I truly enjoy reading articles like this one, wherein we are reminded that just five years ago, movie executives weren’t blaming the creators, producers, actors, or even the green-lighter of such “gems” as Gigli for the colossal flops they were in the movie theaters.

Why did a movie like Gigli flop, you ask? At least, according to the movie executives? Unbelievably, they blamed text messaging and cell phones. They blamed people who watched these movies on opening night, and texted their friends (or e-mailed them, or called them, etc.) either after the movie, or sometimes during it, that it wasn’t worth the time or money to go see.

These greedy assholes were actually angry at their first customers for telling the rest of the potential customers that the product sucked. They were upset that their clever advertising campaigns fell flat (i.e., they knew they were lying about these movies’ quality in the ads, but hoped enough people would see the movies in the first weekend so they’d make their money back) because paying customers had the nerve to tell other people (quickly) that they wish they hadn’t spent that money.

Fast-forward five years and we’re looking at the same mentality causing different abuses: the industry now sues its own customers (the RIAA and MPAA would much rather sue grandmothers and kids for pirating a movie than try to go after the big pirates, who actually duplicate DVDs, complete with inserts, labels, and cases, and actually cost the industry much more in lost revenue), blames its customers for its failings, and gets a little bit closer every day to the situation once depicted in a Mr. Show (with Bob & David) episode.

In the chain of skits in that episode involving this “plot,” a movie studio green-lights a mind-numbingly stupid idea after a tiny amount of research seemingly indicates the movie will be a success, even when common sense says it wouldn’t be. Thus, “Coupon, The Movie” was born. Yes, it really was a movie about a woman clipping and using a fucking coupon. When the movie flops, the executives all meet to figure out who to blame for the poor showing. None of the executives wants to be blamed (and fired), so ultimately they conclude: it’s the public’s fault for not liking the movie. They sue, successfully, and win a judgment that every person in America must watch the movie once (and pay for the “privilege”). Soon we’re seeing advertisements for the movie, complete with textual blurbs of “reviews” of the movie. One difference — instead of things like “An amazing movie! — Zack Smeghead, Generic News Herald”, the text blurbs read “A mandatory experience — Judge A. Hole”

It occurs to me that since the dawn of humanity, there have been people so skilled at producing useless shit that they actually convince themselves they’re doing a good thing. Despite decades of evidence demonstrating movie studios produce much more crap than winners, the studios continue to blame everyone but themselves for the dreck they produce. It’s the same with the record labels, too — nevermind that they produce really bad music that no one wants to buy because it sucks, it must really be the consumer’s fault for pirating that crap instead of buying it.

I’ll swear this to you, and to any judge who ever asks me: I have never pirated a Spice Girls album or song. Their music sucked ass. It was relatively nice to see them bounce their boobies and butts around, and it was a guilty pleasure to sneak a peek at the pictures when a couple of the skanks stripped out of their clothes and actually showed off the boobies a little, but that has nothing to do with the “quality” of their music. It had no quality. It was cookie-cutter, boring, and plain. Yet, in recent interviews with the RIAA, the record labels have gone on the record (heh) to say that their latest shitty albums aren’t selling because people are pirating them instead of buying them.

“They want this worthless crap, but they don’t want to pay for it. It’s not fair!” Meanwhile, they miss the boat. The whole thing. By a huge margin. I’m downloading completely legal, independently-produced music. I don’t pirate any music — I just download the stuff I like (that’s free and legal to download). I don’t want the crap being produced by the major labels, and that means I’m not going to waste my efforts trying to steal something I wouldn’t enjoy even if you paid me.

It makes me wonder if I have to make assurances to the clerks at Wal-Mart when I walk through the electronics section. They always eye me suspiciously, as if they’re just waiting for me to try to steal something. I really want to tell one of them: “I wouldn’t pay for any of this shit. But don’t worry — that doesn’t mean I want to steal any of it.”

It doesn’t really matter anymore, does it? The industry has hurt itself so badly in the public eye that it probably won’t survive. Music and movies will still live on, but finally, there won’t be any damned middlemen to inflate prices and ruin artists’ lives anymore.