Has anyone ever had any dealings with www.tvboxset.com?
MrsB is a fan of a particular show – Party of Five – which she’s been watching on reruns. But the channel that was airing 'em quit midway through the fifth season. Checking around, only the first two seasons are available on DVD… except for this website.
It’s got full series-run DVDs of just about every show you’ve ever heard of, including the full run of Party of Five. Which is passing strange, because every other vendor I’ve checked, including Sony, says only the first two seasons are available for sale.
So… are these guys legit? And how do they have stuff for sale that isn’t available anywhere else?
I haven’t dealt with them, but I was interested enough to learn of their existence that I went to their site. In the FAQ, it says:
Will the DVD’s work on my DVD player?
The DVD’s are region free which means they will play on over 99% of DVD players. This includes the major Gaming Systems (Sony Playstation and Microsoft XBox) If you experience problems with the DVD’s we will be happy to offer you a Full Refund.
I’m not aware of any DVD manufacturer that makes region-free discs of heavily copyrighted material. That doesn’t mean that there aren’t any, but that alone sounds pretty suspicious to me. But hey, if you can’t get it anywhere else, and you really want it, and you don’t mind what may be bootlegs, this is the place for you.
ETA: They are selling a box set of the '60s Beatles TV cartoons. These have never been issued to the public. They’re bootlegs.
I’ve encountered this site before, but never placed an order with them. They’re definitely selling bootlegs, and overpriced ones at that. DO NOT SUPPORT THEM, especially because you don’t know what the hell you’ll end up with. They could have been taped off TV and transferred to DVD, with the FOX logo in the corner, crummy reception, and even the original commercials in between.
This page lists their Party of Five discs as being region-free. That strikes me as particularly suspicious; the big studios almost never release content on region-free discs.
In contrast, the Amazon page for Party of Five season 1 lists it as being Region-1, which is what one would expect.
Here is an interesting Usenet thread discussing them as well.
Very clearly a bootleg company, of course.
That’s what I figured, but I wasn’t certain.
Of course, now that I’m back at my own computer, I can start typing “tvboxset” into its handy Google search bar, and the suggested searches come up “scam” “review” problems" etc…
They’re not just selling bootlegs; in some cases, they are selling bootlegs of shows that are legitamately and widely available, like The Adventures of Brisco County and Twin Peaks. Do not support them! In fact, who can we report them to?
They’re a Canadian company, so start with the Canadian BBB I guess.
Yeah, it looks like only the first two seasons have been released on DVD at all. If you find any website offering other seasons for sale, they’re bootlegs.
But even they don’t have a Viva Variety set 