Gangster, I know that’s the argument behind preventing any copies being made at all, and I can’t fault them for trying to protect their income.
What’s annoying the shit out of me is them actively doing everything they can to keep me from making backups for personal use.
Going back to 321 Studios, they made a product allowing you to do what is perfectly legal. The RIAA, in effect, ran the entire company out of the US for doing so. Now I’m stuck with expensive software that I can’t get support for unless I move to Canada. Does the RIAA give a damn about the $120 I’m out? Hell no, they’re just happy I can’t now use it to back-up a copy of Liar, Liar.
And going one step further, banishing an entire company to the Great White North hasn’t done a thing to stop, or even slow, piracy. 5 minutes and a few keywords in a search engine will offer up scores of ways of doing it.
So now I have to jump through a bunch of hoops and learn new programs to do something that I’m allowed to do in the first place. All the while using my $120 coaster to set my beer on. :mad:
Does anyone know if there’s some way to embed CD keys into movies to allow for small numbers of backups? Seems that would help to cut piracy while allowing users to make a backup.
<nitpick>
I think you mean the MPAA here. The RIAA doesn’t really care about your movies or software except insofar as the technology used to copy them can and is used for music piracy, and they’re both on the front lines of the DRM/piracy battles.
</nitpick>
I guess you’ve never heard of MacroVision. I hadn’t until I tried to view my DVD output through my VCR (to reduce the number of cables). Suddenly my screen was going bright to dark every few seconds. I thought my input on the VCR was broken, until I learned about MacroVision.
I don’t expect the MPAA to make sure I can backup my DVDs, but when they do everything possible to prevent it, I get pissed. They are violating the spirit (and likely the letter) of fair use.
Bodyguards protect your life. Police enact punishment for crimes commited–just with crimes like “conspiracy to commit murder” we have finagled things to allow the police to punish people for crimes that haven’t been commited yet. So I would maintain that the government still views the “right to live” as meaning only that you (or your stand-in does) have legal recourse to act against any person who divests you of your life.
That does appear to be so. If you get sued for success in accomplishing something which it was your right to do as stated by congress, then they have no legal basis on which to hope to win and are wasting time and making bad press for themselves. Doesn’t mean they might not try–just that it is stupid and quite officially a violation of your rights.
No. Their efforts to stop piracy make it difficult for you to exercise your right, but does not infringe on it. However, suing you for success in making a legal, personal backup is infringing on your rights.*
I would note that at this point, I am asserting things with much more force than I have any authority to do. As such, I am starting a GQ thread to verify for myself. This will be titled “Legally what does a ‘right’ mean so far as the US government is concerned?” Which I will link to if I can edit this post after starting the thread.
Not so. You won’t be liable for copyright infringement for making a backup, but breaking the copy protection (i.e. decrypting it) violates the Digital Millennium Copyright Act because it circumvents an access control. You can’t legally make a backup copy of a DVD without permission. You can’t even legally watch the DVD on an unlicensed player, since you have to decrypt it to watch it.
Also, owning a permenant marker is verboten, sinnce by drawling a line on the outside of a disk, you can defeat copy protection, and you just can’t have technology that let’s you do that. Or some such simulair nonesense.
Nitpick noted. Both piss me off to the same level and I sometimes just meld the two. It was the MPAA I meant to deride, I believe. Thanks for clearing it up.
I really, really, really hope this isn’t true. I’ve never heard it so I could be whooshed here, but I want to avoid even snarky comments about breaking the law.
It’s true. Sony’s “Key2Audio” protection format could be defeated by simply covering up part of the disc with a marker. They never filed any DMCA lawsuits against people for selling Sharpies, but presumably they could have - under the DMCA, a felt tip marker is just as much of a circumvention device as a program like DVD X Copy.
I just knew I should have put this in the Pit. (Because of my own anger). And you’re adding to it. Maybe. Let’s see.
I hadn’t even thought about the DMCA. I was stuck in the '80’s and what Congress ruled in the “landmark” (apparently not?) fair use legislation. And I’ll admit I’m not familiar with the ramifications of the DMCA with regards to “fair use”.
Did the DMCA effectively wipe out the “fair use” argument and law? Or did it offer some kind of loophole to circumvent the law? (Apologies to the grammer police)
No, fair use is still as alive as it ever was (depending on how you look at it). What the DMCA did is create a new type of violation–circumventing an access control–and fair use is only a defense to copyright infringement, not this new crime.
So if you can legally gain access to the video on a DVD (say, by playing it on a TV and then pointing your camcorder at the TV, or hooking the DVD player’s outputs up to your PC’s video capture card), then you can legally make copies as long as they fall within fair use.
Circumvention of access controls is only an issue when there are access controls, of course. You can still do all the fair use copying you want of VHS tapes (Macrovision isn’t an access control, although the DMCA does mention it, so some forms of disabling it are still illegal), books, text on web sites, etc.
Specifically, it’s legal to make a copy of the bits on a DVD that you own. If you could create a perfect copy of an encrypted DVD that you bought, without decrypting it, then you’d be able to legally do so (as long as what you did with it fell under fair use). The disc contains a bunch of encrypted video files, and a key that your DVD player users to decrypt it, so ideally, you’d be able to just blindly copy all of that to a new disc.
But because of the way DVD burning works, you can’t make a perfect copy of the disc. You can copy the encrypted data, but not the key, so any copies you make that way will be useless (but still legal under fair use). The only way to make a working copy of the disc would be to decrypt it first, and that’s what violates the DMCA.
Just to be technically accurate, my understanding is that it is not an issue of “how DVD burning works”, but rather that no recorders are released for public use which will write to the section with the keys, nor (probably) are any DVDs released where the section with the key uses a material that can be written to by burning. So it’s not a technical issue so much as a “no one sells anything which will allow it” issue.
Of course, given some impressive scanning equipment, a bucket of random molecules, and enough nanites you could make a perfect copy of anything.
Had forgotten about it due to the magical box I purchased many a year ago. There is still a legal and feasible method for a making a copy of your DVDs though:
I believe you can write the keys if you use a DVD-R for Authoring drive and media, but they’re so expensive that there’s no point. You’d do better to just get two copies of every DVD you ever buy.
[QUOTE=duffer]
2. Do Not post or link to anything that is even questionably illegal. I’ve got at least one warning already for pushing the P2P argument. Again, this isn’t about breaking laws.
Anyway, here’s the buildup for the thread. Last fall I paid $119.99 at Best Buy for DVD XCOPY Gold published by 123Studios. It is a software program designed to copy any DVD (movie or data) so you can have a back-up copy of it. Thanks to whatever happened, 123Studios is no longer available in the US. The nearest support center is in Canada, but the web site and phone number listed won’t help Americans.
[QUOTE]
Then “call from Canada” from the privacy of your own home. Find a canadian phone number via bartering with the natives of that strange land, (or use an online phone book, for a bussiness, and use it after bussiness hours) and then use:http://www.covertcall.com/26897
(21) Is Orange Boxing legal?
That depends entirely on why you are doing it.
Orange Boxing is probably completely legal for joke/gag purposes.
Also, if you’re a telemarketer you are probably aware of new
telemarketing regulations that require you to transmit valid Caller ID
that indicates a real phone number where the called party can reach your
company. These regulations aren’t specific on whether that Caller ID
must come before the call is answered or if afterwards is OK. If you
are doing telemarketing from home and don’t want to give out your home
phone number to everyone you call, then the Orange Box may allow you to
comply with these regulations by letting you spoof your own company’s
toll free number.
However, if you are planning to use an Orange Box to deceive or harass
someone, then perhaps it is for the best that its limitations make it
least useful for these highly illegal and unethical purposes.
We are not lawyers - ask one before you try doing something you think
might be illegal.
Anyway, do you really want to watch a film that’s compressed from the copy process? Just buy another copy when it’s time and enjoy it in full DVD resolution.
With the advent of dual layer DVD burning, there’s no quality loss (not that it’s very noticable anyway if you have the time to do deep analysis and error compensation). DVD+R DL media is expensive, but still cheaper than buying another copy of the movie.
Shudder.
An update, but first, a refresher on Fair Dealing U.K. and Fair Use U.S.
Now, I just turned to Slashdot and found the following (wait, if you like the show arrested devlopment, stop reading this and turn to fox.)
Your Rights Online: MGM Concedes Some Fair-Use Rights Exist
The Internet
Posted by timothy on Sunday April 03, @04:34PM
from the how-very-gracious-of-them dept.
jambarama writes “MGM seems to have given a little in the Grokster case. After getting nailed on the possible implications of banning P2P software, they’ve now admitted it is perfectly legal to rip one’s own CD and store it. Is this a return to the stripped down ‘fair use’ rights or a temporary court concession?” Read More
