tonyc3742

Okay....pardon the paranoid tone of the thread header, but I just read this article, and it is somewhat frightening: http://www.usatoday.com/money/indust...rtnation_x.htm
I'm thinking we're not too far away from 1984 and Brazil, only instead of the government, it's a company.
Certainly we all want good prices on stuff we buy, and I'm all for a free market, but Wal-Mart's growth is truly scary.
"It averages 100 million customers a week. That's 88.5 million more people than U.S. airlines fly in a week."
"It alone accounted for as much as 25% of the U.S. productivity gains from 1995-99"
"It employs one of every 123 U.S. workers and nearly one of every 20 retail employees."
"At P&G, Wal-Mart accounts for 17% of annual revenue, up from 10% just five years ago"
"Wal-Mart says it has the USA's biggest private satellite communications network, one that links stores to Bentonville by voice, data and video. Suppliers tap directly into Wal-Mart's computers to track sales of everything from soup to nuts, which improves inventory controls and cuts costs."

So 5% of the total retail workforce, and almost 1% of all workers, works for WalMart.
Certainly they're not going anywhere, but *should* WalMart have to deal with some catastrophe, its failure alone could wreak havoc on the world's economy.
And to make the post match the header title, this quote:

"Other companies have likewise tweaked products so that they pass muster with Wal-Mart. Video game maker Planet Moon Studios two years ago wanted an industry group to give its Giants game a teen rating. Why? So it would be carried by Wal-Mart and others. Planet Moon changed the color of blood in the video to green from red, toned down the language and put a bikini on a topless character, says CEO Bob Stevenson. Without those changes, he says, "The risk to sales was too high.""

We're used to Blockbuster doing that with DVD's, but we don't hear as much about video games and music from WalMart [anyone remember the Poison album way back when whose cover was edited because of WalMart?]. WalMarts dvd selection, I have found, is rather lacking. Certainly they can sell what they want, but if they buy millions of DVD's and CD's and computer games, but only certain ones, then the chances of people producing the ones WM isn't buying, will vastly decrease. Not to mention having the power to change the actual product. What's next, books? Requiring book publishers to edit out the curse words in Stephen King novels? The word censorship gets tossed around far too lightly these days, and this is certainly not First Amendment-violating censorship, but these kind of tactics definitely approach censorship. It's like those Utah dvd rental places that edit out the 'bad stuff' of their DVD's. Only in that case, it's still quite easy to get the 'original' version. If WM's buying power increases too much more, maybe the 'original' version won't be released at all any more.
Luckily, even though WM is crushing the mom'n'pop, local or limited stores, there still exists alternate purchasing channels on the Internet....for now....
Am I being paranoid, or does this article bother anyone else?

dreamcastrocks

You are being paranoid...does that make you feel better

dvde

Talk about being paranoid. Relax people! Also, Wal-Mart is not that big of a dvd reseller. Their selection sucks really bad and they don't get nearly all the new releases every week. So to say they are giants in the dvd world, I would say they are not. Best Buy out sells them without even blinking an eye.

Cheddarmuff

What's Wal-mart???

tonyc3742

OH NO! They've gotten to you! I knew those satellites weren't just for communication....

darinart1

Walmart bites.Being a huge force in the retail market isn't enough for them.They want to shove their censorship down our throats.I knew about this since Marilyn Manson told them to stick it because they wouldn't release AntiChrist superstar with a deletement of their title song and the cover changed.

Light a Candle For The Sinners...Set The World On Fire
MM

spyzdope

It is well known that Walmart forces studios to release P&S versions of their DVDs by threatening not to sell their product if they don't.

renaldow

Since I live in a major west coast city, and we have only 1 walmart, and only the white trash section of the population seems to shop there, I'd have to say: No.

Hawkrune

I just want to thank dtcarson for making this vitally important distinction in this post:

"The word censorship gets tossed around far too lightly these days, and this is certainly not First Amendment-violating censorship, but these kind of tactics definitely approach censorship."

Too many times, people claim this kind of behavior from Wal-mart (or record labels, local church groups, or whoever.) violates the Constitution. What they fail to realize is that the 1st Ammendment protects citizens from the GOVERNMENT engaging in censorship, not from companies or other citizens in the course of exercising their rights. Dtcarson makes this distinction and I for one greatly appreciate it.

My compliments to the poster for framing it more correctly than just about any other censorship-related post I've ever seen. Anyone who cares about this issue should pay attention and learn exactly what the Constitution is and what it protects before jumping into the arena.

Pointyskull

I've been in Wal-Mart a million times, and I don't think I ever once went into the DVD department. I just don't think of Wal-Mart as my DVD source.

The stuff I want on disc I usually get on-line, or search ads for the best B&M price. Call me an educated consumer, I guess...

tonyc3742

Thanks, Hawkrune, for the unsolicited testimonial : )
It's so easy for rumours and fallacies to spread across the internet, I try to take time to make my points as factual, clear,l and verifiable as possible. And yes, very few people understand or know a lot about the Constitution, and the limitations it places on government, and how almost since the beginning those limitations have been slowly stepped over.

12thmonkey: True, WalMart is not my major DVD source either, I think I've bought one or two out of 150 dvd's there, but that's part of the problem. You and I, and probably most people on this board, may drop 2-5% of our dvd dollars at WM, if that much. But the article I referenced talked about WM's global reach, and it's sheer power as a retailer. We may buy our unedited dvd's from UneditedDVDs.com, but when WM buys 75% of XYZ DVD Publishing's DVD's, if WM says We don't like the F word, XYZ is going to listen. Which will ultimately 'trickle down' and have an impact on the consumer, regardless where s/he buys his dvd product.
And not just DVD's, but virtually everything they carry. And things they don't carry--if WM doesn't carry a product A, but they would carry a similar product B, the manufacturer may well drop product A for product B.
And again, I'm all for capitalism and profit making, but what worries me is that there's a fine line between reacting to an ever-changing marketplace and adjusting your product offerings, and having one marketplace venue [WM] control, or at least have a huge impact on, both supply and demand.

davejt1

Sounds like a conspiracy.

Or better yet - a conspiracy theory!

Conspiracy Theory...hmmmm.

That reminds me - need to go to Wal Mart tonight to buy a DVD!

TNDVDFAN

I work for Wal-Mart and I need to clear something up. Wal-Mart DOES NOT censor music. The record companies censor the music. True, Wal-Mart won't sell CD's with explicit lyrics but it's the artists and the record companies selling out so they can sell CD's at Wal-Mart for more $$ in their pocket. If you hate it that Wal-Mart only sells CD's the record companies censor then SHOP SOMEWHERE ELSE.

tonyc3742

Well, I never have bought a CD at WM, and I've only bought maybe two DVD's from WM, and I've never bought any books there.
Perhaps I wasn't clear--I realize that WM doesn't censor the music [or movies, or whatever] and that the publisher of the media is involved with that decision [I hesitate to say the artist, since they have so little control over their disks anyway, but perhaps].
But the mere fact that WM has that much power over the publishing companies is my main point in my initial post. Certainly we can shop somewhere else--at least now, because WM, while having a huge portion of the sales, does not have them all. But it might not be too far down the road, based on WM's growth evidenced in the article, where 95% of CD's or DVD's [or computer/video games, etc.] are sold through WM or a WM affiliate. If that's the case, and WM says We don't like blood in games, make it green; or We don't like that CD cover, change it; and the publisher does, how long is the publisher going to make that 5% of inventory the way it 'should' be? This is already a fact with a few DVD publishers ['Blockbuster says consumers only want Fullscreen, so we're not doing Widescreen at all anymore'], and that is a frightening, to me, development.
I realize some media may not be 'acceptable' to everyone. Two of my favorite bands would probably cause poor Sam Walton to have a heart attack [if he weren't dead already, of course]. But for WM to basically control if I can recieve their CD's or not, that's what I have a problem with. Not the fact that they can request to sell whatever they want, but that the publishers cave, and eventually won't sell the 'unexpurgated' version because it's not worth it.
Here's a similar situation, with regards to the 'net and everyone's favorite search engine, Google. http://slate.msn.com/id/2077875/
Certainly SearchKing isn't in the right, but is Google?

CaptDS9E

If i hadnt gone down south for vacation every year i would have never heared of walmart.

capt

darkflounder

Wal-Mart will not sell CDs with objectionable lyrics. If a record company wishes to sell CDs at Wal-Mart, then they must bend to Wal-Mart's will.

What bothers me is that, up until a few years ago, there was absolutely no indicator on the CD that it was different from what you'd buy at BB. I bought a Monster Magnet CD, was completely torqued off to hear frigging radio edit beeps over the curse words. And, since I had opened the CD, I could not return it.

I only buy new releases of DVDs at Wal-Mart, and only when I'm not in the mood to wait for a DDD shipment (which is rare).

Wahl-Marcht UBER ALLES!!

Jason

Plus, clean versions of CDs are available from other retailers. Wal Mart may have been influential in getting record companies to initially make clean CDs, but they have been widely adopted.

dvde

I think that all retailers kind of control what you see or watch to a certain extent.

dvd-fanman

Yup, and most of the time it's a matter of what's going to sell better. B&M stores only have so much room to store things in. I can stock 2 copies of Movie A, B, C, D and E. Or I can stock 5 copies of Movie A, B and C and I know they will sell better than movies D and E.

If I was a store, I think the easy choice would be to stock the 5 copies of each of the selective group to better maximize profits.

The beauty of online stores, is that they have much larger warehouses and have much larger product selections.

costanza187

I remember the Poison Open Up and Say Ahhhh cover!

Aaron Amos

does this mean that they are not a "family orienated" any more?

wz42

Julie Walker

ok...what was so bad about the Posion cd cover?

I've seen two versions of the cover.One is the usual just a pair of eyes since the rest of the image was blacked out.The other was a full image of some lady with a cat like face.

What is the big deal about that image? Sure it looks alittle freaky..but i hardly find it 'objectionable'.


Then again.Stores find the Andrew cd cover 'to much' to handly as well.So the packaging is wraped in a black plastic sheet to cover the 'offensive' imagery of a person with a bloody lip!



Yet i don't think censored cds sell at all.I laughed when i saw the piles of piles of the new Korn cd at Wal-Mart over the holidays.It took up a whole row since they had so many they needed to get rid of.Well each said "Edited version" on them.Thus no one bought them.What a pathetic waste of $$ on the stores part

Even K-Mart which is going bankrupt started selling uncensored cds finally! Yet they still refuse to carry unrated movies! The store sucks royally anyway.So i'm glad it's going down the drain


Anyway while Wally-Blundermart supposts censorship & rather conservative views despite nice prices.

It's best just to shop elsewhere 99.9% of the time save for those good $5 dvd deals. + If enough people protested & boycotted the store until they change there pathetic takeover policy of what consitutes 'family values'. Then maybe they would get the picture.Afterall..whats a family store that ignores the adults & everyone mature enough to handle alittle 'objectionable' material be it the content of a movie,book,music or game???

siberianhusky

Oh, so what you are saying is Walmart censors music, thanks for bringing clarity to the situation. I think you proved that walmart does censor things.

silentbob007

What I really loved, perusing through the walmart DVD section on a whim, is the huge display of "One Hour Photo" they had -- all with stickers that said in huge letters "NO BLACK BARS! FITS YOUR TV!"