Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
Depends where you live. It's not legal in the UK, for example. I'm not entirely sure that backing up DVDs is legal in the US - ISTR that one of the big software companies (might have been the makers of "RealPlayer") was forced to withdraw from sale a DVD "backup" program when the courts ruled that it was a tool for infringing copyight, and that DVD owners did not have an inherent "right" to create backup copies of their DVDs.
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Whattayasay we look at some actual "law."
http://www.jenkins.eu/copyright-(sta...rt-1-index.asp
Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988
1988 CHAPTER 48
The Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (and amending legislation) is reproduced under the terms of Crown Copyright Policy Guidance issued by HMSO.
An Act to restate the law of copyright, with amendments; to make fresh provision as to the rights of performers and others in performances; to confer a design right in original designs; to amend the Registered Designs Act 1949; to make provision with respect to patent agents and trade mark agents; to confer patents and designs jurisdiction on certain county courts; to amend the law of patents; to make provision with respect to devices designed to circumvent copy-protection of works in electronic form; to make fresh provision penalising the fraudulent reception of transmissions; to make the fraudulent application or use of a trade mark an offence; to make provision for the benefit of the Hospital for Sick Children, Great Ormond Street, London; to enable financial assistance to be given to certain international bodies; and for connected purposes.
15th November 1988
BE IT ENACTED by the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:-
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CHAPTER III.
ACTS PERMITTED IN RELATION TO COPYRIGHT WORKS.
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Computer programs: lawful users
Section 50A: Back up copies
50A.-(1) It is not an infringement of copyright for a lawful user of a copy of a computer program to make any back up copy of it which it is necessary for him to have for the purposes of his lawful use.
(2) For the purposes of this section and sections 50B, 50BA and 50C a person is a lawful user of a computer program if (whether under a licence to do any acts restricted by the copyright in the program or otherwise), he has a right to use the program.
(3) Where an act is permitted under this section, it is irrelevant whether or not there exists any term or condition in an agreement which purports to prohibit or restrict the act (such terms being, by virtue of section 296A, void).
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Now, I do not pretend to be conversant with UK law. So I can't state categorically what the state of UK law is at the present time.
The law I've cited above deals with computer programs, not DVDs. But the underlying copyright concepts for both are the same, & I'm pretty confident that UK law runs parallel to US law, although it might deviate in details.
Here's how US law runs, broadly speaking:
1. it is NOT illegal for a private person to make a copy of digital media which he owns himself, even if the program is DRMed.
2. it IS illegal to sell or distribute a program which defeats DRM.
3. a private person who copies, for personal use, digital media which he owns, has done nothing illegal, and this remains true even if he defeats DRM to do so.
4. the person who gives him or sells him the program HAS done something illegal.
Now, can you see the distinctions here? Owners have the right to copy digital media. But it is illegal to sell/give tools to defeat DRM to those owners. The illegality of the latter does not impact the legality of the former, although it has a practical effect.
Do DVD owners have an inherent "right" to create backups? No - not in the sense that such a right can be asserted to defeat the statutory framework involving DRM of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. But at the same time, making backup copies does not violate copyright law.
And please pay particular attention to the following section of the UK law I've cited:
(3) Where an act is permitted under this section, it is irrelevant whether or not there exists any term or condition in an agreement which purports to prohibit or restrict the act (such terms being, by virtue of section 296A, void).
I was really pleased to see this, because there doesn't seem to be a statutory counterpart in US law, although the legal principle is the same here. Now, this section is not directly on point to some of the discussions we've been having about these sorts of things. But any lawyer reading this language will get the flavor of the situation. What this section strongly suggests, in the ebook context, is that just because some ebook seller in England tries to condition the purchase of an ebook on the buyer "agreeing" that the ebook cannot be copied or transferred, the condition is void if the statute protects such a right.
In the US context, the same legal principle means that since I, as the purchaser of copyrighted material, have the right to "fair use" of the material, the seller cannot restrict that right by contract or in any other fashion.
This is why copyright holders wanted the DMCA. If that Act had not been passed, sellers of copyrighted material would have been unable to enforce DRM by claiming the existence of a contract in which the buyer had given up his right to defeat the DRM and copy the file.
Bottom line: no ebook owner need fear the law if he makes a backup copy of the ebook, and lends either the original or the copy to a friend, so long as it really is a loan, and the friend either returns or deletes the copy after taking a reasonable period to read it.