Region 0: Why not?

[edonline]

Does anyone know the reason why DVDs can't or aren't released more on Region 0 for ALL parts of the world? I'm sure there are financial reasons, but beyond that does anyone see a time in the near future when there might be a one "regional" format?

[[SD] Bob Plisskin]

There's talk of mebbe the whole idea of regions being illegal due to some free trade agreement or something (there's a court case on at the moment, i think, to deal with Playstaton games). But there are other reasons for the seperate regions, not least of which is the different frame rates of tvs in different countries. while Americans use the NTSC system (50hz i think) and the UK uses PAL (60hz i think) and some people use SECAM. This means if you buy a dvd specifically made for your region you can be sure there'll be no compatability problems with the rest of your setup. One of the other reasons aswell is that the release dates of films to cinemas is not global therefore meaning it may be possible to watch a film on dvd before it was released in cinemas if there was no region encoding. However, stupidly, everybody who cares about such things as getting to see the film earlier just gets a multiregion hackable player. Only the people who don't know enough to care about seeing a film earlier are stuck in their region.

thats my thoughts anywho.

<OB>

[herculeez]

I'm not sure if its because certain countries have certain versions of the movies. I.E some are stricter with what they censor than others, and if everyone watches exactly the same movie world wide then some countries might be outraged by the lack of censorship etc.
Screwed up world http://www.joblo.com/ubb/smile.gif

[stefanb]

Not to sound like a flaming racist, but blame the Chinese. Intellectual property infringement is a MASSIVE problem in Asian countries. This problem isn’t just movies, but also music, video games, software, etc. If you search the Internet for Star Wars DVDs, you’ll find they’re not hard to come by. Chinese video pirates have lifted the movie from the laser disc release and used it to write out Region 0 DVD’s that they can peddle to North American buyers.

Need more proof? Sony started selling the PS2 some time ago and Microsoft just started selling the XBOX. Neither of them are sold in China. Why? Because, just like the printer industry, and the razor cartridge industry, the video console industry LOSES money on the game console itself. Microsoft loses about $200 for every XBOX they sell. They make that money back by the HUGE mark-up on the video game sales and rentals. In china (and other Asian countries like Singapore), the piracy exceeds 90% in some areas of the market. That is to say, there are 9 illegal copies of “X” being sold for every legal copy of “X” being sold. Ouch. Microsoft isn’t going to willingly lose $200 on a console just so they can loose even more on games being pirated.

ENTER... the “REGION”

DVD regions were thought up as a way to break the world into distinct, unchangeable “zones”. This way, products released in North America are for ONLY North America, and products released in China will only be for China. Likewise in Europe, Australia, etc, etc... A product that’s pirated in China is less likely to be leaked into the North American market. In the same respect, a product made for North America won't be widely pirated in Asia becase of this.

If you want a DVD player to play movies for ANY zone, I suggest buying a Sony PS2 and getting a “mod chip” installed. No matter where you live, someone will offer mod chip installations… check your newspapers classified ad section.

[This message has been edited by stefanb (edited 12-16-2001).]

[stefanb]

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[This message has been edited by stefanb (edited 12-16-2001).]

[Kamikaze Street Vendor]

That is weird, I have a shitload of Hong Kong DVD's (96 and up) and they all work perfectly on my PSX2 and DVD player, plus you can play VCD's on certain DVD players aswell.

Plus they ain't bootlegs at all. I doubt the Triads would try North America yet. Well, they prolly already have.... http://www.joblo.com/ubb/frown.gif

[stefanb]

There are some Region "0" movies and games that made legally that way (some). It's really up to the company that's producing the product. Some don't bother with a region. Also, I know there are at least a couple players made that with ignore region info. Your case most likely falls under one of those. The most obvious non-region-specific hardware is a PS2 with a mod chip installed.

VCD's (and games stored on CD's) aren't region encoded, so it's no shock that a VCD will play for you. As long as your player can play VCDs, then it's just like a CD... (actually, it is a CD). CD's have no region encoding, and that's all a VCD really is anyway, so...

[edonline]

So, would you actually be better off buying a VCD version of film rather than the DVD, or is there some significant difference between the two?

[Kamikaze Street Vendor]

IMO VCD's are horrible, I just wanted a couple just to see what they are like. They are ok, they are so popular since they are so fucking cheap. Video and audio can be good. Sometimes poor subtitles, and yes. You gotta flip the disc after 70 minutes. It sucks, but atleast it makes you get off your ass :-p. You can get SOME extras with VCD's like a few trailers at the beginning of the movie, and that's it.

Plus you can get specials, I got Gen-Y Cops for 15 bucks and it came with a video game, the movie and a CD soundtrack http://www.joblo.com/ubb/smile.gif. God, I love Chinatown.

But I like DVD's more, since you can put more shit on it. The only bad thing is when you are watching the "making of" documentary, it's usually just in Cantonese...with Mandarin subtitles, no english ones at all.

So I like DVD's more. I just got those VCD's since I just wanted to know what they are like. They ain't bootlegs at all aswell. Which is sweet http://www.joblo.com/ubb/smile.gif

plus the other good thing about VCD's is that they come out one month after the movie, so you don't have to wait that long.(unless you wanna buy a cheap bootleg one with horrible shiet.) that's one of the only pros of VCD's, other then that. Stay away from them, unless you wanna add something interesting to your movie collection http://www.joblo.com/ubb/wink.gif

[stefanb]

at BEST, one could say VCD is the same as VHS quality. At WORST, you could say a VHS tape is better (clearer) on a good VCR with a decent quality tape than a VCD is. The problem with VHS is that the tapes wear out over time and get eaten by the machine n' all that kinda shit, whereas VCD's never wear out. It'll keep it's half-ass quality for 1000's of viewings. I only ever owned one VCD, and I wasn't impressed at all so I sold it on eBay. It was Star Wars: Ep1 before Lucas announced the DVD release, but as I said, it wasn't worth keeping. I'd take a VHS copy before I kept that thing.