321 Studios, the guys that brought you DVDXCopy have set up a website, Protect Fair Use. It seems that a few judges have decided that we Americans should not be making backup copies of our DVDs. While it is obvious that 321 has a vested interest in the legality of copying DVDs, this issue goes far beyond economics. You, as a consumer, are entitled to protect your property. The recording industry would rather you purchase a new DVD when that Toy Story DVD gets trashed by your child. Wrong answer.

I would not have a problem with this if all media sellers agreed to send me a replacement DVD for my damaged DVDs for a nominal fee ($2.00 or less) Of course, that will never happen. They would rather prosecute a war against consumers costing them (and you…) millions of dollars. I suspect it would be cheaper if they would simply agree to replace damaged DVDs.

The DVD content industry must be sleeping at the wheel. Didn’t they learn anything from the music industry? Piss off your core audience and your audience will take its’ revenge slowly. Why damage revenue? Why push people towards piracy in anger? You see, the software industry realized long ago, that a certain level of piracy will always occur. This is not lost revenue. It is revenue they were never going to capture. The problem is some fool in the industry woke up one morning and found a way to save his job. Go after the revenue that is lost to piracy. A hero… in his own mind. You, as a consumer, are entitled to protect your media purchases. It’s that simple. This game of trying to preempt consumer protection laws with the DMCA’s reverse-engineering provisions is a losing battle just as prosecuting teenagers and college kids for illegal MP3 possession is a losing battle.

Run out and buy your copy of DVD backup software now as it will likely be unavailable soon. On second thought you might want to wait, I am sure that a great open source alternative will hit the web real soon now. Who knows, it might just be DVDXCopy downloadable in England for free…