this post was submitted on 01 Aug 2026
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Piracy: ꜱᴀɪʟ ᴛʜᴇ ʜɪɢʜ ꜱᴇᴀꜱ

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How common was video rental piracy during the 90s? (nord.pub)
submitted 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) by Ironfox@nord.pub to c/piracy@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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This was during an era where VHS was standard and DVD's were just brand new at the time (before streaming sites existed). Chains like Blockbuster were booming back then with people renting movies or even TV shows for a fee but have to return them by an expected date, what happens is that in order to "keep" a copy, people would use a PC with disc burning software to burn the contents from that DVD onto a blank one.

Know those blank white DVDs? Basically those were used on storing a "pirated" disc for themselves before returning the rented copy back at the video rental store. When I was a kid, I remember encountering what clearly a pirated copy of The Prince of Egypt (so who ever pirated it kept the rented copy) since the disc art is crappy & low quality (it's been printed then glued onto a blank DVD used for copying upon peeling it off).

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[–] Shimitar@downonthestreet.eu 12 points 1 day ago (1 children)

It was not free. You rented for a price, then returned the VHS. The longer you kept it, the more you paid.

My grandma recorded a few thousands of VHS, but she aimed at an historical collection so that was all from the television, dubbing existing VHS needed more equipment and was. Not that easy.

[–] anomnom@sh.itjust.works 7 points 1 day ago (2 children)

We had a VHS camcorder that didn’t have the anti copy channel on its play head. So you could record commercial VHS with the scrambl copy protection right to any connected VCR. I think at even had S-video for higher quality, but I may be wrong. It’s still in my moms attic because I wouldn’t let her throw it away 7-8 years ago.

[–] GrindingGears@lemmy.ca 1 points 3 hours ago

My dad had us on the VCR train pretty early on, so we had a model that was from 83 or 84, like whenever they basically first came out for home use. All those scrambl and antipiracy protections they had later on, it wouldn't pick them up. So if I remember this correctly, as long as you used the older VCR to play the movie, you could copy it on the newer one, and those protections wouldn't work and it would come out just fine. I even remember, quite vividly, when we discovered that. One of those key moments in our household.

[–] Naich@piefed.world 10 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (2 children)

That was Macrovision, which was a signal inserted into the top few frames that weren't shown on a TV, but which the VCR used to calibrate its black level. I designed a box which removed them so I could make copies of stuff. It was a bit pointless with hindsight, because I very rarely watched the copies I made. I think the enjoyment of getting one over on the man was far more than actually watching the films.

[–] f4f4f4f4f4f4f4f4@sopuli.xyz 1 points 35 minutes ago

I wasn't even trying to copy, just trying to connect a DVD player to my RF-cable-jack-only TV.

DVD player -> AV cables -> VCR -> coaxial cable -> TV.

Nope! Not allowed! It's 2001 and we're already screaming loud and clear that pirate copies are superior because they just work.

I ended up getting a Voodoo3 3500 TV on clearance sale, and playing movies on the TV through that.

[–] anomnom@sh.itjust.works 1 points 14 hours ago

Thank you! I’d forgotten the term. It’s been a solid 30 years since AV class.