[timezone]

There appears to be a number of issues being discussed. The intrusion of DRM and the copyright issue.

As I understand the US law, we as a consumer have the right to fair use of a product. This includes copying material for backup purposes and personal use. The VCR industry decades ago won the personal use lawsuit. I believe it was Cablevision that recently won an appeal for DVR use. They want to use their own servers rather than the hard drive on the DVR to playback a movie. Their argument was, each copy was tied to the user that had the right to DVR a program.

So we have the right at least in the US to fair use of a product. However a company is not required to provide the consumer with the ability to utilize the right to fair use. DRM impedes our ability to fair use of a product. This is where I think it is murky. I believe someone offering a program to break DRM maybe breaking the law but the consumer using it to obtain fair use of the product may not be breaking the law. I wish there was a copyright lawyer here that could comment.

The other issue is the Pirate Bay case. If they provided servers where the copyrighted material ended up on its way between where the file was held and the person requesting the material then I believe that is enough to find them guilty. At the same time an AOL type of model or Internet provider operates like a bulletin board. They are not responsible for what people say or do. Just like the phone company is not liable for people discussing criminal activity on the phone. If Pirate Bay was just a peer to peer network without their own servers then I think they have a stronger case. The people sharing the illegal material would be the ones breaking the law.

Of course I really do not know the law and I am only offering these thoughts as items to consider as the debate rages on. Copyright infringement is a crime but I believe there are times when it gets tricky.