(upbeat music)
- Welcome to our summer season of In Wisconsin.
We're at Whitefish Dune State Park in Door County.
Hello everyone, I'm Patty Lowe.
This week, find out what this man's grandson was doing
on the computer that caused his grandpa to be sued
for more than a half million dollars.
- I told him, I said, I don't know what you're talking about.
I said, I don't even, you know, I wouldn't even know
how to go about that.
I said, I'm not really a real computer, a literate person.
- Discover the way to Bayfield County sheep farmers
are learning to live with predators.
- This is wolf territory that we've come into
and chosen to be in, we need to learn to live
within that system.
- Rev up your engines for a trip back to a time
when cars were king.
- Yeah, I've done everything that you can see to it
'cause it was nothing like the original at all.
It painted it, side pipes, the white stripe,
and the whole world is sitting there.
- All that plus more of the scenery
from Whitefish Dune State Park in Wisconsin.
- Major funding for in Wisconsin is provided
by the people of a lion's energy,
who bring safe, reliable, and environmentally friendly energy
to keep homes, neighborhoods, and life in Wisconsin
running smoothly.
A lion's energy, offering energy saving ideas on the web.
UW Health, providing specialty and primary care
for all ages throughout Wisconsin.
Information on UW Health physicians and clinics
and on University of Wisconsin Hospital
is available on the web.
Wisconsin's technical colleges, providing local education
for the crucial occupations essential to our communities.
Wisconsin's technical colleges, communities first.
- For many of us, internet technology can be dizzying.
As fast as you learn the latest, it changes.
That's what happened to a recene grandfather.
He found himself in a world of trouble
without really understanding how it happened.
- I told my, I said, I don't know what you're talking about.
I said, I don't even, you know, I wouldn't even know how
to go about that.
I said, I'm not really a real computer, a literate person.
- Retirey Fred Lawrence was in the dark
when Hollywood lawyers first contacted him
about pirating first-run films off the internet.
But it turned out Lawrence's 12-year-old grandson, Ben,
had downloaded four movies on the family's home computer.
- I downloaded four movies.
I wrote about the grudge, gotten, and the incredible.
- The boy quickly fasted up, but says he believed it
when the internet site where he found the films
declared the download's 100% legal.
- I didn't watch them.
- Why did you download them?
- 'Cause they're out and they want to see them.
- A big mistake.
The film industry first asked Ben's grandpa
to pay $4,000 to avoid a copyright infringement suit.
When Fred Lawrence explained he couldn't afford that,
the stakes got higher.
Three movie studios slapped the recene grandpa
with a $600,000 lawsuit.
$150,000 for each title.
- Well, I was just dumbfounded.
I said, you know, I said if I couldn't pay $4,000,
it's very highly unlikely that I could pay $600,000.
- And that's where it stood until a Milwaukee
copyright lawyer came to the family's rescue.
She negotiated a settlement that threw out the lawsuit
in return for Ben speaking to others his age
about the dangers of downloads.
- I downloaded the four movies and sooner or later
my grandpa got a lot of trouble.
- Ben was not the only child who's downloading
and this is not the only family that is involved
in litigation for music or video downloading.
- Because the movie industry is dead serious
when it comes to illegal downloads or internet piracy.
- The motion picture industry has lost $5.4 billion
in 2005 alone, so these are huge numbers.
- But how exactly do you know when something is
in a legal download?
It's not always easy to tell.
- The Motion Picture Association has these tips.
They say watch for titles that are too new to be true,
like movies that are still in the theaters
and you get what you pay for.
Low prices for movies are another indication
of pirated titles.
The Motion Picture Association says there are
legitimate online services, including movie link,
cinema now, iFilm, movie flicks and vango.
To stem its losses, the industry is pushing hard
to get the word out about internet piracy.
- You find it on the internet and you download it,
nobody's looking.
Is that legal?
Yeah, but you're always looking.
You're always looking for cans.
- This national internet safety expert works
with the movie industry to clue kids in to piracy.
Perry F.
tab got middle school students
in suburban Milwaukee talking about what she calls
the high price of free movies.
- Somebody may show up knocking your door
and sue you for a lot of money.
- F.
tab traveled to Wisconsin in connection
with the settlement agreement and the film industry's
lawsuit against Fred Lawrence.
- I want you to meet Ben.
Ben, come on up here, sweetheart.
- I'm here today because I want you to know
that it's not worth getting movies free online.
I'm not sure how cool the movie, game, music, whatever.
You can get in big trouble and get a lot of,
get other people in a lot of trouble also.
- Most of the kids listening to Ben's warning could relate.
- Do you guys have experience with downloading movies?
- Yeah.
- And yet these teenagers were not aware of the consequences.
- I didn't know the punishment was so bad either.
I mean, so much money you can get sued for.
- We don't want to take money out of people's pockets
by any means.
What we want to do is we want to educate, we want to empower.
We want to let people know about the dangers
of certain file sharing networks and the consequences of piracy,
which is why we're so fortunate that the lawrences
have agreed to help us out on this and educate people.
So-- - Yes, the lawrences agreed
to help the movie industry in return for the more than
half million dollar lawsuit being dropped.
The educate instead of litigate route
is a new direction for the film industry.
And it was tried out for one of the first times here
in Wisconsin.
The movie's directed at young teenagers,
the group largely responsible for illegal downloading.
And this case of a 12 year old and his grandfather
was right out of central casting.
- In this case, we were dealing with a child,
not an older teen or an adult, but someone who was 12
years old at the time.
And I think this child did not understand
that what he was doing was wrong,
but through programs like this, other children in
the sage group will.
- And I know that this is going to be helpful
if the word gets out that, hey, you know,
this could happen to you too.
- Besides, Fred Lawrence says, even full priced
store bought movies don't pinch the pocketbook
like the one, two punch he managed to dodge.
- Even if you pay $20 for a film,
it's a lot cheaper than $600,000.
- The attorney for the Lawrence says she has clients
in six new cases involving the music industry.
These involve people who downloaded music
onto their computer.
The music industry is threatening large lawsuits
if smaller settlements aren't paid.
(upbeat music)
- Our next report takes us to Bayfield County,
the heart of Wolf Territory.
- Something that's a good idea that wolves
are making a comeback, but others see a larger
wolf population as a threat.
We met a pair of sheep farmers who found a solution
to their wolf problem by turning to a trio of cunning canines.
- Just off County A in Bayfield County,
in the heart of the far north, is the morning view farm,
owned by Larry Fickbaum and Gail Gomsior,
and their family.
It's 300 acres.
The family has horses, peacocks, chickens, and sheep.
Lots of sheep.
- We're approximately 250 years right now.
We're looking at around 400 lambs
and we're raising cattle with them.
- And amid all those sheep is another animal
that looks like a sheep.
- Can't blend right into it.
- This sheep-like dog is called a merema.
They stand about two and a half feet tall
and weigh in at 70 to 100 pounds.
They're three of them, Jose, Moses, and Lola,
and they play an important role on this farm.
They're not pets, they're protected.
- For the sheep flock.
- We're in the heart of predator territory.
It's probably the most predators in the state right here.
The other day I saw a bear right up the road,
I saw a coyote when I was cutting hay yesterday
and I often hear wolves.
- The heart of predator territory.
- We saw where the fawn had been killed by a wolf
and that's only half mile away from here.
And you can tell because a coyote
would eat around the bones and the wolf
would eat right through the bones.
I mean the bones of the backbone is cut right in half.
And sheep like these are easy prey.
Three years ago the family had first-hand experience
with what predators can do to a flock.
- We went out one morning and I think we found
about 15 lambs that were chewed up.
- Yeah, kill.
- Eventually one year there were 28 carcasses
that were found.
- Yeah.
(crowing)
- This is not a hobby farm.
The thick bomb makes his living as a farmer
and losses like those were unacceptable.
- It's not a very pretty thing this series.
- Yeah, it was very distressing.
You know, and you think what could we have done
differently and you know, we felt somewhat
blame that we didn't protect them better.
- At the time of the wolf strike they had only two
Miramas, Jose and Moses.
For years two dogs had been enough for predator control.
But Wisconsin's wolf population has multiplied in recent years.
So after the wolf strike three years ago
they added a third dog, Lola.
The math is now three Miramas for up to 650 sheep,
patrolling a 300 acre farm.
Despite the increase in wolves, three Miramas
has been enough to keep wolves and other predators away.
- And so far it's been successful.
And it's been three years since we've had a wolf strike.
And I guess that they're over the place
I hear them all the time.
- Miramas are described as livestock protection dogs
or flock guarding dogs.
Their origin is Italy, where they've been guarding sheep
for 2,000 years.
Different breeds of flock guarding dogs
have been used by shepherds around the world.
But it wasn't till the 1970s that Miramas
were brought to the US to work on sheep farms like these.
- Way by, it's a way by.
- It's common to see a border collie hurting sheep.
- Come on, bring 'em up, bring 'em up, bring 'em up.
(mimicking)
- But you'll never see a Mirama hurting sheep.
Miramas have no hurting instinct.
Instead you'll see Miramas within a herd,
patrolling, protecting, or sometimes even
leading the herd.
- Actually, I have seen one dog hold the sheep at the gate.
Well, the other dog goes around the boundaries
and then he comes back and he's like,
"Okay, let 'em in."
- They check out the territory, make sure it's safe.
- They're bred to protect the animals that they're with.
- And they're with this flock, 24/7,
winter and summer on their own, patrolling, protecting.
- They mark a lot of their territory by urinating
and defecating.
We've gone out in the wintertime and I've seen packs
know where the trail just keeps going
around and around.
They kind of have a perimeter that they keep checking over
and over and over again.
It can be three quarters of a mile to the round.
- So how do you get this dedication?
How do you train a Mirama to do this?
Answer, you don't.
We don't train Mirama's.
- You let the instinct work and you let the instinct work
by not training these dogs.
They know commands whatsoever they don't know their name.
- Everything is instinct and that's the goal
is not to socialize these dogs.
If you socialize them, they'll be in their driveway
and that's not what they're here for.
They're here to protect the animals.
- The bonding is best begun when the dogs are puppies.
- They were born in November, it was cold
and I had some wool around them last time they shared them
and I took a fleece and put it right in their nest with them.
And then I made a pan right in the middle of the sheep pasture
they were engulfed by the sheep.
That's the type of thing that you have to do
when they're a pup to give them the bond.
(crowd cheering)
- Mirama's is come as far as where I can almost touch this
tree on the spot.
How you doing?
I feel about always gonna let me do.
To give them a shot or take care of them,
we kind of got a trip and attack them.
(laughs)
It's really hard.
Mirama's know their humans, but they're not bonded to them.
(crowd cheering)
This is their pack and this passive looking dog
can be very aggressive in protecting it.
- I came around the corner with the border collie
and we chased up a coyote that was really close to the sheep.
And he went around the corner and he ran snack dab
where one of the guard dogs was.
And it was an awesome sight, it was an ugly sight.
The coyote was like a dish rag.
I mean, it lasted a matter of seconds.
- It would have been.
- I mean, so you went from one extreme to
this mild mannered dog to a vicious fighter and I
was in a matter of seconds.
And I've seen him chase bear right out of the pasture also,
right on the bear's tail.
- Wolves, the Mirama's traditional foe
require a bit more.
- A dog is not gonna be able to fight with a wolf
and come alive.
Now, if you're what kind of a dog you have,
it's not gonna happen.
But a pack of dogs, big imposing dogs like these Mirama,
deter the wolves by barking and charging,
holding their ground.
- Before we got the guard dogs, I used to hear the sheep
going all the time, wake up and little nice,
Jesus was going on out there whatever.
And now I sleep to the night because I know,
I got protection out there.
- The protection team.
- They said the communication system,
they work as a team.
We saw some of that teamwork in action.
The Mirama's were friendly enough toward us
while we were filming and the family was around.
Jose settled down for a nap, Moses hopped the fence to
go off and patrol the farm.
But when Jose woke up and found us in the field
with the sheep and without the family,
he sounded the alarm.
(dog barking)
And Moses came running.
They joined forces, formed a barrier between us
and the sheep and kept watch till we left the field.
- They almost have the pack mentality themselves,
like wolves do.
They have a wolf pack thing where they work together.
I mean wolves are extremely social
and they work within that pack for everything.
Raising their young and kills and everything else.
And I think these dogs do some of that same thing,
their communication, their wandering,
their trading back and forth, you know,
the type of garden they do.
- Mirama's can cost around $500.
At a time when the pressures between people and predators,
particularly wolves are growing ever stronger,
these dogs offer a relatively low cost,
no-kill solution for coexistence.
Gamsior and Fickbaum feel very strongly
that the wildlife, particularly wolves,
is an essential part of the North Woods.
Wildlife is part of the reason why they live there.
- I firmly believe that this is wolf territory,
this is coyote territory, this is bear territory
that we've come into and chosen to be in,
but we need to learn to live within that system
as best we can and the dogs help us do that
and still farm without negatively
impacting our business.
- I honestly don't think that we could be in business here
without these guard dogs.
(dog barking)
- Since we first produced that report,
one of the dogs, Lola, has been sold to another farm,
but her pup, Lena, is now part of the team with Jose and Moses.
(dog barking)
- Time now for a Wisconsin Retro report.
Art Hackett produced this cruise back in time to 1980.
- It's called surfing now, everybody's
learning how to come up.
- My estimation on a weekend night you might find
as many as 100 to 150, driving around,
looking for friends, something to do,
meet in the parking lot.
- Is the high cost of gasoline made any difference
as far as you can tell?
- We find that the tend to park more often
than they previously did.
(singing)
- But they're still out there.
- They're still out there and they're still driving.
- In some cities it's called the Strip.
Here in Jamesville it's called the Circuit,
a pair of one-way streets that run back and forth
across the Rock River in the middle of downtown.
? Baby, honey, don't need me, baby ?
- A few years ago, Don Zumstein might have been polishing
his car in preparation for cruising the circuit,
but now he says he's just going out on a date.
- It's not as packed as it used to be.
It's probably because of the gas prices.
(singing)
- That's what we expected, rising fuel prices,
cars too expensive for teens to afford,
an American institution, coasting to an out of gas halt.
- We just don't do that.
- Why not?
- Gas is too precious to us.
- But as Sergeant Pollock went hinted,
some people are still driving.
Back when I first started cruising,
people used to kind of cruise non-stop all night long.
We'd pull in the plaza here and we'd talk
once while we'd play for Izby.
And after they closed on the plaza to us,
then people started cruising around a little more
and then gas guy had a little expenses,
so now we try finding a parking lot where we can.
- What's the meaning in all of this?
- Well, a person can't sit home on Friday and Saturday nights,
and most of ours are on town, they're pretty worthless.
And if you don't want to sit and get drunk all night,
you come downtown for a little excitement.
Actually, I think it's a good, clean fun.
- If gas were a little cheaper, do you think you might
be out cruising tonight?
- Got the circuit.
- What's dangerous about it?
- Oh, you just don't know who you were gonna meet down there.
Rough crowd down there.
- A lot of the girls I went to high school
with wouldn't be caught dead down on the circuit.
It was considered a low class thing to do.
It was for all those gear heads to come downtown
and see what's machinos has to know.
? He got in Louisiana across the new Arleines ?
? We're back up in the woods among the evergreen ?
? There's still the long cabinator verse in wood ?
- Whatever the appeal, an appeal is still there.
The circuit draws cruisers from as far away
as Rockford, Illinois.
- A lot more people on the streets.
You gotta watch out for them.
You can't be just driving along, you gotta watch out for them
and they're always watching out for you.
- You think there are more kids on the streets?
- Yeah.
- How do you explain that with a higher cost
of operating a car?
- Can't.
? Why do fools fall in love ?
? Why do persons fall in love with me ?
? Love is my way to pay to pay ?
- I come up about once every two weeks.
- How much time you figure you'll spend out here tonight?
- Half of the tanks worth.
? Why do fools fall in love with me ?
- Mainly it's to see everybody else's car.
Then you get ideas for it for your own.
This is basically a four-door ambassador sedan,
a pretty sedate car.
- Yeah, I've done everything that you can see to it
'cause it was nothing like the original at all.
I painted it, side pipes, the white stripe,
and the whole work.
- There's a lot more kids doing it.
There's a lot of them doing it.
- Now I would think that with the cost of gas going up,
that would slow it down.
- Yeah, I haven't been coming up as much as I generally do,
but I do all about every two, three weeks just to see
if the new car is.
- And I just can not see my friends.
(upbeat music)
? Why do birds dance okay ?
- I'm not one of those that's impressed by a fast car.
- What type of car does impress you?
- One that runs.
- I don't know, I'm not impressed by that.
- I don't do the girls.
- Yeah.
- You think there are a lot of girls
that are still impressed by fast cars?
- Yeah, I think it's mostly the younger set.
So, you know, like the ones that have just gotten their life
since they're still in high school.
(upbeat music)
- Excitement, can afford movies or bowling right now.
- We never were impressed by the car, though.
- Lash summer.
Lash summer, I wasn't at the summer.
- What kind of car is impressed you?
- Cameras.
? The thrill is gone ?
? The thrill is gone away ?
- We thought about building this story around that theme.
But the thrills aren't gone.
At least not all of them.
A while's would people drive from miles around
to drive around some more.
One circuit rider we talked to asked us to say something nice
about the circuit.
We dubbed the whole affair an American institution.
What more could he ask for?
But that institution is suffering a little
and those who are just starting out with it
are hoping that it will survive.
- Everybody does it, even the old people.
? The good night sweetheart ?
? Will it's time to go ?
? I hate to leave you ?
? But I really must say ?
? Good night sweetheart ?
? Good night ?
- Two years after Art Filed that report back in 1980,
the Jamesville City Council passed an
anti-cruising ordinance, effectively stalling out
the un-car enthusiasts.
But in recent years, Jamesville seems to be looking
back a little more fondly on its motor past.
The city organized an event called Chevy's on the circuit,
celebrating the tradition of classic cars riding the circuit.
Events have included inviting artists
to paint small Chevy replicas.
There's also a car show featuring what else?
Chevy's planned for June 24th.
That's our program tune in next time
when we'll join these tree trimmers
as they show off their skills 30 feet off the ground.
- Find the inner squirrel.
- That's next time.
We leave you tonight with some more scenes
from beautiful whitefish dunes State Park.
But in the winter time, still beautiful,
but a bit colder than it is right now.
For In Wisconsin, I'm Patty Low.
See you next time.
(wind blowing)
- Major funding for In Wisconsin is provided by the people
of Alliance Energy, who bring safe, reliable, and
environmentally friendly energy to keep homes, neighborhoods,
and life in Wisconsin running smoothly.
Alliance Energy, offering energy saving ideas on the web.
UW Health, providing specialty and primary care
for all ages throughout Wisconsin.
Information on UW Health Physicians and Clinics
and on University of Wisconsin Hospital
is available on the web.
Wisconsin's Technical Colleges, providing the people
of Wisconsin with the knowledge and skills
they'll need for the economy of tomorrow.
Wisconsin's Technical Colleges, communities first.
(wind blowing)