The MPAA chairman and CEO Dan Glickman called upon exhibitors at the annual ShoWest convention in Las Vegas to join distributors to fight the scourge of film piracy. His call was made against the background of a boxoffice revenue drop of nearly 8% to $23.2 billion.
Glickman unveiled a new website, FightFilmTheft.org, launched by the MPAA, the National Association of Theatre Owners, the Canadian Motion Picture Distributors Assn. and the Motion Picture Theatre Associations of Canada. The site offers an online theatre employee training programme in the US and Canada designed to provide employees with information on identifying and preventing illegal camcording. It is estimated that 90% of the piracy of new releases in North America comes from such illegal camcording.
The site builds on the “Take Action!” campaign started by the MPAA and NATO in September 2004 that offers a $500 reward to employees who identify and prevent movie theft. In the US, it has resulted in stopping 69 camcording incidents and gave rewards to 30 people.
