How does one know if it's legal to download something?

By now anyone who watches t.v. or reads a newspaper knows it’s illegal to download music from sites like Kazaa.

But what about other sites? How do I know if it’s legal or not to download the videos on stileproject.com ? I was on a web site about Sam Kinison that had a bunch of video clips of him performing. How do I know it was legal to view those? How far can this thing go?

Well, actually, you don’t know, and this is a big problem. The burden of proof will ultimately come to you to prove that you had a “right” to download and keep a copy of the items, and that the items have a chain of ownership and intellectual property rights adherence that maintains their legality.

It took me years before I built up enough legal backing to support my claim that scans of public domain artworks where the goal is to create an accurate reproduction and not add new content* were not in fact worthy of a copyright and were in fact also in the public domain. Until that point, I didn’t really know that it was absolutely legal to download scans of public domain works (especially since nearly all sites make very Scary and Frightening copyright statements, many of which are fraudulent and just scarecrows).

*[sub]BRIDGEMAN ART LIBRARY, LTD. v. COREL CORP., 36F. Supp. 2d 191 (S.D.N.Y., 1999)[/sub]

The best solution is to go to a site where downloading is legal.

For instance, http://www.buymusic.com lets you download songs and albums legally. You pay for them, but can put them on your computer and even burn CDs from them. The number is specified for each item. (And if you’re asking how, the files require you use Windows Media Player 9 to download and burn. I’m pretty sure there is a rights management feature in it that keeps track of the number of copies). CDs usually cost less than $10 and individual songs $0.99-1.25.

Music at http://www.mp3.com is also legal to download.

It’s simple. The way you know is by paying the US government large sums of money to perform a copyright search.

Wouldn’t the burden of proof be on the prosecuter (assume he was taken to court over the matter). In a case like this he would clearly be the defendent.

Just to nitpick: it is not illegal to download content from Kazaa or any other site. It is illegal to download copyrighted material from any site if the copyright owner has not given permission. That is, it is the content, not the source or protocol, which determines whether it’s illegal. If you were to download some public domain work through Kaaza, it would be legal. If you were to download music through Kazaa which was posted by the musician with permission to distribute, it would be legal. If you download unauthorized copies of anything, it’s illegal regardless of the source or method used.

I hate to belabor this point, but it’s very important to remember that technology in itself is not illegal (at least as long as it can show it has significant non-infringing uses). Music pirates don’t make P2P software itself illegal any more than child pornographers make web browsers illegal.

And how is one to know if it actually is legal? Just because you paid money for it doesn’t make it legal.

What I’m thinking of are all the websites that have some video clips…like Stile. Nowhere is there any info that downloading the free ones (or even the pay ones) is legal.
I did a search on Sam Kinison the other day, and came up with a site that had several long playing videos of his act. How is one to know that it’s ok to download those? I was searching sites for old commercials and came up with one that had about 50 video clips of 1970’s commercials. How am I to know that they had permission to post those. How am I to know if it’s ok for me to download those?

Isn’t it possible that there are thousands of sites with illegal things on them? Are copyright owners going to sue everyone who stumbled across something while surfing the web?
Will it get to the point where one needs to consult a lawer before going on line?

In “The Arts” section, page E3 of today’s (9/16) NY Times there’s a comic strip (yes!) entitled “The Revenge of the Copyright Cops” that takes a swipe at all this illegal copying.

It’s worth a look. Here are some excerpts:

According to a more thorough examination of copyright law, if you are engaged in any of the following acts. lega action could be brought against you.

Whistling a song wile riding a subway.

Walking dooor-to-door singing copyrighted Christmas carols like “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.”

“In a lot of these examples, copyright owners may not be able to win the lawsuits, but theye are all plausible cases that you wopuld need to come up with a defense for.” -Fred Von Lohmann, Esq. Intellectual Property Attorney

Singing “Happy Birthday” to your child in a restaurant.

Making a mix CD for friends, lovers or wedding guests.

Displaying posters of your favorite pop stars in your school hallway.

Blasting music out of your car window…

…some wish the record industry would actually crack down on this behavior instead!

If all this seems preposterous, let’s not forget that ASCAP* decided it was a violation to sing copyrighted songs around the fire at overnight and girlscout camps…

…and they WON.

“The application of copyright law in the new technological environment has been a challenge for everyone, but the complexity of the law can’t mask right versus wrong. Taking something that doesn’t belong to you is wrong.” Amy Weiss, RIAA** spokeswoman commenting on these scenarios.

I am going to try scanning this little gem.

If you want to see it, but don’t get the Times, or can’t view it at nytimes.com, and you have one of those safe places to email to, just say so, I will send it to you as an attachment.

If instead (and if it is okay with SD Management), you can tell me how to send it here as an attachment, I’ll do that, too.

*American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers

** Recording Industry Association of America

It depends on whether it is a civil or a criminal case. Most copyright and IP cases are civil (or all? I’m not sure), and thus there isn’t a prosecutor per se, but a plaintiff. The burden of proof in a civil case is different than in a criminal case, the common expression being a “preponderance of the evidence” as opposed to “beyond a legal doubt and moral certainty”. Now, those are not legal “definitions”, nor am I a lawyer yet, so I will defer to any actual attorney who wishes to pimp-slap me down here…

Can anyone tell me how to use boldface, itals, etc., in posts here?

It would have helped make my latest post (above) a little clearer. E.g., where my thoughts end and the “editorial” begins, and vice versa, bolface for emphasis as used in the piece, etc.
Also, can I somehow edit my post once it has been submitted?

Send a C-note to the moderators and they’ll do it for you. Otherwise, it can’t be done here.

Antiochus, to see how someone did a certain effect, click on the “quote” button for that post.

For your other questions, look at the “Forum Rules” at the bottom left corner of this page, click on the FAQ button at the top right corner of this page, and read all the sticky FAQ threads in the “About This Message Board” forum.