Quote:
Originally Posted by cmbs
Harry, Fair Use is a specific set of laws, and what I said is correct.
The laws governing recording tv shows, and NOT DISTRIBUTING, would not fall under the Fair Use laws.
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No, I'm sorry, but that very specifically
is a matter of "Fair Use", and when video recorders first appeared, movie studios tried to get them outlawed under copyright law on the grounds that the recording of copyrighted TV shows was an imfringement. The court case which decided the matter was the decision of the US Supreme Court:
Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, Inc., 464 U.S. 417 (1984)
which ruled that the making of individual copies of complete television shows for purposes of time-shifting does not constitute copyright infringement, but is fair use. The Court also ruled that the manufacturers of home video recording devices cannot be liable for infringement.
This Supreme Court decision established the general legal principle, which has been applied more recently in file sharing court cases, that a device which has the capability of being used for copyright-infringement purposes can be legally used if it can be shown that it
also has significant
non-infringing uses.