"...There are no file-sharing Web sites that could be subject to digital piracy lawsuits like the ones facing Napster. But the geek underground is trading versions of nearly any movie you can name online, thanks to widely available compression and playback formats.

Piracy is about money, power and politics, according to Moore. Consumers are mad as hell, and they aren't going to take it any more. "Piracy is the tool that allows consumers to drive down prices," Moore said. "They're realizing they have no power to punish companies for unfair pricing, price fixing, limited distribution for DVDs."

"I don't see how pricing and piracy can be put in the same sentence. Piracy is theft, pure and simple," said Emily Kutner, an anti-piracy spokeswoman for the Motion Picture Association of America. "The motion picture industry employs hundreds of thousands of people -- everyone from employees who work in the offices, grips, gaffers, catering crews," Kutner added. "If anybody would stop to think of the number of people who need to be paid for an honest day's work, they might not question pricing."

Online movie pirates better be prepared to get smacked way, way down, according to Kutner of the MPAA. "Put it this way, you never know who you're talking online," she said. Movie investigators are watching, and the government is getting involved, too..." NULL