Gee, so all those restaurants and bars that openly display cable programming are illegal. Why aren't they busting in on Fat Johnny's Extreme House of Wings when they are showing ESPN to anybody who walks in off the street ??

I sorta already posted the copyright is about distro not use bit

Maybe i'm not the person to ask because I believe hacking should be legal but my pov on this is that its ok as long as you don't sell or give copy's cause the person distributing them to you is wrong of course that makes you an accessory(I think).

but it was a good way to elaborate

yeah how come tivo isn't illegal? can't you skip commercials with it?

I really don't see how this could be considered illegal, or how anybody could say it is illegal.

Downloading copies of something that is actually sold, like a DVD, is one thing. But downloading something that is free over broadcast (yes, you can watch many TV channels with no cable service) is something completely different.

Who really gives a flying f*ck? You could have taped it.

All this legal/illegal stuff is just a bunch of crap. You could have watched it on TV for FREE anyway!

So get it and watch it.

YOU ARE TEH TERRORISTZ

YOU HAVE TO GIEV MONEY TO POOR TV INDUSTRY

YOU COMMUNIST PIECE OF ****

YOU'RE A DISGRACE TO YOUR GREAT NATION

WHAT'S NEXT? MURDERING YOUR OWN FAMILY? LOSING CHRISTIAN FAITH?

I'm amused that anyone is bothered by the ethical questions of this.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to get back to watching James Burke's "Connections," which I just downloaded

And I'll go back to watching the X-Files which I just downloaded

Man, this is exactly why I hate copyright law. I am so confused now that I'm afraid to turn on my VCR lest some MPAA goon squad bust down my door.

I'm reminded of what Senator Elihu Root said about our tax code:

"I guess you will have to go to jail. If that is the result of not understanding the Income Tax Law I shall meet you there. We shall have a merry, merry time, for all of our friends will be there. It will be an intellectual center, for no one understands the Income Tax Law except persons who have not sufficient intelligence to understand the questions that arise under it."

Good lord, how hard is it to make straightforward and reasonable copyright laws?

Was that supposed to be funny?

Downloading stuff from broadcast is stupid, illegal or not. That's like stealing music at 32 kbps. It is compressed so bad you can count the artifacts. I'd pay $40 for Family Guy season 3, and not have to deal with the off color, high compression, sound issues, messed up proportions, etc. And everyone should have Family Guy.

And about the stealing. Borrowing requires a third party who knows who you are to have purchased the said item (tv show). Since only 5% of the P2P users supply 80% of the poor quality content, then it is highly likely you are stealing from somebody who stole that episode from someone else. It is stealing, broadcast, dvd, or whatever. It's not yours.

And you'd have to be paranoid to believe that the MPAA is going to bust down your door. And who uses a VCR anymore?

Sorry, I guess sarcasm and hyperbole do not translate well onto forums. I didn't mean for that to be taken quite so literally.

And I do use a VCR, although I also have a DVD player. Sorry, I haven't sprung for a TiVo yet.

On the legal implications of downloading TV shows -- legally speaking, it is probably not that simple. The copyright laws are notoriously complex, and common sense judgments are not always the legally correct ones (in general as well as in this case). Not that I know what's right in this case either... I'm not a intellectual property lawyer.

But on a moral plane, don't you think it's-well-wrong to download stuff like that? You didn't buy it, so you stole it. I thought it would be simpler than way. But morality to most people around here is only tacking 1,000 and looking at porn only twice a day.

MacNN doesn't need that attitude! Get the **** out!!!

Ethically speaking, I take the Mill's "harm to others" approach. So:

Broadcast TV, I think it's fine to download and maybe even share. Revenue is generated for those programs by selling advertising, and by downloading the programs you're not hurting those revenues (not very much, anyway -- only by *maybe* infintesimally decreasing their ratings.) Most people are probably downloading simply because of their schedule or to archive their favorite programs.

Cable TV, it's a bit murkier. You're more directly harming the cable company, which generates ad revenues but also charges user fees to subscribers. Downloading the program short-circuits both of those sources of revenue if you're not a cable subscriber. If you are a subscriber -- again, I'd say it's probably fine, so long as you're not handing it out to others (presumably non-subscribers.) You've paid your fee, and they'd certainly let you tape or TiVo cable TV programs for personal use.

Agree or disagree?

Don't forget Interpol and the FBI who put those nice scary messages at the end of videos and DVDs.



I think that we're mostly discussing the merits of downloading non-DVD released works (but you seem to group all of us anyway: It is stealing, broadcast, dvd, or whatever. It's not yours.") And there are content that isn't as badly pixelated. HDTV rips are pretty close to DVD quality—closer than TV rips of course.


Interesting points thus far:

Commercials are copyrighted works as well.

Any public place showing TV is similar to downloading.

Bittorrent leachers are also seeders (I conveniently forgot this fact).

TiVO and more advanced VCRs allow the user to skip commercials.

Read this on anti-piracy for movies.article

Uhm... no.

What do we know?

TV is free, advertising pays for it.
These are TV rips so I don't see any problem with downloading them off of the net.

Some people might say that with out the commercials you are stealing it.
By that logic, every time you get up and leave during a commercial break you are stealing television.

If the show is on cable though it could be argued that you are stealing it because you didn't pay for cable, yet cable has MORE commercials than regular TV!
So who is stealing from whom? You "stealing" TV, or the cable broadcasters stealing your time? You decide.

Though, when dealing with entertainment (movies, TV...etc), there are few instances where someone isn't getting screwed out of something. My philosophy is: Better them than me.

Cable TV is not free. Cable companies pay for those channels. Those channels derive their income from ads and payments from cable operators.

Yeah, they're idiots. The whole ad concept is based on voluntary viewing by the viewer. But, when you download a TV rip, though, someone else has removed the ads for you. That is where they have the problem. The choice should be made by the viewer. Even if you choose to download the ad-less rip, you are cheating them. The ad concept works based on the viewer's inaction (i.e. they see the ads through just sitting there, avoid ads by actively leaving the room, changing the channel, etc.) If the rip is available without ads, you don't see them through inaction. That is where the problem lies. If too many people start doing that, shows get cancelled due to low "legitimate" viewer ship.

They have more ads because advertisers pay a lot less for ads on cable due to a smaller audience. Cable operators still have to pay for those channels because the ads still do not pay for the channel completely.


Let's hope you don't produce products for people with the same philosophy.

How about borrowing a CD or a DVD from someone in person? Would that be illegal? And what about royalties on books from the library, where you don't have to pay to check them out?