Trading could be considered illegal

This new thread is related to one recently closed to avoid legal problems.

I add this because if we are all informed, we can avoid personal or groupal problems.

The FBI page has published:

In the meantime, it is perfectly fine for anyone, without FBI approval, to use the following generic language on material protected under U.S. copyright law: "Warning: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000."

Even when it's stupid, the word unauthorized distribution could include trading. It doesn't say reproduction and distribution, it clearly says reproduction OR distribution.

This is another one from other source:

Warning the copyright proprietor has licensed this DVD (including its soundtrack) for private home use only. Unless otherwise expressly licensed by the copyright proprietor, all other rights are reserved. Any unauthorised copying, editing, exhibition, renting, lending, public performance, diffusion and or broadcast of this DVD, or any part thereof, is strictly prohibited. This DVD is not to be exported, resupplied or distributed by way of trade outside the EU without a proper license from Classic Entertainment. (Disc format DVD9).

This one is even more clear. So it's 100% illegal to trade DVD's with people outside USA and the interpretation of distribution in the first screen MAY include trading inside USA.

Iván

cobb wrote: So what you are saying Ivan, is that it is both ethically and legally wrong to share, copy or distribute copywritten material - wow, that's a surprise!

I don't talk about ethics, but my obligation as member of Prog Archives is to avoid risks being RIAA and their associates in other countries so strong lately.

Of course the law may change from country to country, but the FBI warning ckearly states this.

Being that Prog Archives doesn't encourage or allows illegal activities, I believe this policy must be informed.

Iván

Snow Dog wrote: I never did understand why its illegal to copy a CD for someone and yet ok to sell it second hand.

You bought the CD - so you can also sell it. Same as when you buy an apple, a car our a house. But copying the CD ... in Germany it is legal if that "someone" is a relative, or a very close friend. Other than that, copying the CD and giving it to someone is essentially creating a second CD from the one you bought, and thus causing potential damage to the rights owners - because your friend might otherwise have bought the CD himself.

Vompatti wrote: ^Copied CDs are pieces of plastic as well, yet selling them is illegal.

The copying is usually not illegal, just the selling. After all, you didn't buy them.

^theoretically it may be possible that even the artist him/erself is not authorized to sell those recordings, or to give them away for free. I remember that on the Devin Townsend homepage a link to a bootleg was removed a couple of weeks later "on request of the record label". Apparently sometimes the record label has more rights than the artist.

Empathy wrote: MikeEnRegalia wrote:  Apparently sometimes the record label has more rights than the artist. Sometimes?

Sometimes the artists produce the music themselves and keep all rights - today more so than in the past decades, because today it's less expensive to record an album. Let's hope that this trend continues!

Snow Dog wrote: MikeEnRegalia wrote: ^ sure it is - a compact disc is not virtual. It's a piece of plastic, some paper and a plastic case. Of course you can sell it. Are you deliberately not understanding???? Its not just a piece of plastic, if it was we would have nothing to write about!

About a month ago there was a lengthy article in my favorite computer magazine. From that I gather that it's absolutely legal (at least in Germany) to sell CDs and DVDs. Other countries might be different, but Germany is one of the most strict countries in terms of copyright ...

Why are you all so concerned about the word "distribution"? It hasn't got much to do with selling a used CD, has it?