Unable to skip anti-piracy adverts on DVD

I wrote to the anti piracy lot FACT on just this subject a number of weeks ago. It really annoys me for the same reason as you suggest: I bought the DVD so I don't need the lecture (which, by the way, is noisy, in your face and VERY annoying) and those who use pirate products, probably have the message stripped out anyway.

I agree, I think it is time for the Record and Film companies to reduce the prices of CDs and DVDs to a more rasonable price, then Piracy would be less of an issue. Although I am not saying it will dispense with it completely, because there will always be people who want something foe nothing, but I do believe that if the prices were reduced most reasonably minded people would not download pirated material.
DRM on discs and Software is just another excuse for the invasion of individual privecy, I think that once you have bought the material, it should be up to the purchaser how it is used. After all, it is our money that the Record, Film, and Software producers rely on to pay for their mansions and jet set lifestyles. So it is time for them to STOP treating their customers like sheep or cash cows.
Following the debarcle with Sony and the implanted spyware in it's DVDs, I have stopped buying Sony products altogether, and suggest that more pepole did the same thing. In my view it is the only way to hit back at the big companies who are trying to dominate our lives as well as the marketplace.

Get used to it people. It's about to get worse!
DRM - or Digital Rights Management is happening and it's on the increase.
Just this week Virgin have announced that they are planning to hit people who use their internet connection for file sharing and I suspect that soon other major ISP's will follow suit, all with the intention of stopping you from copying or sharing your music or videos.
Personally I think that 'most' people are happy to pay for art but within reason.
Why the big companies don't realise this and rather than bleating about how much money they lose to piracy, why don't they create a structure so that people can buy it or download it for a fair price?
Why would someone download a compressed dodgy version of Pirates of the Carribean from some torrent which could easily contain a virus (or worse) if they could buy it or download it for a couple of quid?

quite often if you press "previous" or "fast rewind" it`ll go to the menu

Monty & Smiffynotts, a good gripe and one that I thoroughly endorse. Though I don't agree that a piracy message at the beginning of any DVD is acceptable, especially one that assumes that I AM about to commit piracy. I just bought the damn thing!

As you say, where the publishers' philosophy falls over is the assumption that the piracy message will be included in a subsequent copy. Of course it won't! It's the first thing to be stripped out of the DVD when it is pirated, along with all the trailer nonsense. So we're left with a situation where the only people that get it in the neck are the honest purchasers. You and I.

Now, until recently I put up with this rubbish, but my patience has finally expired. So, armed as I am with AnyDVD and CloneDVD, I rip my purchase into a format that should have been sold to me in the first place. Do I lend this new and improved copy to a family member, or a close friend? Well actually, no, I don't. Instead I let them watch the original that I bought and leave it up to them to decide whether it's worth purchasing.

(more below)

Unsurprisingly, seven times out of ten they won't buy an original because, despite raving over the feature content, they can't stand the piracy message or the trailers! However, if I lend them an original that was produced by Paramount, and they really enjoy the film, they usually place an order for their own copy soon after. You see, Paramount shows how it should be done; no slap in the face, no trailers - just a nice film to watch!

So, what to do? Avoid Sony, Warner or Fox? Buy Paramount only? Of course not. Buy your film, rip it to bits with software mentioned in this and previous posts, burn to DVD, enjoy! OK, so it adds a needless expense in the form of blank media and, more importantly, your time. But until stupid publishers get wise and stop penalising the innocents it's the only way.

Where is all this going? It's hard to say, but the war will continue between publishers and DVD rippers until the publishers finally get sensible. Personally I find piracy messages indefensible and trailers to be intrusive. I put up with enough advertising on the TV, thanks! I also firmly believe that all the garbage included at the start of a DVD does nothing but encourage the practice of piracy. Indeed, I walk a fine line myself in deciding whether to perform the act just so my family and close friends don't have to endure the torture! Who knows, maybe if we share films and I do all the rip and burn......

Sadly, I fear that things will only degenerate further now that Sony & Co have won the HD war with Blu-Ray. Will they wake up and do some decent market research? I doubt it. They're too arrogant to understand what drives people to copy DVD's in the first place and would rather continue in shoving their philosophy down our throats. However, don't despair. Be content in the knowledge that there will always be someone who will crack whatever they invent, simply because they can't stand this insulting behavior either!

This gripe prompted me to finally investigate properly how to get a unrestricted player working on a PC. Happy to report, in the free Knoppix 5.1, you can play a movie DVD and fast-forward or skip, anytime. Bye-bye, obnoxious copyright nag. So long, tedious swirly studio logo. I'll miss you, moronic menu thingy. Oh, the joy. You need two drives - one CD drive for Knoppix, one DVD drive for the movie disc.

Download here: http://www.knoppix.net/
Instructions here: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Knowing_Knoppix/Multimedia

Thanks for the tip Bluebeard, I will try it and let you know how I get on later. Happy Copying :-)

Yeess! I hate it when I press the Fast Forward button and a little "No" symbol appears on the screen, a circle with a line through it. What?! How dare a mere machine refuse me!

e should asking ourselves why do we pirate DVDs and the like. Why do we have to? The actual copying costs for a DVD cannot be more than a £1. So why are they selling DVDs for £15.99 or more? Answer Greed, pure and sheer capitalist greed.

The copyright laws give the owners of a copyright far too long a right over their work. Copyright should in all propriety last no more than 15 years like a patent. We should not have to wait till they die and 50 more years, or for 70 years after publication, and such like rules.

And why are we paying £8.98 for a DVD of Brief Encounter, a film made 50 years before DVDs were invented?

There should be a national database where we can download all books, magazines, films, pictures, whatever for free 20 years after their issue or publication. It will come.

We are all grossly overpaying at the present.

Ok Mr Titewad, try DVD43 instead
http://www.dvd43.com/
DVD43 is a free DVD decryption utility that runs in the background and decrypts DVDs.
or go to
http://www.dvddecrypter.org.uk/
I just downloaded SetupDVDDecrypter_3.5.4.0

Bluebeard, "DVD decrypter" is no longer available form their Website, because they were either bought out, of forced to close down by the Hollywood studios'.
"DVD De-Crypter" was a great DVD ripper programme, which when used in conjunction with "DVD Shrink" could copy and fit movies ont any normal DVD; use them both to Backup DVD collections to safeguard a movie collection.
By ripping and re-authoring DVDs with these two progs, it is possible to cut out the annoying stuff on DVDs.
"DVD Shrink" is still available as a free download fron cnet.co/downloads but "DVD decrypter" is not