[jonnathanson]

I think you're misinterpreting me here. Windowed theatrical / home video release strategies are orthogonal to PIPA and SOPA (to which, for the record, I am staunchly opposed). Theater groups and studios would still employ a windowing strategy absent PIPA and SOPA, and vice versa.

And yes, you are entirely free to opt out of the windowing system by not buying the same movie twice. While I agree that the industry employs many deplorable tactics in an attempt to stave off technological change, there are plenty of things the consumer has freedom to decide for himself. Nobody's forcing you to pay for a movie in theaters and then pay again for it on DVD. Nobody's forcing you to buy a DVD, and then buy the "Special Edition" of the same movie 6 months later. Just as nobody's forcing you to buy Gilette's newest razor model, then buy the newer version a year from now. Or to buy the ten different "pre-workout," "post-workout," etc., versions of Gatorade currently on the market. Or to buy the "Limited Edition" Nike sneakers at inflated prices in December, only to find out that the edition becomes unlimited and goes on sale in January.

We can call these practices annoying, and they certainly are. But they're common to all consumer products industries, they're consumer-avoidable, and they're nowhere close to the same ballpark as PIPA and SOPA.