The Legal Aspect Of File-Sharing

#1 (**permalink**) February 23rd, 2004

hey lee,,,

you seem to know so much more than me about is file sharing legal or not ,, from what i have read you seem to have really done some homework on this subject,, question for you ,, i bought a service called k-lite,, k-lite advertised that they are a file sharing site of music,movies,and more that is 100% legal,, they advertise you dont have to worry about getting caught ,,going to court,,they say they are legal,,,so i bought a years subscription with the idea that if sombody does end up suing me i could say that i paid for this site that was suposed to be legal,, go after them ,,not me,, have you ever heard of legal file sharing sites,,or do you think i got fooled into buying a false advertisment ?? and if you think it is false,, that i got fooled,,do you think the company suing me will be more interested in going after k-lite or just targeting me ??

LeeWare · #2 (**permalink**) February 23rd, 2004

Most of my opinions can be stated quite simply:

Don't share copyrighted material on the public Internet!

The record companies should have started by suing individuals. Copyright infringment is not a technological problem. The root cause of copyright infringment lies squarely on the sholders of the infringers. There is a remedy for those who didn't intend to infringe on someone elses work. It's call a cease and desist order = warning don't do this anymore. You have an opportunity to stop doing what your doing after this its open season.

I completely agree with the actions of MPAA, RIAA and BayTSG. When it comes to taking actions against pirates. However I completely disagree with them when they go after the technology that facilitates file sharing. File Sharing is not a bad thing.
File Sharing is not illegal.

Quote:

Originally posted by chick-n-man
hey lee,,

i did some-what agree with your views of copy rights,, sombody,, somwhere,,owns these songs that people are sharing,, i was wondering what your opinion is on this,,, back years ago sombody invented the old 10 foot satelite dish,,people bought them and found that they could pick up every channel in the sky,,,so premiem channels (hbo,showtime,and such) did not start suing people,,they scambled there signals,, so people invented black market descamblers ,, but in todays time even those are about usless because they scramble their signal so fast and often,,and can even send a signal that will burn the descrambler,,, the people with these old dishes were just getting what was availble to them as long as it was availble,, todays times sombody invented the computer and file sharing,,,people bought it and found they could share music,,what is your opinion on that if the record companies feel they are getting ripped off then make your cd"s where they can be played but not copied or shared i"m sure they have this technolgy,,, people who are doing this sharing are just doing what is availble to them,, i mean,, why pay for county water if you have a well ??? from what i have read ,,,you seem to be a person of good since and knowledge,, i was hoping to get your opinion on the record company suing people for just doing what is availible,, v/s doing like hbo,showtime making their product only availible to those who pay for the service ???

LeeWare · #3 (**permalink**) February 23rd, 2004

I assume you are talking about http://kazza.com Like most file sharing services you pay for access to their site i.e web page or software and your use of their site. i.e. web page is NOT illegal using there software is not illegal. What you download and share is another issue. I hate to break it to you but unless you are downloading and sharing content that is freely available and licensed for public distribution you got gouged.

If you read there material it says clearly that they are not responsible for the content that is shared. There pretty much repeat everything I've said countless times in the forum. Therefore, if you end up in court and you try to use the argument that you paid for the software and access to content. They the company will agree. However if you are in court because you got caught up in a sting operation for distributing infringing content that company is going to leave you holding the bag because their responsibility stops with collecting your money and giving you some software and access to some web pages. That's what you paid for not those juicy mp3s or feature length movies.

I would stop short of calling people who run these types of sites scam artists because what they are doing is perfectly legal. A little dishonest and not straight forward. It's like those companies that promised people access to good and high paying jobs.

If you first sign an agreement that you will not sue them or hold them liable for their services. Then you fork over $75 dollars then they lead you to a room where there are newspaper cut outs of high paying jobs.

There's a sucker born everyday.

Quote:

Originally posted by chick-n-man
hey lee,,,

you seem to know so much more than me about is file sharing legal or not ,, from what i have read you seem to have really done some homework on this subject,, question for you ,, i bought a service called k-lite,, k-lite advertised that they are a file sharing site of music,movies,and more that is 100% legal,, they advertise you dont have to worry about getting caught ,,going to court,,they say they are legal,,,so i bought a years subscription with the idea that if sombody does end up suing me i could say that i paid for this site that was suposed to be legal,, go after them ,,not me,, have you ever heard of legal file sharing sites,,or do you think i got fooled into buying a false advertisment ?? and if you think it is false,, that i got fooled,,do you think the company suing me will be more interested in going after k-lite or just targeting me ??

ursula · #4 (**permalink**) February 23rd, 2004

Correct me if I am wrong on this point, but, unless there has been a recent and fundamental change in legislation...

Downloading is legal

Uploading is not legal.

A bit like possesion/consumption of cannabis related substances in many countries today...
It's OK as long as you obtained it through a process similar to immaculate conception !!!

#5 (**permalink**) February 23rd, 2004

hey lee,,,

thanks man,,your info and views make good since,, i mean hey,, if sombody owns copyrights to somthing and you take it with out proper permision,,then you have violated copyright laws,,no matter how you cut it,, nothing comes free,, i"m gonna hold off on file-sharing until some judges make a definate ruling,,on the copyright issues,, and these law suits go away,, wish they would work somthing out where everybody is happy,, but thanks again for your info,views,and advice....

#6 (**permalink**) February 23rd, 2004

leeware will i be in trouble if

i dont know if ill be arrested/sued if i download for example [Edit] and i also wanna know is all movie downloading illegal

1. Being nice here and not posting the 'big' Edit Note about references to copyright infringement, but please do not name names of artists or song titles or software or any other copyrighted material.

2. No need to make multiple posts on the same subject or question.

3. Relax. Really... The tax people will probably get you in about 20 years or so if you simply stand still !
So, don't worry too much now about all of this.
Have a read through as much as possible and you'll be in a better position to decide what you wish to do.
I'm sure that LeeWare will be around to try to answer any questions that are not answered here already.

LeeWare · #7 (**permalink**) February 24th, 2004

Uploading is not illegal [it depend on what you upload]
Downloading it not illegal [it depends on what you download]

Finally let's say I wanted to pirate gigs of content. Well most file sharing networks have swarming features. Let say it takes me days or weeks to download the pirated content. During that time I am also a source for that content during that time. How would you know that their isn't an agency spider querying your host? You don't

Furthermore, people [not you] have presented arguments what if I named the file something else? how would they know the the file I have is the real one without downloading the entire file?

Again most of these arguments overlook fundamental facts.

The agencies use the same system used by the P2P networks to weed out fakes. Remember hash values etc. Therefore they know the real files by its values not the names.

Quote:

Originally posted by ursula
Correct me if I am wrong on this point, but, unless there has been a recent and fundamental change in legislation...

Downloading is legal

Uploading is not legal.

A bit like possesion/consumption of cannabis related substances in many countries today...
It's OK as long as you obtained it through a process similar to immaculate conception !!!

LeeWare · #8 (**permalink**) February 24th, 2004

The conclusions you have arrived at are the correct one. copyright infringment is copyright infringment no matter how you cut it.

I doubt if any judge will provide a ruling that states that it's okay to pirate content from the internet. No judge has the power to effectively reverse the standing copyright laws. The most the file sharing community can hope for is that they stop drawing heat for the actions of individuals. When I say the file sharing community I mean the P2P application producers. Technology should be free to innovate.

Now the purpose of my many discussion is NOT to discourage people from participating in file sharing network. It's to help people mitigate their legal issues while doing so. If you listen to the media reports you get the impression that P2P = piracy This is largely a falacy. It is more accurate to say that P2P is one of the way people pirate content. Alternatively, if you listen to those in the P2P community mainly users--RIAA and MPAA are the evil empire and they are infringing on peoples rights and in invading their privacy. This is also a falacy of omission.

MPAA and RIAA are groups the represent the interest of their members i.e. record companies and movie studios. People do you P2P to pirate content. The ISPs fight for the users rights to protect their own interest. NOT because they support piracy. The ISPs don't want to get sued for forking over people information without proper legal documentation. People commonly confuse this with the ISP is protecting me. No, the ISP has a legal responsibility to enfource its TOS and AUP policies. It also has the responsibility to respect the privacy of its customers. This does not equate to protecting pirates.

Quote:

Originally posted by chick-n-man
hey lee,,,

thanks man,,your info and views make good since,, i mean hey,, if sombody owns copyrights to somthing and you take it with out proper permision,,then you have violated copyright laws,,no matter how you cut it,, nothing comes free,, i"m gonna hold off on file-sharing until some judges make a definate ruling,,on the copyright issues,, and these law suits go away,, wish they would work somthing out where everybody is happy,, but thanks again for your info,views,and advice....

ursula · #9 (**permalink**) February 24th, 2004

Hi, LeeWare...

My error of omission...

That should have read -

Downloading copyrighted material is legal.

Uploading copyrighted material is not legal.

To paraphrase -
Taking is OK,
Giving is not.

The rulings with which I am familiar have all supported the above.

?

Morgwen · #10 (**permalink**) February 24th, 2004

Quote:

Originally posted by ursula
Downloading copyrighted material is legal.

Uploading copyrighted material is not legal

Wrong it depends on the countries law, Germany changed the law recently. Now also downloading is illegal, I believe the USA have a similar law. AFAIK Spain and Canada are countries where you are allowed to download.

Morgwen

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