Konstantin Zemchenko of the Russian Anti-Piracy Organization is the top movie pirating enforcer in Russia.

He measures his success by counting down the time from when a blockbuster hits the theaters until the bootlegs are released on the street corners of Russia.

His most recent experience was with The Da Vinci Code.  He was hoping for a 10 day lag which would be a positive sign, meaning his teams hard work was starting to pay off.  But no such luck this time, after three days there was a dark grainy release on the streets and 5 days from it’s big screen release a perfect copy with professional style menu’s and bonus features had already begun selling for around $5 each.

One of the biggest problems in Russia is the fact that eventhough you can get kicked out from a theater for filming the movie with a camcorder the only penalty you receive is a ticket and that can be beaten in Court by proclaiming the copy was for personal use only.

As with many problematic industry practises in Russia nowadays the problems begin and end with the laws and corruption that runs rampant throughout the coutnry.

I read a statistic the other day that says your chances of being hit by lightning are approximately 1 in 3 million.  So I guess I am not too worried.

But according to this story if you are using a cell phone during a lightning storm the chances of getting struck are substantially increased.

There is quite the push from India to capture US dollars via offering cut-rate prices from everything Internet, be it design, customer support or programming India has figured out that they can undercut the rest of the world and still make lots of money.

Now Motorola has announced it will be investing 100 million dollars to set up a cell phone and telecom equipment plant.  Industry anyalists say this is a direct response to Nokia’s stranglehold on the Indian market.

Word is they will invest an initial 30 million in their project in Tamil Nadu with final cost projections of 100-120 million dollars.