Please don't think I'd ever illegally take a movie, television series, or music off the net. (especially if you're part of the entertainment industry) But I was thinking today about how the torrent downloads were changing our way of life.
In the western world we are often shaped, not only by our friends and family, but by the entertainment we are subjected to. I can not tell the kind of mental anguish I was forced to endure every Christmas as my family sat down to watch Scrooge, the musical. But it wasn't only the Christmas season that brought on old movies and strange traditions. My mother regularly encouraged us to watch things like, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. As crazy as it may seem, I began to enjoy the old movies. They showed a light into the past, where values were different. Watching a movie made in the 1950s is almost like watching a foreign film. So much of the language, culture and style are so unique!
With the torrent craze, it almost ensures that young people never learn anything about the old culture. They may hear stories but they will not have the personal contact that movies allow. While I appreciate the concept of the torrent, I just wish that there was a place to download all the great classics and few of the great independent films!
3 comments:
I never liked torrents. It was like "we will give you this file, but first we will break it up into a million pieces and give each piece to a million other people and you have to get it off them". I mostly annoyed at it because it is what Blizzard uses to distribute the WoW patches and it is always fudging slow.
As to young people never learning about old movie culture, torrents are not the blame for that. It is Holywood's fault for making movies that appeal more to Generation Y than the old ones. You could also blame the producers of DVD's, because if an old movie isn't put onto DVD then it is highly unlikley to be avaliable on the 'net.
i suppose you have a point. As long as popularity is defined in the 'here' and 'now' we will continue to loose touch with our past.
I would also argue that torrents have actually increased our ability to see older movies... I've seen many classics available for download (though I would never download them myself, of course).
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