Talk:DVD region code

message: In addition to the legal issues, which are very interesting, there should be a section on general criticism. Many criticisms have been voiced on this talk page without taking this appropriate step. The section could definitely be better developed, so I invite editors to contribute to it.94.222.208.225 (talk) 18:18, 30 December 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Yabut, you're duplicating information already found in the article.  The ACCC paragraph is fine.  Your ref simply makes it better (now with four, instead of three, Australian refs).  The "Legal concerns" section could legitimately be retitled "Criticism", however section titles should not be changed for "light and transient reasons" as they are linked to off Wikipedia.  My point is:  These are all about the same organization that has the concern:  ACCC.  These references should all be kept together in the article, for the reader to understand that this one org has four separate cited concerns.  —Aladdin Sane (talk) 18:56, 30 December 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for your feedback. The information was not redundant, because that section is still limited to "legal concerns," a very specific criticism. Many voices on this talk page have voiced other criticisms, yet there is no space to include them. I am not aware of any guideline where sources should be confined to one section. Yes, let's find additional sources- shouldn't be too hard. The problem is the section now is so narrowly focused as to discourage developing it. I agree, let's either retitle the section or have a new one, but the old version does not make sense. Either solution is better than just reverting.94.222.212.140 (talk) 03:28, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

text: Ok, I found some additional sources (Washington Post article, etc.) and expanded the section into a "Criticism and Legal Concerns" section. I hope this solution finds consensus. Also the discussion of legal concerns includes the situation in Australia, New Zealand and the European Union - all with refs.94.222.212.140 (talk) 04:38, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: For the record:  I agree with 94.222.xxx.xxx's concerns about "the legal concerns" section, and I agree it should be widened (with sources).  The current changes I agree with, as they contain cited sources.  I am not against adding info, I am only against redundancy for the reader of the article.  Now that the section is expanded to "Criticism and Legal Concerns" I say, "Have at it", just give me a source.  —Aladdin Sane (talk) 17:01, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Added "Criticism" section 

message: In the article it says "On Feb. 7, 2001, NASA sent two multiregion DVD players to the International Space Station.[26]" While true it's neither informative, illustrative or actually all that interesting. Unlike the former sentence "In March 2009, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown received a "wrong region" message on a screen when attempting to watch a DVD set of classic American movies received as a diplomatic gift from US President Barack Obama.[25]" which clearly illustrates a criticism. Why is the NASA sentence there? RamdomWolf 198.96.34.35 (talk) 18:49, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Delete this sentence?

message: The map shows it as region 2 (probably due to being French), while the article implies (being part of Oceania) that it's region 4.
Also for Blu-ray regions, New Caledonia is indicated as A in the map, shouldn't it be B?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.21.26.119 (talk) 11:19, 23 April 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  New Caledonia? 

message: Hello,
Had to make several changes in the article, because of almost 10 errors spotted. 
First of all it's not true that a country or territory can be in two regions at the same time. (In the same way that for example the state of Maine cannot belong to both USA and Canada at the same).
Also it's not true that european DVDs has been further coded for the countries they are intended used, making them impossible to play outside these countries. These codes are just internal codes used by Warner, and any DVD bought in UK will play OK in Norway, and vice versa no matter what D or Z lettering that are printed on the cover.
The only extra coding possible in addition to the regions, are the RCE system used on a few USA, Can and Jap discs to create problems for people buying discs outside their region.
It is staten that R0 disc are common in China and Phillipines. As far as I know they're common in all DVD producing countries of the world. At least 40% of my very international DVD collection is Region 0. All countries are richly represented. 
The main thing causing confusing is the territories of USA, UK, Fra and Hol laying thousands of km away from the mainland in a different region. (All of them islands, except French Guyana). US territories are counted into R1, and french territories are counted as R2 'cos they're ruled from Paris with very limited independence. But what about UK and Hol territories? Some are goverened tighly from London and Amsterdam, while others, especially those laying in the Caribbean are almost ruling themselves as own countries. Not even bothering using their "motherland's" currency.
Also there are no such thing as SECAM DVDs. All SECAM countries (except Cuba) changed to PAL, when DVD was introduced. (SECAM was a video system made in France 1965). There is just two systems on DVD: NTSC and PAL.
 
Best regards
Stein S., Oslo, Norway
P.S.  I come back and make further changes, when I have time.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.209.93.233 (talk) 15:05, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Please discuss your changes first; the material you have (repeatedly) added introduces numerous errors into the article. There are some spelling errors, you have added uncited opinions, and there is no real need to change the country names in the way that you have. --Ckatzchatspy 23:46, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

text: It is not correct to say that countries that used SECAM changed to PAL with the introduction of DVD.  DVDs are neither SECAM nor PAL as both terms refer to two different methods of adding colour information to an analogue television signal.  The term 'PAL' is usually incorrectly used on DVD packaging to signify a 720x576 pixel format picture (equivalent to the analogue 625 line system).  Note that the same argument is not quite so true of the term 'NTSC' which also refers to the 525 line television system as well as the colour system frequently employed with it, but not to any digital format including DVD.  Although DVDs sold in France (for example) are marked as being in 'PAL' format, France's analogue television broadcasts nevertheless remain in SECAM. 86.184.24.140 (talk) 17:38, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Made changes because of numerues errors 

message: Hello,
 
Instead of looking at all these listings written off each other all over the internet. I went straight to the source itself, Hollywood. (They must know since they invented the system). Out of my ca. 90 DVDs bought from USA Hollywood companies, 23 is genuine R1 discs (found it out on my PC drive). And by reading on the backcover of these DVDs all of them "are inteded for use in USA, Canada and US territories". Not even 1 out of 23 mentions "Bermuda". That must count as some sort of proof. 
By the way, why would they bother to take Bermuda in? It just don't make sense. It's a british colony getting the supplies from the "motherland".
Also, all regions maps on the internet shows not only Russia, Belarus and Ukraine as in Region 5. But in fact the entire Former Soviet Union. Meaning that also Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania (the Baltic states) and Moldova are included too.
There's no such thing as SECAM DVDs. To prove this I suggest you go to Ebay, and search for russian or french DVDs. And no matter how many backcovers you maginfy it will always say PAL. (All countries that used SECAM videos (except Cuba), changed to PAL with the introduction of DVD). 
Lastly Hong Kong does NOT use both R3 and R6. I've got ca. 60 HK DVDs at home and when examing them on my PC drive, ca. 40 has R3 and NON have R6 or R3+R6.
The article has a number of issues, that has to be sorted out. 
Best regards
Stein S., Oslo  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.209.93.233 (talk) 00:30, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bermuda is NOT in Region 1 etc. 

message: This article has no clear explanation on how this sistem was born, or about who created it.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.12.84.169 (talk) 21:30, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: The very first paragraph has the why and certainly implies the who. 86.184.24.140 (talk) 16:38, 16 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  history 

message: Do music CDs have region codes?
--Fladoodle (talk) 02:19, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: No. Alphathon /'æɫfə.θɒn/ (talk) 16:09, 4 July 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Do music CDs have region codes? 

message: I noticed that the regions are different between DVDs and blu-rays. Can blu-ray-players play DVDs from all regions? --Oddeivind (talk) 18:40, 19 July 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Generally, no - they have both a Blu-ray region and a DVD region. For example, a UK PS3 will only play region 2/region free DVDs and region B/region free/all region Blu-rays. Of course, like with standard DVD players there are region-free players available (although I don't know how prevalent they are). Alphathon /'æɫfə.θɒn/ (talk) 19:36, 19 July 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Playing DVDs in blu-ray-players?  

message: At this time, the article provides two stated purposes for DVD region coding.
:One purpose of region coding is controlling release dates. 
While the coding does protect cinemas/box office sales with new releases, the coding restriction applies way beyond what is needed for this purpose. This purpose clearly does not apply to old movies that were released long ago. The purpose would also become moot as time passed. It is unlikely that two years or five years after the release of a film in either the European or the American market the film will receive a large theatrical release in the other region. 
:Finally, the copyright in a title may be held by different entities in different territories. Region coding enables copyright holders to (attempt to) prevent a DVD from a region from which they do not derive royalties from being played on a DVD player inside their region. Region coding attempts to dissuade importing of DVDs from one region into another.
While region coding may generally provide some protection to copyright holders it doesn't do this very well. In legal terms, the restriction is not closely tailored to its purpose. For example, there is only one region code for all of Latin America, yet the countries all have their own copyright laws. Residents in one Latin American country would be able to view a code 4 film even if the copyright holder receives no royalties from DVDs sold in that nation. Many Latin American countries share common borders and trade among the nations is widespread, so that DVDs sold in a country that provides no royalties can be easily distributed to other countries.
Region 2 at once presents examples that tailor regional DVD protection to royalty protection and to examples where it absolutely doesn't. The former is the case for those countries in the European union. It is a big geographic area, with many countries that provide the same protection to copyright holder. However, not all European states are members of the European Union, particularly the states in Eastern Europe. However, Western China, Japan, South Africa, Egypt, Swaziland, Lesotho and Greenland are all part of this region. This clearly presents a situation where the holder of a copyright from one country is not protected from having that film viewed in a country that does not provide royalties.
I'm pretty sure I'm not the first person to point this out, and sources citing these criticisms should be abundant. Yet these are not mentioned either in this section or the criticism section.
Finally, the major downside to region coding and the reason why some countries are trying to limit region-coding is not the inconvenience of travelers. The major criticism of regional coding is that it is an anti-competitive practice. Regional coding inhibits price competition for both DVD players and DVDs themselves. This is also a detriment to those who view globalization as a positive goal. The criticism section makes it seem as if the harms of region coding are just the laws of couple of countries on competition and the inconvenience to travelers and ignores the elephant in the room - that the codes enable anti-competitive and anti-consumer practices generally. Ileanadu (talk) 20:33, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Logical limitations to the stated purposes for the region codes. 

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message: In the "Regional codes and countries" section, Region 0 is "Any region/region-free", while Region ALL has all 1-8 flags set, allowing
the disc to be played in any location, on any player. What, then, is the practical difference between Region 0 and Region ALL? 108.20.174.117 (talk) 19:11, 13 May 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: If a hypothetical region 9 was to be created in the future (let's say for Antarctic research labs), Region 0 would work in it, while Region 1-8 would not. But otherwise there's no practical difference. 92.40.29.22 (talk) 16:29, 26 July 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Regional codes and countries -> Practical difference between 0 and ALL?