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Originally Posted by nonanon
I confess so haul me away. In the 80s I used my VCR to record movies and tv shows without paying the copyright holder. Even before that I used cassettes to record music from the radio without making any payment.
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This is not illegal in the US; format shifting has been allowed for more than 30 years - i.e., pretty much since consumer vcrs became available.
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The only differences between that piracy and what occurs today is that the copies are much better because of much better tech. If I liked the movie or tv show, I bought it on VHS, the same with music, first on LPs, then on cassette, then on CD and now digital copies.
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The difference today is the internet, not the media. If I copy a cassette tape, I can share the copy with one friend at a time. And he can share it with one friend at a time, etc. If I make a digital copy of music, I can share it with millions of people, almost instantly. And all of those people can share it with millions of people. That's the difference.
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As for books, am I a pirate if I buy a used book? The author gets no money from the resell so isn't that piracy too?
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Not in the US. Google right of first sale.
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The greater threat to "creative types" is the biggest source of piracy ever known - the public library, where I first committed piracy back in the 60s. Reading books without paying for them, checking out magazines and later CDs and movies, all for free. If I liked it back then I spent my hard-earned allowance and bought it. Some things never change. The music industry feared LPs would ruin concert ticket sales and they've been wrong ever since.
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Library books have already been bought. See right of first sale.