MovieChat Forums > The Corporation (2004) Discussion > Does it seem hypocritical...

Does it seem hypocritical...


...that this movie is bought/sold?

The basic premise of the movie is that profit-driven organizations are essentially a bad thing, right? Well, if the producers of this movie were truly driven by the "higher purpose" of informing the masses about this problem, then why not give it away for free? Simple supply vs. demand dictates that that's the best way to get the most people to see it. (Never mind that the same theory also bears out the fact that every person/entity is a profit maximizer) Filmmakers like Micheal Moore are lining their pockets by playing the same capitalist game that they criticize in their movies. Even if they were to go to break-even, do you think that it costs $25.49USD per DVD to bring you their film? Also, if you go to their website, they're very explicit about their copyright laws (that this for HOME AND EDUCATIONAL use only!) - A law designed to protect profit of a given product.

Thoughts?

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it doesn't seem hypocritical at all. typically, the largest portion of the cost of something like this is distribution and retail. for say something like a $14.99 music CD, less then $1 of it goes to the artist. the record company takes a chunk, but typically it's the distributors and retail outlets that take the biggest portion.

for something like 'the corporation', if you noticed in the credits, i believe funding came from places like the canadian film board. not quite sure, but i think that was one of the funders. well, while the filmmakers might like to get their message out for free, the people who actually paid for the cameras, film, editing equipment, transportation, research, etc. usually like to get at least part of their money back. i'm talking about the people who actually fronted most of the money for this film. even if this weren't the case--even if the filmmakers used their own money entirely for the film and distribution, it seems ridiculous that they should have to put themselves in debt for life in order to get their message out.





"The only place to spit in a rich man's house is in his face."
--Diogenes of Sinope

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The filmmakers have made it available to download for free.

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where exactly?

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Really, it's not that difficult to find. Try using Google and look for "the corporation torrent".

See http://tinyurl.com/2tn499

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it's free to torrent
if you have a bit torrent downloader/tracker/thingy you can download the torrent here www.chomskytorrents.org as far as I remember (the site isn't loading at the moment).

It's also on Google video or a site I frequent http://www.jonhs.net/freemovies/corporation.htm
and I assume you can download it from google video
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3203253804055041031&hl=en

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You can download it legally and for free here: http://www.archive.org/details/The_Corporation_

So yeah, they did give it away.

You can also get a lot of other films free from this site as they are no longer in copyright or have been given away by the owners.

The Power of Nightmares (2003) is one of the best docs I've ever seen and well worth watching.

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"You can download it legally "

Why would you automatically assume that "legally" even matters to everyone?

It doesn't.

Don't confuse 'lawful' with 'legal'.

It's perfectly lawful to download (which is really just modifying magnetic polarities on YOUR OWN harddrive, and you have the right to modify anything you own to your heart's content, or even more) anything.

Corporations and governments have tried to use their greed as logic, saying it's stealing. But it's not stealing at all. Information wants to be free, and all the information exists because the Creator gave it to us, even if He gave it to us through people.

Whatever people have, whatever corporations have, is because the Universe gave it all to them FOR FREE. Every single piece and bit of information, at least publically released, belongs to ALL BEINGS IN THE UNIVERSE.

Besides, consider this.

There used to be a problem with airspace, when airplanes started becoming popular. The problem was that millions of people owned bits of airspace, because they owned land. The airplanes couldn't just freely cross that airspace, without the consent of the owner.

But it would have been impossible to go and ask every single owner of every single piece of the airspace a permission, so it was decreed that since it's impractical and impossible, they don't have to do it.

The same thing is true with information and data these days. It's impractical and impossible to "own" bits, especially if you publish them.

I mean, you can't PUBLISH something and then greedily at the same time think you can PROFIT from it. Look, you either OWN that something, and keep it locked in your desk drawer, and don't send it anywhere, _OR_ you give it freely to the Universe (who actually gave what you have to you originally freely anyway - how much did you pay for your inspiration or ideas? How much did you pay for your brain or your muscles that helped you create whatever you made? Why do you expect others to have to pay for something that YOU got for free? Sure, if you had hard work, it would be decent if you got a _REASONABLE_ compensation for it, but trying to make millions by RESTRICTING people's right to modify their own harddrive as much as they want, is just greedy, egotistical and wrong)!

Don't bring human-created MONEY system (that's just 'debt' anyway) into it! Don't bring governments, banks and corporations into it! Don't put it through all that - just give it to others for free - your Creator will take care of you, that was promised to us already thousands of years ago!

In any case, when someone says 'copying is stealing', it's like they have been completely brainwashed, and lack the logic that a 4-year already should have.

If I go to a store, and I don't have any money, and I am really hungry, and I take a banana and run away, that's stealing, BECAUSE the actual owner of that banana doesn't HAVE it any more, and did not receive a compensation for it (though Earth gave that banana for free, only humans put a price tag on it, but that can be talked about later). It's a LOSS for the store owner, it's taking someone else's property, DEPRIVING HIM OF IT.

THAT is what stealing is - depriving. You take something, which means that the end result is that that someone NO LONGER HAS IT. It's gone. You stole it.

Now, if I go to the same store, and I don't have any money, and I am really hungry, and I COPY the banana (An E.T. handed me a device that can scan anything small-ish and make a perfect copy it, without touching or harming the original, for example, if you need an explanation as to how this could be possible - I mean, this is a rhetorical device, an E.T. didn't REALLY hand me any device), ..

.. with _WHAT_ kind of twisted, feminist, fascist, corporate-greed, endlessly evil logic is that STEALING?

The store owner STILL has his banana, he doesn't even have to know about what happened, and I will have food, and everyone is happy. He can still sell the banana, and get his profit. No one was hurt. AND NOTHING WAS STOLEN.


The corporate logic goes like this, I think:

- They make some crap that no one wants
- Someone 'downloads' a 'copy' of that crap
- That someone would definitely have BOUGHT that crap, if he couldn't download it
- So they lost that 'revenue', because now they have to sell it to someone else instead!

Yeah.. that's really logical. So instead of having billions and billions of dollars of profit, the poor, sad, victim-corporations only now have billions of dollars. Oh, HOW CAN THEY STAND IT! The poor dears!

The corporate logic doesn't consider these factors:

- The market might not have been as big as they thought it would
- People are used to recording stuff on tape from radio and TV, so they might not necessarily buy it all anyway
- People do not have an endless supply of money, so even if they couldn't download the thousands of mp3s (for example) that they might have on their harddrives, it's possible that they STILL wouldn' t been able to afford all those thousands of songs
- People might not WANT to purchase the crap, even if they couldn't get it for free
- Even if people would buy and want to buy the music, and couldn't get it for free, it's possible that they might still arrange their budget very differently than what the corporate calculations show

It's like, someone might be able to afford two CDs a month. Now, he can download thousands of songs easily. But every single song is calculated as a 'loss', as if this individual would have DEFINITELY BOUGHT every single song, if he couldn't get it for free - although he can only afford two CDs a month!

Something is very, VERY wrong with the corporate calculations, as well as logic, as well as common sense (or lack thereof), as well as pragmatism. Those corporations are like big babies who cry for authority figures if they can only eat 2 liters of ice cream every day instead of 20.

When it's questionable, whether they should be eating ice cream AT ALL.

Down with those legal fictions, I rather live within the world of common sense, common law, and human beings than persons, corporations and the 'legal system'.

By the way, copying/downloading/'transferring files' is not, I repeat, is NOT "piratism". I know there is a 'pirate party' and 'pirate bay', but this is just the typical NWO-lingo that they WANT people to use.

And when the elite, the NWO-people and the corporations are the REAL pirates (more real than most would imagine, but if you research where the Nazi SS skull death cult symbol came from (the pirates), who did the original voodoo rituals with - you guessed it, Moloch to sacrifice babies to (the pirates), it's easy to piece it together to modern elitists like the bush and rockefeller family, etc. who belong to the SKULL&CROSSBONES club, and have rituals in Bohemian Crove where they sacrifice either real babies or baby effigies (not that much better, when you think about it) to a stony owl-demon called .. well, we all know)..

.. it's somehow ironic that they accuse, stigmatize and claim that people who do harmless copying (which is completely and utterly LAWFUL activity, because you don't kill, steal, harm or fraud) are somehow "pirates" and they do "pirating".

One could write a thick book about pirates and the whole skull&crossbones-symbol, that permeates all areas of life these days, from old, old comic books to the most modern movies and TV shows. That symbol is EVEN IN THIS MOVIE!

There's just no escaping that symbol - no matter how well you try to hide yourself from it, it will punch you in the face, sooner or later. I was one day taking a nice stroll, when I looked at someone's yard, and what do you know - the kids were indoctrinated into playing "pirates", and they had that symbol in a flag that was actually raised in a flagpole! There is no escaping it unless you are blind or never watch or read anything visual, or go outside.

They even sell kids' pillows with a 'cute-ish' version of that symbol! And often it has the other eye(hole) covered by an eyepatch (All-Seeing Eye thrown into the mix) or covered in some way.

It's a sick, crazy world, to the extent, that no one probably can make a FULL report on all the evils and horrible structures and forces behind every bad thing in it.. and everything is connected to something else.

So I will end this message now, otherwise I might end up typing 200 pages of text, and still feel that I have not quite covered the matter.

But my point is that copying is not piratism, it should not be called or associated with piratism in any way. It's just a way to arrange free information and data for EVERYONE - FREEDOM FOR ALL, isn't that what people have even been willing to die for (and murder for, but no one usually puts it like that for some reason)?

If everyone could have everything they need and want, wouldn't that be a definition of a paradise? Then why be against it? Because you care so much about shareholders and their slightly smaller PROFITS?

I care about the planet, about it's Creator, it's denizens (and not just humans, either), and life itself.

Which do you think is the better target for caring?

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There's nothing hypocritical about it.

First off there's nothing said to be wrong with "profit-driven organizations." Corporations are a specific kind of organization, the movie clearly says that they support local businesses.

As for copyrights, the movie doesn't make any claim about being opposed to intellectual property. Just because they don't like corporations doesn't mean they can't want to maintain control over their work!

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Michael Moore, nor the makers of the Corporation are against all forms of capitalism. This is a common argument from a lot of people when someone denounces multinational corporations, or some other problem with capitalism. It's the old insult. "What are you, a communist?". It's as if you either want to give big business unfettered power to do what they want, or you want to stop anyone from making money, as if there is no in between. It's the Bush-syndrome of everything being black and white. It's not. I want to make money, but I believe in doing it with ethics.

As for the movies themselves, they are not owned by the filmmakers. Michael Moore doesn't own the rights to "
Bowling for Columbine". He does not distribute the film. If he did, it probably would not have been seen by very many people. Documentaries are not cheap to make, and in order to make them, filmmakers have to make deals with others, who, in return, demand certain things. If you want to get your message out there, then you have to give in to certain things. In the end, though, it balances out. It's like people criticizing Al Gore for flying around making speeches about global warming. It's ridiculous. The amount of good that Gore is doing by flying around and bringing light to the issue outweighs the size of the `footprint' he is leaving.

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[deleted]

Stop spreading bullcrap.

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It's a paradox that the only way to bring down Capitalism is to sell stuff, but it may be true. It's hard to get the message out unless it's marketed. I guess it's all the more reason to change things around.

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yeah... i guess the difference between The Corporation (film) and the corporation is really the type of product. The Corporation leaves a lesson of ethics, whereas corporations generally don't. so even then, the marketing for the film is more "worth it" in the moral and extreme-long-term sense; whereas the marketing which corporations engage in merely brings more returns to empower themselves.

hope the difference makes sense!

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When you download it off the internet it actually thanks you for doing so.

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That would be a paradox, except nobody here is trying to do that. In the film itself, the CEO of the carpet company (can't remember his name) said that if we are going to run big buisness, we just need to find a better way to do it. Start from scratch and try again, this time with some morals and ethics in mind. It's not the fact that there are huge corporations that run everything that is the real problem; granted, this creates it's own problems in itself, but those are not what were being addressed in this film. The problems here are the greed and selfishness that they have, and how they put both humans and the earth as a whole at risk for their own financial gain.

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The basic premise of the movie is that profit-driven organizations are essentially a bad thing, right?


Wrong. While the overall tone and erratic narrative make the film direct the viewer to this conclusion, the logical conclusion is that the legal structure of business ownership as a corporation results in the isolated, unchecked pursuit of profits with detrimental long-term effects. Pursuit of profit is not an intrinsically bad thing - indeed, the "profit test" is a very important and useful tool to direct the allocation of our limited resources. The problem is that the profit test only "works" when it is not manipulated by the legal and legislative framework. The limited liability protection of corporations in the US undermines the cost of their "psychopathic" behavior and allows them to operate profitably where they otherwise would not. The conclusion of the film should be that limited liability protection should be removed. Unfortunately, the filmmakers, to a large extent, are willing to substitute the concept of corporations with the concept of business in general and it diminishes the power of the film.

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