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Ripping CDs Set To Be Legalized In UK
nk497 writes "The UK is finally set to legalize format shifting, making it legal for the first time to rip songs or films from CDs and DVDs. Ripping is technically illegal under copyright protection laws, despite most industry lobbyists agreeing it was time for a change. The rules look set to be modernized as the government endorses a recent intellectual property report, which also called for the government to ditch plans to require ISPs to block illegal file-sharing sites without a court order."
It was illegal in the UK? I would have thought that of all places, it would have been illegal in the US. Truth is sometimes stranger than fiction I guess...
"People don't want to learn linux" hasn't been a valid excuse since '03.
I am not trying to be a pessimist here, but I would think there is some small loophole in the new law, that would give the British equivalent of RIAA or MPAA some leverage. Anyone knows anything about this ?
Awesome that the UK legalizes format shifting.
If we're finally getting around to CDs now, I guess sensible laws relating to downloaded/streamed content will be coming in around 2030.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
I thought the reason this was illegal was because ripping (almost all) commercial DVDs involved breaking CSS? Will this make circumventing such crappy DRM legal then?
Okay, I am curious. How does this matter in the long run? As per the US-UK extradition treaty, US laws trump UK laws anyways. If it is illegal in USA, a UK citizen can get arrested and extradited regardless. And considering the kind of laws RIAA/MPAA lobbying has managed to get passed("economic terrorism"), it will be eventually illegal, once RIAA does gets around to getting a rider attached to some important bill to get fair-use rights eroded. And at that point, the treaty means that it will be illegal in UK as well for all practical purposes automatically. Or am I misinterpreting this somehow?
I'm ignorant about UK laws, do you have some kind of breaking-encryption-is-verboten-law?
Even circumventing completly useless "encryptions" like CSS is afaik not allowed under DMCA, copy prevention systems for audio CDs like intentionally corrupt data are imo similar protected.
Does the format shifting law explicitly include that the original has to be unencrypted?
No, we just have copyright laws that have no concept of fair use.
Therefore we can't time or format shift, can't use copyrighted material in parodies or for other works without getting permission from the copyright holder, and so forth.
Nobody ever prosecuted anyone on these issues unless it was blatantly criminal activity (e.g. selling dodgy copies on a market stall). But ignorance of the law is no excuse, and under these laws about 95% of all UK citizens are criminals. I doubt you'll find anyone alive since the 80's that hasn't copied music to tape for listening in a car/walkman, recorded something to videotape for later viewing, ripped music from a CD as an MP3/AAC file, and so forth. It's just become one of those laws that's there but nobody cares about.
I've not checked the proposed changes, but I suspect that it's a fairly broad - and long overdue - attempt to introduce a more US-like set of exceptions. I doubt that we will be allowed to legally circumvent DRM, though - that would be a step too far for the corporate lobbyists.
People are just reporting the "legal to copy a CD" thing because it's attention grabbing. Most readers will look at the headline and wonder what it's on about, as they didn't know it was illegal...
I'm ignorant about UK laws, do you have some kind of breaking-encryption-is-verboten-law?
I didn't know, but Copyright and Related Rights Regulations 2003 seems to be the relevant law.
IANAL. It seems to be illegal to break encryption for commercial reasons, I'm not sure about non-commercial reasons. But if the encryption prevents things you're allowed to do (so, soon format shifting...?) then there must be a way round that.
US, UK. Both common-law countries, yet they seem have such different legal/judicial "cultures".
I suspect that someone accused of filesharing 24 songs over dialup wouldn't get a multimillion-dollar decision of damages against them in the UK. But, of course I could be wrong. Are there any barristers / solicitors lurking on /. to chime in and give us first hand opinion about the differences in the practice of IP law between the two countries?
In France, private copy was always legal, but the fact that it stayed legal for so long is because "private copy tax" was introduced on all storage media (blank CDs/DVDs, memory cards, hard drives). This tax is per MB, and has never been updated, which means that you sometimes pay more tax on a new hard drive than the drive is worth.
Hopefully it won't get like that in the UK...
"But if the encryption prevents things you're allowed to do (so, soon format shifting...?) then there must be a way round that."
Not really. Being "allowed" to do something does not mean you have a right to do so. This is also a common misconception regarding the US Fair Use doctrine. Fair Use is not a right, but it is a defence you can use in a case against you.
The difference may seem subtle, but if it was "a right", then companies wouldn't be allowed to use encryption to stop you from exercising your rights. Since format shifting will be merely "allowed", the media companies will still be allowed to use DRM to stop you from doing so.
I doubt any front bench politician would have the balls to call for format shifting to become a right.
This is something that Labour went out of their way to keep illegal during the last copyright review - hopefully this helps show that while the Conservatives are evil amoral bastards, at least they're not quite so crazily desperate to set up a police state (by criminalising things that everyone does AND trying to remove the right to a jury trial / destroying the idea of double jeopardy)
"But if the encryption prevents things you're allowed to do (so, soon format shifting...?) then there must be a way round that."
Not really. Being "allowed" to do something does not mean you have a right to do so. This is also a common misconception regarding the US Fair Use doctrine. Fair Use is not a right, but it is a defence you can use in a case against you.
I can't really add anything beyond just copying out the bit of the Wikipedia:
The new section 296ZE creates a remedy via complaint to the Secretary of State if a technical device or measure prevents a person or group of people from carrying out a permitted act with relation to the work. The Secretary of State may issue a direction to the owner of the copyright to take such measures as are necessary to enable the permitted act to be carried out. The breach of such a direction is actionable as a breach of statutory duty.
and the relevant section of the act.
The law itself is far too confusing.
But what about ripping CD`s into Itunes, the music is only for your use, and many people want to copy music into their library and keep the music CD away somewhere safe. This is a good decision.
liberare massarum ex ignorantia, clausa descendit molestie.
It's the result of a one-sided change in the law. Copyright was solely a civil tort and you HAD to prove damages to get damages. Since format shifting for your own purposes was illegal but caused no damage to the copyright holder, there was no need to make it legal: no court would take it on.
Then they changed the law about needing to prove damages.
Therefore we can't time or format shift
Format shifting is illegal, which is utterly ridiculous, however time shifting is explicitly legal (see section 8).
It's official. Most of you are morons.
With such a measure, the average Joe will claim "format shifting" each time he makes a copy for himself, his friends, his mates.
You do have a "turning copy". Your wife (such was the societal norms in those days) can be given a copy of any copyrighted work you have. It's not often known and of course it's not promoted as a right you have by the copyright lobby.
More than a lot of the /. postings, this one needs a suddenoutbreakofcommonsense tag. Let's hope U.S. courts eventually come to the same conclusion as their UK counterparts.
Bark less. Wag more.
This post should be modded up.
After all being amoral is what copyright is all about.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
Are audio CD's basically obsolete at this point anyway?
It's legalised.
can't use copyrighted material in parodies or for other works
Yes you can. Parody may be covered under crticism depending on the nature of the parody.
This is also a common misconception regarding the US Fair Use doctrine. Fair Use is not a right, but it is a defence you can use in a case against you.
In Eldred v. Ashcroft (2003), the U.S. Supreme Court held that there are a few things keeping the exclusive rights granted to authors from violating the constitutional guarantee of freedom of the press. Expiry is not one of them, but fair use is.
How is this relevant in today's "cdless" world?
But then what? You need to build up the next picture frame with the additional information in the next chunk of encrypted data.
That means you need to STORE it.
and a few Downings
Comment removed based on user account deletion
"No, we just have copyright laws that have no concept of fair use."
This is an often repeated myth, and is simply not true. Numerous exceptions including time shifting exist in UK law already
See here to get it straight from the horse's mouth:
http://www.ipo.gov.uk/types/copy/c-other/c-exception.htm
What is changing is that format shifting, and parody works are being added to the existing list of things like time shifting, and research or review work.
>however time shifting is explicitly legal [
Unless you watch it twice or simply keep a copy beyond the first viewing.
Destroy that old Red Dwarf you taped off BBC2 now you tortuous infringer!!
As is evident in Canada, where we are about to receive an amendment to copyright that although it explicitly endorses private copying, format and time shifting, and numerous other fair use activities, at the same time it suspends *ALL* of those privileges under the sole condition that the work is protected by any form of digital lock, in addition to prohibiting the sale, creation, or importing of any tools which do not have any significant use outside than defeating such locks, creating additional incentives for publishers to utilize such locks (since they would enjoy legal protection), which in turn results in a diminished number of unlocked works in the future and effectively makes those privileges completely moot other than for the lawmakers to "proudly" boast about all the fair dealing privileges that Canada grants.
I'm pretty sure that if Canada's government can manage to give with one hand while simultaneously taking away with the other, that Britain can do the same.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
I am not a lawyer, but it is a common misconception that Fair Use is "just a defense" to a copyright lawsuit. If you look at the law, it says that Fair Use is a limitation on the scope of copyright. Anything that is Fair Use, is by definition a use that copyright does not grant exclusively to the artificial monopoly holder. That is, it's a use where the public gets to exercise the right to copy (part of the right to free speech) that they already have. So, in a technical sense, Fair Use does not need to give you any rights; but in a practical sense, to speak of it as "not a right" is to obscure the very important fact that it enables the exercise of existing rights.
Therefore we can't time or format shift, can't use copyrighted material in parodies or for other works without getting permission from the copyright holder, and so forth.
Time shifting and format shifting doesn't fall under "fair use" in the US either. There is a huge difference between what you and I would consider fair (anything that doesn't hurt the copyright holder) and what is "fair use" according to copyright law. (Just occurred to me that the copyright holder may feel very much hurt by a parody of his works, but it is still "fair use").
None of these ever work, though. If you have to violate DMCA to read an audio CD, then you've already got a CD that doesn't work in hardly any players, so it'll have a high return rate and lots of bad word-of-mouth.
I haven't seen an attempted-copy-protected CD in about 9 years, and the one I saw back then just plain didn't work in any player at all. Since then, none of the hundreds I bought required any DMCA-violations in order to use them.
Music briefly flirted with DRM but then gave up. Music is actually a pretty legitimate market now, as long as you keep away from the downloadable stuff, where it's intended for use with proprietary players like iTunes or Microsoft' equivalent (whatever that is) or crap like that.
Buying music CDs is totally safe.
. I doubt you'll find anyone alive since the 80's that hasn't copied music to tape for listening in a car/walkman, recorded something to videotape for later viewing
There are adults alive today who can't remember video or cassette tapes, or the Sony Walkman. Yeah they might have been alive but they were babies.
Having a well-funded BBC is a completely worthwhile, admirable thing to do. In and amongst its more inane offerings (which at least have the virtue of being comparatively cheap to produce), the BBC produces and funds some of the highest quality television around. If we're going to fund blowing up the Middle East and council flats for teenagers skiving off school to concentrate on making babies, there is an argument for also devoting a comparatively small proportion of money to funding some educational, inspirational television.
But, the TV licence is a fundamentally moronic way of raising those funds whose only tangible purpose is to keep TV licence van drivers in jobs. A huge number of services not "strictly necessary for the survival of the human race" are paid for out of general taxation, be it local libraries, motorways, evening classes in martial arts for the over-60s, empty buildings rented by the NHS etc, even though they benefits only a certain sector of society. Why make the BBC such a special case that you go to the anal measure of driving special vehicles up and down the country to collect this specific tiny proportion of tax...?
What would be the various ways one might violate this law. Be specific on the details ;)
No, some format shifting is explicitly legal. The Philips 765 CD burner that I own, for example, is explicitly intended to convert analog audio from other stereo components into digital and record it on CD, or make digital copies of existing CDs, but it (a) will only burn to CD-R discs which are marked "Digital Music" (making sure the music industry gets a cut of the CD price), and has certain copyright features(SCMS) in place to limit making multi-generation copies.
The Audio Home Audio Recording Act of1992 explicitly allows for such format shifting as long as authorized equipment is used.
Mainframe/UNIX Bit Twiddler and long time Windows/Linux Hobbyist.
The Theorem Theorem: If If, Then Then.
That is irrelevant to this. CD's are not and can not be encrypted or they simply won't play in a CD player. CDs can only have mostly useless copy protection on them. I don't know if there are any updated techniques, but the protection used to rely on Autorun on Windows running a program from a data section on the CD that stops the copying.
Personally I've never had a problem ripping a single CD on Linux (even ones that mentioned copy protection), using the standard ripping programs, no circumvention required, though admittedly I rarely buy CDs these days.