Do they have the rights?
 

If you buy content from a content company there is no guarantee that they actually have the right to sell it to you. Many movies today are shot and owned by independent producers who then sell or grant a distributor the American DVD rights with or without other rights included. A canny producer grants only American DVD rights. These movies are now turning up on content sites for 2 reasons.
1 The distributor is marketing his titles and carelessly included movies he doesn?t hold the Internet rights too in the package
or.
2 The distributor thinks the original producer will not find out.

This has happened to me twice now, the first time a Webmaster had to completely redesign a website and withdraw all of its content, the second I just found out about.
In each case the content house believed they had the rights. In each case they did not!
In the latest case the distributor says they didn?t even know they were selling internet rights they thought they had signed up for VOD.
It can take months for a producer to find out that his content has been sold illegally therefore it can sit on your site for months before the fun begins.
The possibility for legal action is obvious but who gets sued? And how much damages will the unsuspecting Webmaster have to pay?
Here is a clue, if it says on the front of the movie or on the box a John T. Bone movie distributed by xxxxxxxx company you can guarantee that nobody holds the rights but me. Unfortunately most independent producers aren?t that smart so if you are buying content look out you may end up in litigation!

Thanks for the heads up, Mr. T Bone...

Welcome back, man. Thanks for the heads up. :)