Copyright law [LWN.net]

Copyright law

Posted Nov 12, 2020 22:07 UTC (Thu) by ldearquer (guest, #137451)
In reply to: Copyright law by Wol
Parent article: The RIAA, GitHub, and youtube-dl

If the law incorporates an exception for private copies, it is pretty much all about redistributing.
Granted this exception may not be common across jurisdictions.

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Copyright law

Posted Nov 13, 2020 0:20 UTC (Fri) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link] (7 responses)

What do you mean by "redistributing". The exception in English law says you can have copies AS LONG AS YOU ALSO HAVE THE ORIGINAL.

To me, "redistribution" means giving copies to friends etc. They don't have the original (I do), so those copies are illegal!

If I have both the original and the copies (the only legal possibility), then that's not redistribution! And if I give the original away, I have to destroy the copies as they are no longer legal.

Cheers,
Wol

Copyright law

Posted Nov 13, 2020 11:56 UTC (Fri) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] (3 responses)

To me, "redistribution" means giving copies to friends etc. They don't have the original (I do), so those copies are illegal!

Here in Germany we get to give an (unspecified) limited number of copies of music CDs we own to friends and family (not random strangers). In theory there's a surcharge on CD-ROM burners and blanks that is distributed to the artists, composers, music publishers etc. as compensation.

Copyright law

Posted Nov 13, 2020 12:54 UTC (Fri) by anton (subscriber, #25547) [Link] (2 responses)

The surcharge is reality, and we also pay it on hard disks, printers and probably many other things. And your GEMA and our AKM gets the money (based on the theory that they represent all the authors, artists, etc.) and distributes some of it to its members.

Copyright law

Posted Nov 13, 2020 14:48 UTC (Fri) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] (1 responses)

AFAIR the GEMA surcharge on CD-ROM media applied to “audio-quality” CD-ROM blanks (which are otherwise identical to standard CD-ROM blanks). I don't think anyone uses these any longer.

Historically, CD-ROM blanks were not exclusively used for copyrighted music – when the idea was new, CD-ROMs were popular as backup media, for sharing family photographs with relatives or sending them off to be printed, etc., and people reasonably objected to having to pay GEMA for the privilege of storing their own stuff on their own CD-ROM blanks.

Copyright law

Posted Nov 13, 2020 17:07 UTC (Fri) by jem (subscriber, #24231) [Link]

I'm not German, but this Wikipedia article lists surcharges on DVD media, external hard drives, MP3 players, PCs, Mobile phones, set-top boxes, scanners and printers, etc.

This is a bureaucratic system, and unfair to users which don't use these products for storing copyrighted material. The system also doesn't make sense with dwindling prices per gigabyte on external media. If the charge is ~2 cents per gigabyte for CD-R, then, for the same price per byte, it ought to be 200 € for a 10 TB hard drive. How about 20000 € for some future 1 PB media? Should cloud storage also be affected?

The same system was also used in Finland until the end of 2014, at which point it was abandoned completely.

Copyright law

Posted Nov 13, 2020 14:18 UTC (Fri) by ldearquer (guest, #137451) [Link] (2 responses)

> What do you mean by "redistributing". The exception in English law says you can have copies AS LONG AS YOU ALSO HAVE THE ORIGINAL.

That was my whole point. I see I failed to word it properly :)

I was saying, I always thought the copyright law is all about distributing copies. Once you have an original, you can *not* make copies and distribute them. But you can make (private) copies and keep them for yourself (for your car, etc).

So, you can make copies, but not distribute them

So I thought youtube-dl use was OK as long as I don't make copies and distribute them. Because I was not aware of further restrictions imposed by DCMA.

Copyright law

Posted Nov 13, 2020 19:04 UTC (Fri) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link] (1 responses)

It's not "further restrictions imposed by the DMCA". The default position of copyright law is you cannot make any copies full stop. Not for personal use. Not for backups. Not even temporary copies required to run programs.

That's why things like software licences appeared - so people could legally run their programs. And all the exemptions about personal copies.

The DMCA was an attempt to criminalise what was already illegal - making unauthorised copies of commercial DVDs. (Made all the more complicated by the American concept of "fair use" and people saying "making backups is fair use".)

Cheers,
Wol

Copyright law

Posted Nov 13, 2020 22:37 UTC (Fri) by ldearquer (guest, #137451) [Link]

> I was saying, I always thought the copyright law is all about distributing copies. Once you have an original, you can *not* > make copies and distribute them. But you can make (private) copies and keep them for yourself (for your car, etc).

s/copyright law/status quo of copyright law plus applicable private copies exeptions (existent in most jurisdictions)/