[Osiris]

I've always wondered why films and TV series (with limited budgets) don't just use off-the-shelf screens from Windows, OS X, or Linux distros. Are there some copyright/trademark issues that get in the way? It seems like a lot of work to develop your own UI that will only be on the screen for a few seconds.

I did notice that in an episode of Homeland that Saul was runing Media Player Classic on Windows to watch a video from an SD card, with the titlebar blurred out (so the name of the app wasn't visible). Later, another character watches the same video but there's a total custom UI used to bring up the video. In the same episode.

[bad_user]

Personally I get annoyed whenever I see product placements, like Macbooks, or iPhones, or Windows screens in movies, not to mention Google/Bing searches or Xbox/Playstations in futuristic settings.

Especially when I go to a movie theater, I go there to watch a movie that I pay for. I'm not paying between $7 and $20 to watch a commercial.

[coob]

Why? These are brands and products the vast majority of the public use and know. It would make a film less realistic if their products didn't appear.

I agree that blatant product placement is offensive (Bond), but just having a Macbook on a table doesn't annoy.

[npsimons]

Actually, it's highly unrealistic to see everyone using the exact same platform or exact same software. Especially the Apple products, as their perception of ubiquity is highly inflated by their advertising.

[TallGuyShort]

It's also highly unrealistic to see everyone looking like actors and supermodels. Especially within the set of people who know emacs and nmap.