Comment: Who can resist Hollywood's united front?

The whole plot of the movie Titanic revolves around the discovery of a sketch of a topless Kate Winslet, and the circumstances under which it was drawn - so does it make sense to produce a version of the film in which all references to her chest are edited out?

Well, apparently it makes sense in the world of CleanFlicks, a firm which has re-edited the movie to meet demand for a chestless edition, in American Fork, Utah. Where CleanFlicks went wrong is in taking payment for the doctored version. You see, in the make-believe world of Hollywood, when you buy a DVD, you don't actually buy it, you "acquire a licence" to play it back. And what CleanFlicks is doing is selling licences it does not own, to the doctored edition.

Curiously, if CleanFlicks sold a consultancy service, editing other people's videos for 100 times the sum it charges per video, there would be no easy way to sue it. Instead, there would merely be cries of outrage from directors (which is happening anyway) whose creative talent has been abused by the desecration of their output (which happens anyway).

The image which amuses me is the one where film directors of the world outlaw censorship by suing repressive governments for breach of copyright.

A lovely thought, but of course the idea of an intellectual property licence remains a polite fiction. I'll believe in licences the day I break a DVD and go back to the shop to ask for a free replacement - on the grounds that I have a licence, and just need the data restored - and don't get treated as a loon.

And, much though I'd like to believe it, I'm afraid the argument we should "support licensing, so that they won't remove Kate Winslet's finer features" simply does not carry enough conviction.

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