SOPA Sequels: The Method to the MPAA's Mississippi Madness

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February 18, 2015

A few weeks ago, the New York Times reported on increasing dissatisfaction that the big movie studios are having with the MPAA, their big trade association. And it’s no wonder. While the six major studios pour 20 million dollars each into the MPAA every year—so that the MPAA can focus on the future of the movie business—recent reports reveal that the MPAA is instead focused on convoluted, Rube Goldberg-like political strategies far removed from filmmaking.

Try to follow this strategy. To influence copyright law, which is set by the U.S. Congress in D.C., the MPAA hired pricey lawyers to ghostwrite a 79-page legal document for a state attorney general, Jim Hood, in Jackson, Mississippi. And this document requests information from the search giant Google about a few rarely watched YouTube videos promoting the sale of steroids, some pornography, and other content. What does a state-steroids strategy have to do with MPAA’s “mission” of “advancing the business and art of filmmaking”—or even with copyright?

Read the full piece at Forbes