"We are facing a very new and a very troubling assault on our fiscal security, on our very economic life and we are facing it from a thing called the video cassette recorder and its necessary companion called the blank tape. And it is like a great tidal wave just off the shore. This video cassette recorder and the blank tape threaten profoundly the life-sustaining protection, I guess you would call it, on which copyright owners depend, on which film people depend, on which television people depend and it is called copyright." -- Jack Valenti, testifyng before Congress 1982-04-12
[Sorry, but I can't resist adding an editorial comment to this one. Y'all -- except for the young'uns -- remember when we still had broadcast television and big-budget movies, right? Before The VCR-induced collapse of those two industries later in the 1980s? Back when we had a whopping three major broadcast networks instead of the measly five we have now (I'm ignoring PBS for now since it's non-commercial, whether it counts as major or not, and I honestly have no idea how many cable networks there are). Gosh, it's such a shame that we didn't implement legally-mandated Digital Restrictions Management systems on VCRs when we had the chance, or outlaw home recording outright, so we could still have profitable broadcast television to watch!]