Warner Home Video will close its branches in the Czech Republic and Slovakia in October and partner with Magic Box for licensing and distributing its slate of new releases and library titles. WHV is leaving the country because the film distribution market in Eastern Europe is saturated and piracy of video content is growing, the company said.
“The DVD market has matured, reaching saturation in many territories,” Philippe Cardon, general manager for WHV in Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa. The decision to phase out WHV’s offices in these two countries is part of an overall international restructuring, he said.
According to unofficial data provided by industry sources, the company’s market share was about 18 percent.
But there’s little incentive for distributors such as WHV to stay here because the market is simply too small to justify the cost of dubbing films, said Michal Krejci, business director of Bontonfilm, another home video distributor. “Dubbing into Czech costs as much as into French, but the market is several times smaller,” he said.
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I have visted the the Czech and Slovak Republics many times and my children speak Slovak as their mother tongue.
I have found very few DVDs or videos made in Slovak or dubbed into Slovak. So few in fact that me and my wife bought every title that was suitable for children that we found.
Also P2P is even worse.
Despite using Bit Torrent WinMX open nap and other networks I have yet to find any TV or Movie made in or dubbed into Slovak.
So I think WHV man speaks with “forked tongue”.
The issue is not dubbed content it is ENGLISH language content that is DUMPED in eastern europe killing their indiginous movie and TV industry.
Take it from me the piracy of Slovak and Czech versions of Hollywood hits is negligible.
It is the flood of ENGLISH language titles that is killing the market whether from P2P Chinese pirates or licenced distributors like WHV that can’t be bothered to respect Slovak/Czech language or culture.
So if any Slyck users know where I can get Slovak language content anything free or paid for on the web I would be very grateful if you would let me know.
BTW the only Slovak media we have managed to obtain is recordings from Slovak TV (made by sister-in-law and burned on to disc then posted to us) and pirate feeds from satellite Slovak TV.
Global media is about global control. Warner home video is about control. Free markets do not exist.