just a bunch of meanies.

And seeing as you probably all have this on the brain now I’ll post it anyway.

Sorry I can’t help myself. I’m scum. If I could limit myself to words with 2 syllables or less I could probably get a job at The Sun. In my defence last time I posted it, on my old site, it was in a discussion about Doctor Who’s new assistant. It is slightly more justifiable here. Well maybe not but if it didn’t get you fired it probably brightened your day a little. Just out of interest who owns the wayward nipple at the bottom left?

Oh by the way this post is probably NSFW.

Films

The buy out will probably initially be a boon for Marvel’s already successful film franchises. They will have access to Disney’s massive clout when it comes time to market the films and get them out there. For films currently being filmed, produced and those currently in pre-production will probably benefit and remain largely free from Disney interference. In the longer term I fear Disney will simply not be able to resist sticking their oar in. Marvel decided to start producing its own films because they wanted to get their properties out there take most of the money and make the films they wanted without the Hollywood executive interference that has managed to all but ruin the X-Men and Spider-man franchises. I’m sure at first Disney will,  as promised, keep their nose out but eventually a Disney executive will see something he doesn’t like or come up with a way to make Marvel films ‘even better’ and Marvel’s films will end up being dictated by people who are not Marvel. Don’t expect any of the post Avengers films to be any better than ‘The Last Stand’ or ‘Ghost Rider’.

The fanboys are positively drooling at the prospect of a Pixar/Marvel animated film. They have already had the possibility of an Antman Pixar film shot from under them but this hasn’t stopped them frothing at the mouth like Cujo. It isn’t going to happen at least not for a very long time. There is no market for a full 3D superhero film. Pretty much every suggested 3D superhero film that was posited after the success of ‘The Incredibles’ has been met with either crickets or hostility, including JLA and Avengers films. There is no real market there and nobody at Pixar is jumping up and down at the prospect of getting access to the Marvel catalogue. So sit down and use a tissue to wipe the spittle from around your mouth.

TV

Marvel hasn’t had a decent animated series since the success of Spider-man, Hulk and the X-Men in the 90s. These only being slightly better than the 80s cartoons that were very successful. All of the cartoons since have been plagued with piss-poor modernisation and pathetic attempts to be cool and hip. Even the animated DVD/TV films based on the Ultimate universe have been ropey. The 90s cartoons managed to be more true to their source material even while hampered with by higher ups who forbade death, injury, drugs and sex even being mentioned let alone featured.  Marvel has never had a successful live action TV show in the nature of say ‘Smallville’. Which is amusing as ‘Smallville’ is a Spidermanisation (I like that made up word) of the Superman mythos. This is where I could see Disney making most use of Marvel’s properties and where Marvel could benefit the most. They have a TV network and everything in place to make Marvel TV shows, animated or otherwise. And now that special effects are so much cheaper make a live action serial out of a comic should be a no brainer. I always the serialised nature of comics was a better fit for TV than Film anyway. Still I’m not sure if any of this will happen.

Comics

The comics are screwed. The comics don’t make massive profits as it is and frankly the market is being propped up by the success of the films. The target audience is aging and declining while new younger readers are just not at the levels they once were. Kids today have many more things to occupy their time and to be honest comics are way to expensive for what they are. I usually pay between £2 and £3 for a comic these days and that is a whole lot for 30 minutes entertainment. Thus any post merger rationalisation will take place here. And it will happen. I doubt their has been a single case of one company buying another were the purchased company hasn’t seen considerable cuts. Disney have purchased Marvel for their character portfolio. There hasn’t been a decent new Marvel character in years (possibly decades) so Disney have nothing to fear by slowly winding down the comics division. In addition Disney will fall from a great height upon any story line that potentially jeopardises any of the other media interests. Things like Civil War and the death of Captain America would probably not have occurred under Disney. Some might argue that is a good thing but they are the kinds of comic fans that like comics to remain the same year on year anyway. Those kinds of fans will probably be happy with Marvel under DC. Though if DC can promise that we will never have another ‘One More Day’ I’ll welcome them with open arms no matter how much they interfere.

Final Thoughts

Disney has been quick to say they will leave Marvel alone as they don’t want to interfere with something doing well and initially this will be the case but in the long run Disney will milk Marvel dry like the entertainment industry vampire they are. Many people have remarked that Marvel will be OK because Disney didn’t ruin in Pixar. Sadly Marvel simply do not have the same clout or unique selling point that has protected Pixar from overt interference. In Pixar’s case they were out Disneying them and Disney had not choice but to buy them in and then leave them alone. Disney is happy to spend most of its time milking its own properties in the direct to DVD market. This is not true of Marvel. Marvel have not been purchased because they do something better than everyone else but simply as a cache of ready to exploit entertainment properties.

Naturally all the higher-ups at Marvel are stating this is a wonderful thing. Sorry but they are bound to say this as their jobs almost certainly depend on it so I think we can pretty much dismiss their comments as spinning the company web line. Stan Lee in particular is all for it but he has been taking Disney’s shilling for a long time so this too is to be expected. There seems to be a split between the fans of the comics and the fans of the films over whether this is a good thing. The comic fans are mostly against the idea as they believe the comics will likely get marginalised while the other media fans are more positive about the buyout. Basically the comic fans are on Cap’s side and the other are with Iron Man. However all this is only the opinion of a washed up old Web Developer so feel free to treat it with disdain if you will. But I will say ‘I told you so’ if I turn out to be right, over and over again. Honestly I’ll be hell to live with.

Interestingly Warner have announced ’DC Entertainment’ this week which is supposedly in answer to Marvel’s similar and successful entertainment division. Naturally this has been in development for two years and has in no way been rushed into existence to try and get some reflected news coverage after the Disney Marvel deal. Nope not at all. In addition to this the DC comics fans have not been entirely happy since Warner bought up DC and have accused it of meddling in the comics. But Disney won’t do that to Marvel, oh no.

Michael Jackson - Dead Person

Michael Jackson is dead and I don’t care.  No really I don’t give a monkey’s that he is dead. Well actually I do as I am fed up to the back teeth with hearing about him. Though I don’t feel any deep sympathy for his friends and family. Nor do I feel that his death is some great loss to the world. Why? I don’t know any of them and I didn’t particularly care for him or his music. Oh, I’m sure he was terribly talented a singer, song writer and dancer but his music never really did anything for me, not enough wailing guitars to get my attention, sorry. Though the press/media might have conveniently forgotten that he was bat-shit insane and in my opinion almost certainly a paedophile I haven’t. How they managed to do this is beyond me as they hounded the guy over both issues for years. But now we have all this hypocritical don’t speak ill of the dead bullshit were we are expected gloss over him being a nutter and not-guilty in the same way as OJ was and remember him when he was still a talented black pop-star. Why should we? Does him being dead make him any less of a horrible car accident of a person? Should we forgive him his oddities and perversions because he could knock out a decent tune? No and No. I will have none of it. As far as I am concerned one of the gods of the vapid cult of celebrity has kicked the bucket and the world is now short one alleged child molester. So I won’t be rushing out to buy any Michael Jackson CD’s, now I’m not at work I won’t have to listen too anymore of is music at an unproductive volume level and I won’t be watching any of the vast number of sycophantic TV programmes that will clog up the airways for the next week.

And yes I probably am a horrible, horrible person lacking anything even resembling empathy for another human being. I do try so thanks for noticing.

Sadly someone at Amazon UK as almost probably got the sack out of this and Amazon have lost £10,000s. Well the 2nd part isn’t so sad.

Lee as Count Dooku

Christopher Lee has been Knighted by the Queen during her Birthday Honours list. Lee who is one the world’s most proflic actors even at the grand old age of 87. He was unable to comment on his honour because he was busy filming. Lee has played some of the most famous bad guys in cinema history starting with what must be considered the best Dracula. More recently of course he was Count Dooku in the Star Wars prequels and Saruman the White in the Lord of the Rings films. He even managed to get himself cast as a Bond villian.

Without doubt the ultimate bad guy of cinema.