Stupid copy-protected CDs

[Loz]

Kingy Wrote:

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> oh ! music sales are up are they ? is

> that why HMV is closing 30 shops, Virgin and Our

> Price are gone etc etc etc

Sigh. That is because music sales on the internet have boomed - or haven't you noticed? Ever heard of a little company called Amazon?

Music sales are up. Per unit they have gained year on year all through the 'downloading era'.

> any breach of the terms under which it was sold is thievery in my book

Fortunately the world does not read your book. I mean, I think you are a bit of an oxygen thief - doesn't mean the plod will be knocking on your door any time soon.

[Loz]

Kingy Wrote:

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> btw Rosie H

> apparently my arse is so full of crap it would be

> difficult to get a copy protected cd up there

You are mistaking your head for your arse. That does not surprise me. I suspect you have arse and elbow recognition difficulties as well.

[Kingy]

Fancy a face to face over this ? Preferably in a boxing ring

[KidKruger]

Give Kingy a break. By law it may well be illegal.

If it is, and as Kingy accurately says, artists lose out which is why they try to protect their material, the question is actually 'how do I steal this music ?'.

Which doesn't really mean Kingers deserves insults.

[Loz]

Kingy Wrote:

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> Fancy a face to face over this ? Preferably in a

> boxing ring

Lost the argument, then?

[KidKruger]

Kingy don't start a fight (you would lose IMO..) !!

You offered advice and it was declined, albeit not delicately.

Let these people embark on a career in arch-criminality, you know you'll see the headlines as they descend the stairs from the dock at the Old Bailey, heads hung in shame, commencing their life sentences for numerous and avoidable crimes if they'd only listened to your advice years before when you tried to reign-in there wayward and criminal tendencies...

[Kingy]

No - you insult me on a personal level - do it to my face - as far as the argument goes it may live on here to clarify - if you are going to insult me then i'm easy enough to find -- come and do it at a gig - to my face

[Kingy]

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is an amendment to United States copyright law passed unanimously on May 14, 1998, which criminalizes the production and dissemination of technology that allows users to circumvent technical copy-restriction methods. Under the Act, circumvention of a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work is illegal if done with the primary intent of violating the rights of copyright holders.

On 22 May 2001, the European Union passed the EU Copyright Directive, an implementation of the 1996 WIPO Copyright Treaty that addressed many of the same issues as the DMCA.

Most Record Companies abandoned the use of DMC after Sony's system was found to be interfering with Windown PC systems

The DMCA has been largely ineffective in protecting DRM systems, as software allowing users to circumvent DRM remains widely available. However, those who wish to preserve the DRM systems have attempted to use the Act to restrict the distribution and development of such software, as in the case of DeCSS.

I don't make the laws - if you want to break them don't advertise it on a public forum, if you want to change the laws - go ahead and try

[Loz]

KidKruger Wrote:

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> Give Kingy a break. By law it may well be

> illegal.

Illegal, yes. Theft no. I object to the ads saying 'downloading is theft' as people like kingy start believing it is so. But 'infringing copyright' doesn't sound scary enough.

> If it is, and as Kingy accurately says, artists

> lose out which is why they try to protect their

> material, the question is actually 'how do I steal

> this music ?'.

It is not stealing. Stealing means taking someone's property and depriving them of it. It doesn't mean depriving someone of a future profit that they probably wouldn't have got anyway.

Put it this way. When I was a kid, my dad, being a DIY-type guy saw those old swingball contraptions. He had a good look at it, went home and knocked one up for us. Is that stealing? No, he just copied something. Now had he then started selling these, that would of course be a different matter, but copying things for personal use has never been taken seriously before now (remember home taping?). And it has certainly never been seriously considered as theft.

> Which doesn't really mean Kingers deserves insults.

No, but starting posts with "AND FLICK YOU TOO" does.

[Kingy]

The FLICK YOU TOO was a direct response to being told to push something up my arse

[Loz]

Re: Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) and the EU Copyright Directive... I still don't see the words 'stealing' or 'theft' in there, Kingy.

[RosieH]

the question is actually 'how do I steal this music ?

Christ on a bike, it really really isn't. I have paid for it twice over already. I would gladly pay for it thrice, were it possible to download. The question is actually, 'is it possible to listen to this in a different format'?

As for not listening to it in squalid mp3 format, some of us don't like to pollute the planet by driving to work in cars.

Yep Kingy, you called me a thief, so I told you to shove it up your arse. I think you started with the insults.

[Kingy]

Breach of Copyright IS theft of intellectual property

[Loz]

Kingy Wrote:

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> Breach of Copyright IS theft of intellectual

> property

Aaaaand so it starts again...

No it's not; it's breach of copyright. That's why there is no mention of the words 'stealing' or 'theft'.

Theft Act 1968:

1 Basic definition of theft

(1) A person is guilty of theft if he dishonestly appropriates property belonging to another with the intention of permanently depriving the other of it; and 'thief' and 'steal' shall be construed accordingly.

Now what "property" here has the copyright owner been "permanently deprived" of? A computer file they never themselves owned?

And if your answer was going to be 'intellectual property', how have they been permanently deprived of it?

[RosieH]

You offered advice and it was declined, albeit not delicately.

Er, no he didn't. His response was one word: "Thievery".

Had he wanted to offer advice, he could have said that there is no way to play a copy-protected CD on itunes legally. That would have been advice, rather than calling me a thief for making the criminal error of exposing my ignorance.

I started a thread a couple of days ago about how most people are fundamentally decent, but I am glad to have been disabused, and reminded that the world is, indeed, full of cunts.

[Kingy]

The copyright owner owns the right to copy it and owns the intellectual property contained therein - copying it without permission is

breach of copyright - breach of copyright is defined as intellectual property theft QED

I don't make the rules, neither did I start trading the insults - copying a cd for yourself does not come under the definition of fair use unless it is for educational or research purposes. In a court of law the onus would be on the perpetrator to prove fair use - yes the law is probably an ass in this case, it can't keep up with the technologies

Neither did I define breach of copyright as intellectual property theft - it just is - that is what it is - like it or not - that is the legal definition

[Kingy]

6.1 Commercially produced audio and video materials

Unauthorised copying of commercially produced audio or video materials is generally not allowed. Some publishers give blanket permission for making copies within a non-commercial educational environment, and others sell licences that permit copies to be made for students' use, but making copies of commercially produced audio and video materials and passing them on to third parties normally constitutes a serious infringement of copyright. Even transferring audio and video materials from one format to another may not be permitted, e.g. from cassette to CD-ROM or DVD, or into MP3 or MGP format so that the materials can be played on a PC. Some publishers are, however, becoming more liberal in this respect. This is the actual wording on the packaging of a recently produced set of audio CDs:

This set of CDs is for your individual use only. You are legally entitled to rip/copy the content of these CDs to your own PC hard drive and/or MP3 player. Please note that it is illegal to:

* make copies of these CDs;

* rip/copy the content of these CDs to PC hard drives and/or MP3 players owned by others.

Look at the terms and conditions on the packaging of purchased audio or video materials or in accompanying documentation. If the terms and conditions do not state explicitly that you are allowed to transfer recordings from one medium to another then you must apply for permission to do so from the publisher.

It seems fairly evident that the assigned right to rip/copy the content of the cd's referred to above have not been assigned to Rosie H'S CD as it is Copy Protected

And ROSIE H - Kindly get your facts right - I did not call you a thief - I commented that the act of copying files off Copy protected cd's in the way described by DJKilla Queen was thievery - which it is (FACT) it is breach of copyright which is intellectual property theft - like it or not. I don't tend to make a habit of judging other people, I don't begin to understand the things people have to do to get themselves through life and from one day to the next, usually as a result of the laws being such an ass.

Later I commented that such acts are killing music (OPINION)

Go ahead - do it - I won't tell on you - you probably have the moral right to do so, having 'paid twice' but I do not believe you have the 'legal' right to do so, and if singled out you would have to prove that such an act was 'fair use' which would cost you a great deal of time and money, especially as such an act is not defined under the existing 'fair use' terms.

Word of warning to others - Offering advice and open discussion of illegal activity can lead yourself open to accusations of conspiracy which carry far greater implications and punishments than those of the illegal activity itself

[HonaloochieB]

RosieH Wrote:

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> I started a thread a couple of days ago about how

> most people are fundamentally decent, but I am

> glad to have been disabused, and reminded that the

> world is, indeed, full of @#$%&.

Now stop that Miss Rosie - what did we say about hataz the other day?

Now mix yourself a gimlet, put on the first New York Dolls LP and go to your happy place - it's what the Mozzatollah would do.

[Loz]

Kingy Wrote:

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> The copyright owner owns the right to copy it and

> owns the intellectual property contained therein

True

> - copying it without permission is breach of copyright

True

> - breach of copyright is defined as intellectual property theft QED

Utter rubbish. Please link to or quote the the relevant law that makes that definition. I'll save you the time - there isn't one.

> I don't make the rules,

True (thank goodness)

> neither did I start trading the insults

False

[Siduhe]

The UK has no clear legal concept of "fair use" - i.e. the ability to move music from one format to another for your personal use or to take a backup of electronic media. However, since at least 2006 the BPI has publicly stated that no action will be taken against someone who copies CDs they have validly purchased into electronic form for personal use, or converts electronic music into other format.

Where a CD is protected by DRM, it is a breach of the licence you have purchased to listen to the music if you break the DRM and take an electronic copy. The act which implements the EU Copyright directive in the UK is The Copyright and Related Rights Regulations 2003, which includes a section on electronic rights management and extends additional rights to copyright holders if someone advertises or tells someone how to break the DRM, does break the DRM or shares media from which the DRM has been removed. However, this remains entirely a civil matter - the rights holder still has to sue the infringer in a civil court, not a criminal one and certainly not theft - which is a strictly criminal matter. The emphasis of the CRRR 2003 is also very much on people who share media in breach of copyright - rather than on someone who is seeking to use material they have legitimately purchased for their own personal use - no-one has ever been sued for breaking the DRM on a CD or game unless they have also distributed it as far as I can tell.

Siduhe (who currently has about 9000 songs in high-bit electronic format, all legally purchased and with the original CDs retained where relevant. I don't condone illegal downloading in any form, but I very much espouse the "fair use" concept for music I have purchased.)

[Loz]

> no-one has ever been sued for breaking the DRM on a CD or game unless they have also distributed it as far as I can tell.

And, of course, this is where technologies such as bittorrent can slip up the unaware. Because downloading a file also turns your computer into a temporary uploader (due to the distributed nature of the protocol) then you can be done for a file-sharing infringement, even though you had no idea you were doing it.

[DJKillaQueen]

It's a complete myth btw that piracy is killing music. Recent research by a BBC documentary sourced statistics (I'll try and find them) that show that those who download illegally on average spend one third more buying CDs. And that piracy has let some consumers test music before they buy. The result is that sales are more evenly distributed and the former monopolies over artists by the big music publishing companies have been broken. Many would say that is a good thing.

Oh and who can forget the time when we in the UK were being charged double or more than those in the US for our CD purchases.....the publishers milked us for long enough.

[Huguenot]

"those who download illegally on average spend one third more buying CDs"

One third more than what...?

"piracy has let [..] the former monopolies over artists by the big music publishing companies have been broken"

It's not piracy that did this, but the ability of artists to promote themselves over media that has vast reach with a low entry cost. If they thought the result was going to be piracy they'd only promote it if they were a charity.

I can understand RosieH's view that the system has let her down, but the vast majority of piracy is simply the acquisition of vast libraries of entertainment with no intention of paying the artists or the people that supported them.

I continue to be disgusted by those who try to repackage this as a 'war on suits' or liberation for musicians. The only thing musicians are being liberated from is adequate recompense for their talent or their labour.

People may well argue that this is a good marketing technique, however, that does not give the thieves the right to impose this technique on artists by stealing and fencing their work. It is the artists' right to choose how they will promote themselves.

There is a gentle irony that the community that's most likely to be indulging in piracy are 'right-on' socialists who feel that the honest labourer is NOT being properly rewarded. Hypocrites? Huh, even lefties are robber-barons at heart it seems?

[SeanMacGabhann]

So if I go to Huguenot or kingy?s house I won?t find any cassettes, VHS tapes or DVDs with old recorded material? None? Ever?

And I don?t see any evidence of

?the community that's most likely to be indulging in piracy are 'right-on' socialists?

At all

[DJKillaQueen]

Yup....the most prevalent group for illegal downloading are teenagers and students.

Many adults that download go and buy the CD if they like it enough and the third more is a third more than those who never illegally download music. This is perhaps why more music publishers are finally allowing consumers to listen to an album online before they buy it.

To be honest there has always been illegal copying and it's never going to go away.