TAKING AIM AT FILM THIEVES BIG DAMAGE AWARDS TO BE SOUGHT.

Byline: Greg Hernandez Staff Writer

Warning that film piracy represents the greatest economic threat to the movie industry in its 100 year-plus history, the Motion Picture Association of America announced Thursday that it plans to begin suing people for allegedly trading illegal digital copies of movies over the Internet.

New MPAA President and CEO Dan Glickman used the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television as a setting to warn illegal movie swappers in a move similar to the recording industry, which began suing people earlier this year for sharing songs through peer-to-peer networks.

``We'd rather pull people into theaters than drag them into court,'' said Glickman, who has been on the job for just two months.

``We believe if we don't act now, the consequences will be devastating for the film industry.''

Glickman said the MPAA would begin filing the lawsuits later this month ``to prevent the wholesale looting of movies'' and estimates that piracy is currently taking a annual bite of about $3.5 billion out of the movie industry revenues.

The MPAA released statistics Thursday stating that the number of infringing movie titles traded daily in the U.S. through peer-to-peer services ranges from 115,571 to 148,591 and that the time it takes to download is quickly decreasing.

For example: On the service FastTrack, which averages 2.54 million users a day, the average movie takes 12-18 hours to download. But this drops to 3-6 hours on some of the newer services and, according to the MPAA, emerging technology has demonstrated the ability to drop that down to 6 seconds.

Glickman said that the improving technology has made copyright issues ``fuzzier in people's minds,'' which is why the movie industry has been working hard to educate people, particularly students from elementary school to college, that it is illegal to steal movies off the Internet.

Glickman pointed out that it currently costs the major studios an average of $143 million to make and market a movie worldwide and that six out of 10 of those films fail to recoup that investment.

Simon Barskey, the MPAA's executive vice president and general counsel, said offenders could be subject to statutory damages of between $30,000 and $150,000 per film. He said the suits would initially be filed against John Does, then subpoenas issued to Internet Service Providers to get the name of the users so the MPAA can proceed with litigation.

``We are going after the file swappers, that's the target of this litigation effort,'' said Barskey, who added that the lawsuits are meant to promote the message that there are real and expensive consequences violators can face.

The MPAA will unveil a new ad campaign in two weeks that will include the screen names of file swappers as part of a movie poster that includes the following message: ``If you think you can get away with illegally trafficking in movies, think again. Lawsuits begin this week.''

Glickman was joined at the press conference by representatives from several of the entertainment industry's major unions who stand united in battling piracy since the income of many of their members is impacted.

``Movie piracy draws real money away ... and the end result is a bite in my paycheck and in every actors' paycheck,'' said actress Anne-Marie Johnson, representing the Screen Actors Guild. ``The majority of us are one paycheck away from losing our health (benefits) and pension.''

Director Gil Cates, speaking on behalf of the Directors Guild of America, said: ``This is stealing, plain and simple. This is a basic question of what is fair and right. We wish everything was for free and that nobody had to pay anyone. But that is not the world in which films can be made.''

California Film Commission Director Amy Lemisch, representing Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, read comments from the actor-turned-governor supporting the MPAA's plans.

``Over 500,000 people are employed by the entertainment industry in California and it contributes over $30 billion annually to our economy,'' Schwarzenegger's statement read. ``We cannot let illegal movie piracy continue or it will cripple this important industry and seriously hurt California's economy. We must each our children that the illegal downloading of movies and music is wrong and that it has consequences.''

Greg Hernandez, [phone]

greg.hernandez(at)dailynews.com