Engines for Bootlegging

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I was looking for information on the TV series HARRY O today…and one of the sponsored Google
listings took me to a slick site that sells bootleg DVDs of TV shows. So did the same search on Yahoo.Top_banner_1

At DVDAvenue.tv (which also does business under the name TVDVDmania.tv, DVDCraze.tv,TVDVDPlanet.com and TVAddicts.tv and probably a whole bunch of others) you can buy complete series boxed sets of shows
like SPENSER: FOR HIRE, BOSTON PUBLIC, JUDGING AMY, ED, JAG, ADAM-12, WONDER
WOMAN, EMERGENCY, NY UNDERCOVER, HAWAII FIVE-O, IT TAKES A THIEF, DYNASTY, STREETS
OF SAN FRANCISCO, all of which are currently not being sold commercially by
their rights-holders.   Tvdvdplanet

 
But DVDAvenue doesn’t stop there…they are even selling
bootleg versions of shows like REMINGTON STEELE, KNIGHTRIDER, SEAQUEST, THE
NIGHT STALKER, THE PRISONER, PRIME SUSPECT and MY SO-CALLED LIFE which are
readily available at your local Best Buy…only they charge a lot more for them. That’s assuming they actually send you the bootlegs  and aren’t just a honey-trap to get credit card numbers from TV geeks.Top_banner2

I’m stunned that the legal departments of Warner Brothers,
NBC/Universal, and Paramount Television haven’t caught on to these guys yet.
It’s not like DVDAvenue.tv is being discreet about their law-breaking.

Google and Yahoo take money from these bootleggers to make their listings show up at the top of any search for a TV show. And these search engines get paid for click-throughs to the bootlegging sites… doesn’t that mean they are profitting off an illegal activity? Don’t they screen their advertisers at all?

UPDATE 1-22-07:  I received this comment from one of my readers:

I too was ripped off by these
guys. I made a number of inquiries abou them. It turns out they are
already under investigation by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, this
because they are in fact located in Canada. I spoke with a Sgt.
Jean-Yves Ducharme, who told me that they have been conducting an
investigation since late 2006 and he would welcome any call from those
defrauded by these guys. Here is his contact info:

Sgt. Jean-Yves Ducharme
Royal Canadian Mounted Police – Federal Investigations Section
514-939-8307
jean-yves.ducharme@rcmp-grc.gc.ca

 

Show Him the Money

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Robert B. Parker tells Zap2it that he has no hesitations
about selling his books to TV. 

The good-humored, Massachusetts-based Parker claims
"how much?" was his only question when the screen deal was made for
his Stone books.

"Seriously, somebody once asked me, ‘Why do you sell your books to Hollywood?’ I answered,
‘For money! What other reason is there?’ That’s not just for the television rights, but the books sell better. My latest Jesse Stone novel (‘Sea Change’) started higher and lasted longer on the New York Times best-seller list than any other. And gee whiz, Tom Selleck has done several Stone movies in the past year or so. I wonder if there’s a connection." 

That said, Parker is mightily impressed with the TV versions of his Jesse Stone novels. So am I. I’ve enjoyed all three of them and am looking forward to more.

"Selling your book is like selling your house," he
reasons. "You can go by it a year later, and they’ve painted it an ugly
color, but it’s not your problem anymore. In this case, when I saw the first
movie (last year’s ‘Stone Cold’), I actually got tears in my eyes. It was the
first time I’d ever seen stuff that I wrote come to life like that on the
screen. I think Tom has so nailed the character, it’s almost
breathtaking."

TV News

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The trades are reporting that ABC has renewed BOSTON LEGAL
for a third season and yanked COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF from the airwaves for May
sweeps…and, most likely, for good. CinC went from the biggest hit of the new
season to one of its most disasterous flops in record time…at least Geena Davis
got a Golden Globe out of the deal before she was impeached.

TV Geeks Rejoice

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Jeriryan
The news that Jeri Ryan, who played the Busty Borg on STAR TREK VOYAGER, will be guest-starring on the two-hour season finale of BOSTON LEGAL is going to send Trekkies into a galatic tizzy. Why? Because the episode represents a cross-over rift in the casting time/space continuum between three different STAR TREK series. Jeri and her Borg boobs will be sharing the screen with William ShatnerDmtrek (STAR TREK) and Rene Auberjonois (a regular on DEEP SPACE NINE and a guest-star in one STAR TREK movie).

It’s just the kind of stunt-casting we were famous for on DIAGNOSIS MURDER. Obviously, someone on BOSTON LEGAL is a TV geek after my own heart. It was only a few months ago that they paired Shatner up with his TJ HOOKER co-star Heather Locklear. I kept waiting for James Darren to show up.

If BOSTON LEGAL comes back next season, I wouldn’t be surprised if Leonard Nimoy, Walter Koenig, George Takei, Joe Regalbuto, Faith Ford, and Grant Shaud appear in episodes…

Mourning THIEF

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THIEF hasn’t been canceled yet, but judging by the way star Andre Braugher and everyone involved with the show is already mourning its passing today in the LA Times, the ax will be falling soon.

As soon as he glimpsed the ratings for the second episode early last
month, "I entered the grieving process," Braugher said by phone last
week.

Despite huge promotion, only 2.5 million viewers showed up for the premiere — we’re talking STRONG MEDICINE numbers — and barely half of those viewers showed up for episode two.

What happened? Braugher and others close to the show have their own
speculations. (Was there not enough action? Were Nick’s problems with
Chinese mobsters adequately explained? Were viewers turned off by
Nick’s ambivalent morality?)

[…]"Essentially, [viewers] didn’t like it," Braugher theorized. "The
audience saw something on pilot night that let them know they didn’t
want to come back."

Count me among them. I’ve only seen two episodes — and although I’ve recorded the others, I haven’t had any desire to catch them yet. If I don’t hurry, my Tivo is going to eat them soon.

There’s no question that Braugher is a compelling performer, but the serialized storyline is so ridiculously over-the-top that everyone comes across as annoyingly intense cartoon characters.  But what probably hurt the show the most was its complete lack of humor. A few laughs, or simply a smile or two, would have helped humanize the characters and make some of the more ridiculous plot moves easier to accept. One of the things that makes THE SOPRANOS so appealing is that it’s both a violent drama and a laugh-out-loud comedy. The same is true of NIP/TUCK.

The bottom line was that THIEF just wasn’t any fun. The same could be said of Braugher. I admire his intensity but it gets tiring and monotonous after awhile.  At least on HOMICIDE his humorlessness was off-set by an ensemble cast of eccentric characters (the rest of the characters in THIEF either blend into the scenery or are totally unsympathetic).  Braugher’s character  wasn’t someone you wanted to invite into your home every week. Or even spend an hour with.

Tony Soprano and Dr. Christian Troy may be sociopaths, but at least they are entertaining ones.

The Jareo Hits the Fan

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The Lori Jareo flap has begun drawing the attention of the mainstream print media after raging in the blogosphere for the last week. As the Dayton Beach News reported:

After it was pointed out by writer Lee Goldberg and spread around by a
growing network of bloggers it became very obvious that Ms. Jareo’s
circle of friends, family, and acquaintances was about to include the
entire LucasArts legal team. Reading the assorted posts this weekend
was like standing amongst a crowd of people watching a swimmer
cheerfully strap on raw meat before diving into the shark tank.

The newspaper notes that her biggest critics were fanfiction writers themselves, who worried about the implications for them of her stupidity.

When you know that what you
are doing is, at best, tolerated by creators you respect who can make
you stop at any time, you get very annoyed when someone walks up and
slaps them. All it would take is for enough authors to start yelling:
"That’s it, everyone out of the pool," and the online world of fan
fiction would fade away.

The more likely result, as Publisher’s Weekly notes, will be more intense scrutiny of POD titles by online booksellers. So far, only one person has come out publicly in support of Jareo, NPR commentator Lev Grossman, who dubbed her an "unsung hero" of the wired universe.  Jareo has remained silent.

Mr. Monk and the Nice Reviews

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My week is off to a great start with two nice reviews for MR. MONK GOES TO THE FIREHOUSE.  The current issue of MYSTERY SCENE notes:

The first in a new series is always an occasion to celebrate, but Lee Goldberg’s TV adaptations double your pleasure. No longer restricted by time, budget and pace of TV production, this terrific TV writer’s latest, MR. MONK GOES TO THE FIREHOUSE brings everyone’s favorite OCD detective to print. Hooray!

And Cynthia Lea Clarke at FUTURES MYSTERY MAGAZINE says, in part:

If you are a fan of the television show MONK, you’ll love this book. If you never had the pleasure of watching a MONK episode, then you should read this book… (Goldberg’s) words are witty, charming and so Monk. Superb! It’s a fast, easy, delightful escape. An excellent read!

My thanks to both Mystery Scene and Futures for their flattering comments.

Book Fest Day 2

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P4300086_1
The day started with Bagels and Goldbergs at the Borders booth, where I signed with my sisters Linda Woods and Karen Dinino.
P4300087_1Steve Cannell stopped by to pick up a copy of THE MAN WITH THE IRON-ON BADGE, which was pretty cool, since the book couldn’t have been written without him (like me, the hero learns everything he knows about being a PI from watching shows like THE ROCKFORD FILES). I  chatted again with a lot of the folks I mentioned yesterday, as well as Harlan Coben, Gayle Lynds, Kelly Lange, Rochelle Krich, Thomas Perry, Paul Levine, Harley Jane Kozak, Jeff Mariotte, and Bill Fitzhugh, among others. I also caught some more panels, including Carl Reiner’s talk and my brother Tod in conversation with Sarah Vowell (a very funny woman who is not the warmest person you will ever meet) and David Rackoff (as lively, personable and funny off-stage as he is on) in front of a packed Royce Hall auditorium.  It was another great Book Fest and I’m already looking forward to the one next year…

UPDATE 5-1-06: My Brother Tod has a more detailed, and much funnier, wrap-up of the weekend’s events on his eponymous blog.  Reading his post reminds me of a strange bathroom encounter I had (Tod’s big moments all seemed to happen while he was in the can). I walked into the bathroom at "The Green Room" and saw a guy standing in front of a urinal pissing free-style while thumb-typing a message on his blackberry. At the same time, I heard another guy taking calls on his cell while having an extreme bowel episode. I like to think this was a wacky LA moment…but I fear this scene could have happened anywhere. I also had someone say to me at the my Borders signing that his favorite books of mine were "the ones where something happens."

UPDATE 5-1-06b: My sisters Linda and Karen report on the Fest and the super secret buffet for brilliant authors…my Uncle Burl Barer stargazes outside the Borders tent…and my cousin Danny Barer discovers what he’s been missing.

Learning Howdunit

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The Rutland Herald has an article today (from the Columbia News Service wire) about how mystery writers use consultants and, as an example, talks about how Dr. Doug Lyle and I work together. But if you’re a DIAGNOSIS MURDER fan, and haven’t read THE SILENT PARTNER yet, skip the article — there are major spoilers in it.

"I know absolutely nothing about medicine," Goldberg said. "But I do
know how to write a mystery. I craft situations where I need a medical
clue, then I call Doug. I simply couldn’t write these without him."

Lyle
is part of a select group of plot consultants who help mystery writers
bump off characters with scientific exactitude. He shows writers how to
poison people properly, open up a skull correctly for an autopsy and
talk like a homicide detective to make the character believable.

The article also appeared in The Toronto Star and the Indianapolis Star, among many other newspapers.