[mythtv-users] "Excellent" transcode isn't so excellent

[F Peeters (MythTV)]

On Sat, October 28, 2006 15:58, Richard Freeman wrote:
> Michael T. Dean wrote:
>> On 10/27/06 15:07, David Brodbeck wrote:
>>> While it may be technically illegal, I see no
>>> *moral* issue with ripping a movie you own.
>>>
>>
>> You /own/ the movie?  You paid the millions of dollars to create the
>> movie?  Wow.
>>
>> I simply buy discs that contain a copy of the movie which I am licensed
>> to view through a licensed DVD player.
>
> Actually, copyright law is generally interpreted in terms of ownership.
>  If you buy a movie at Walmart you OWN it.  You do NOT have the right to
> distribute copies of it, but you otherwise have all the rights
> associated with the ownership of a physical object, such as the right to
> sell it to somebody else and the right to call the police if somebody
> steals it.  The same has applied to books for centuries - you do not own
> the copyright on the book, but you do in fact own the book itself if you
> bought it.
>
> In any case, you're trivializing the issue.  The previous poster could
> just have easily said "While it may be technically illegal, I see no
> *moral* issue with ripping a movie you are licensed to view through a
> licensed DVD player." - and he'd be just as right in my view.
>
> The whole idea that you don't actually own a copy of something that is
> copyrighted started out with software EULAs, and it is a bit of a legal
> fiction.  Just because something is written in a contract doesn't make
> it a legal fact - Microsoft could claim ownership of your next of kin in
> an EULA, and no court in the US would recognize this as being legal.
>
> In fact, until recently fair use was not mentioned at all in copyright
> law, and yet courts allowed such use in the interpretation of the law.
> The reason is in part that courts recognized that when you buy a book or
> other copyrighted work you are in fact obtaining ownership of the copy
> of the book, and there are many things that it just makes sense for
> owners to be able to do.  Modern copyright law sets out specific
> guidelines for fair use, and they're generally in line with prior court
> decisions.  In fact, ripping a DVD for personal use would probably fall
> under these guidelines, making it perfectly legal (the copying is for
> personal use, and does not substantially affect the market for the work).
>
> Sure, the MPAA may not like it, but the fact is that this does not
> really matter - it only matters whether the court likes it.

Bring in the DMCA, and yes, then it *is* illegal, because you are
circumventing an encryption mechanism...

/me is so happy he does NOT live in the US... Not to say the US is bad
(On the contrary, I like the country very much... It's just the recent
legislations that I do NOT like...)

Anyway... The DMCA does give the MPAA a mighty big stick to hit with...

-- 
F Peeters
  PC-Chips M863G Geode - NVidia 440 - Hauppauge PVR250
  Ubuntu 6.10 (Edgy Eft) - XFCE - MythTV 0.20 - Xine
  Panasonic NV-VHD1 VCR/DVD player case modded to fit it all in...