DVD pirates put out hits on Lucky and Flo the crime dogs

If you thought that IP piracy was all fun and games (and cheap movies and software), think again, because the war on counterfeiting just got a lot more dangerous, with Malaysian "syndicate bosses" today announcing a reward for the heads of two real-life McGruff's. You probably remember black labs Lucky and Flo as the Federation Against Copyright Theft's latest weapons in tracking down bogus discs -- they're trained to sit when they smell plastic -- and their careers were apparently going pretty well until they helped bust a $3 million bootleg ring this week only to draw the ire of whomever just lost a major source of shady income. With an undisclosed contract now threatening their very lives, the two canine Columbos have reportedly been moved to a Cheney-like undisclosed location where security has been "beefed up" to ensure their safety as well as future contributions to Team MPAA. Because, as we all know, police dogs do have a tendency to keel over just days shy of retirement, and these hits sure aren't gonna help that much.

[Paul @ Mar 22nd 2007 3:11PM]

I wouldn't be surprised if their "$3 million bust" AND this new bounty on the dogs are BOTH FAKE.
This is exactly the kind of scare mongering the MPAA wants you to buy into.
If some big "bootlegging crime lord" is scared of two little dogs, then you should be too!
This is just to scare people into thinking "wow those dogs really work! I wonder when there will be thousands of them, 6 at every airport!"

[kingofwale @ Mar 22nd 2007 3:17PM]

man, much like Lucky and Flo, I can smell a fake story a mile away

*sits*

[Jay @ Mar 22nd 2007 3:25PM]

kingofwale,

Don't speak so soon:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/northern_ireland/6454375.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6478235.stm

[Lee @ Mar 22nd 2007 3:56PM]

Sorry for not making fun of this posting, but I'm too confused at the mo...

These dogs are trained to sit when they smell plastic (and would therefore be crappy at catching Frisbees) so presumably pirated copies of movies, etc. are made of plastic.

Aren't genuine DVD copies of movies ALSO made of plastic?

Please, somebody un-fuddle me.

.

[Philster @ Mar 22nd 2007 5:22PM]

To: Lee (befuddled)

I think you're right, shipments of genuine DVDs are indeed also made of plastic. But they probably also, carry proper shipping papers that correctly declare their contents and appropriate shipping destinations.

[Nubaeus @ Mar 22nd 2007 3:58PM]

So much for just Ling-Ling...

[Ayle @ Mar 22nd 2007 4:06PM]

They are trained to smell plastic and sit... Do they ever move?

[James @ Mar 22nd 2007 4:20PM]

I wish people could get their shit straight:

* College kids downloading movies they wouldn't have paid to see anyway: real. Impact to movie industry bottom line: pretty much squat.

* College kids that the MPAA wants you to believe look exactly like Snidely Whiplash and who STEAL from HARD WORKING ARTISTS AND FILMMAKERS: not real. Impact to movie industry: see above.

* Chinese, Russian, Malaysian, etc. crime syndicates engaging in mass piracy as a retail operation: real. Impact to movie industry bottom line: not trivial -- DVD revenue in Asia is pretty much non-existent.


So I worry for these poor dogs (I have a soft spot for working canines) and feel zero sympathy for assholes like these guys who had their operation busted up. Small scale piracy hurts no-one; these industrial operations are a big part of the reason consumer media has gotten so expensive and DRM/copy protection has gotten so onerous. I wish good luck to Lucky and Flo.

[Muu @ Mar 22nd 2007 5:28PM]

Don't go saying that Average College Joe isn't hurting the industry by sharing a few titles here and there; individual effects may be small, but there's enough people doing the same thing that when combined it's significant enough to be hurting sales.

That said, the decision of one pirate is going to have no effect whatsoever anyway, and since most people know this, nothing short of very strong negative incentives are going to stop them all. My point? If you're a pirate, you ARE part of the problem; just don't sweat it 'cause nothing you do will make a difference anyway.

[matt.k.mead @ Mar 22nd 2007 4:22PM]

I don't think its the smell of a little plastic but the smell of a LOT of plastic. What tends to happen is two things. Pirates are cheap and they use a certain smelling cheap plastic material to make their bootleg dvd's in large quantities that smell stands out so the dogs can pick it up and they know the difference between boot leg and real.

The other thing is they just might go after all plastic smells as long as there is a large enough quantity to make them go nuts.

[Chris @ Mar 22nd 2007 5:03PM]

You know you're a pussy when you take out a contract on a couple of dogs.

Man up you criminal push pins!

[jptech @ Mar 22nd 2007 5:34PM]

and they want to put downloaders in jail?

"There is no such thing as illegal downloading"

[prateeko @ Mar 22nd 2007 5:39PM]

What don't people get about being able to sniff out plastic as being a good way to find these illegal DVDs. If they were legal they'd be shipping in proper boxes (i.e. boxes that say Paramount on them), which the obviously are not. If you're shipping illegal DVDs, you're not going to say so, thus the idea is, if the dogs find large amount of certain plastic (which I'm sure we can't smell the difference between) in shady boxes, you've got pirates busted.

The story is real, I saw it on CNN.com earlier and obviously the dogs must be doing something right if they got $3 million in goods.

But of course, none of this matters since the real piracy (outside of Asia) has to do with people downloading movies...

[polar @ Mar 22nd 2007 5:46PM]

Oh No! We should tell PETA, that might help!

Or, arm the dogs.

[prateeko @ Mar 22nd 2007 6:10PM]

Let's give 'em frickin' laser beams on their heads

[TAJ @ Mar 22nd 2007 9:38PM]

There could be an unprecedented collaboration between PETA and the NRA

[Will @ Mar 23rd 2007 12:14AM]

i think the writer of the article meant the smell of burned DVD-Rs. I know that some of the media I have opened stank like hell.. even the wife complained about it...
but i have to a gree.. this does smell like more MAFIAA FUD... $3 mill in counterfeit movies and software would be a rather large amount to go through any airport.

[IFX @ Mar 23rd 2007 8:22AM]

Piracy is rampant in Malaysia. Car jacking as well.

Taken from Malaysia Sun:

Singapore and Hong Kong have been ranked the least corrupt places to do business in Asia, while India has been ranked 6.67 on the scale of 0-10 in a survey published Wednesday.

Singapore topped the poll as the least corrupt place to do business with a score of 1.2, followed by Hong Kong at 1.87 and Japan at 2.1.

At the other end of the scale, Indonesia and Thailand both scored 8.03, while the Philippines was ranked the most corrupt place to do business with a score of 9.4 in the annual survey by the Hong Kong-based Political and Economic Risk Consultancy.

Macau ranked as the fourth least corrupt place in the poll with a score of 5.11, followed by Taiwan at 6.23, Malaysia at 6.25, mainland China at 6.29, South Korea at 6.3, India at 6.67 and Vietnam at 7.54.

Singapore was also least corrupt in last year's survey, but the new ratings were good news for Hong Kong, which leapfrogged Japan into second place, and Vietnam, which climbed from worst last year to fourth from bottom this year.

The poll was compiled through interviews with nearly 1,500 businessmen in 126 countries and territories on their perceptions of corruption in Asian countries. Interviews were conducted in January and February.

[LTM @ Mar 23rd 2007 1:14PM]

hey, the dogs are only doing their jobs......if the big bad ass pirates feel they've got to rub out a couple of dogs to feel good about themselves, then F*#$ em all twice!

[Bill @ Mar 23rd 2007 6:03PM]

This may be the first legitimate attempt by the media overlords at catching real pirates rather than going around persecuting 12 yr.olds.

[Tom @ Mar 24th 2007 12:54AM]

I didn't realize it took a dog to smell plastic.