>And yes, they may actually need to give serious consideration to getting ESRB ratings.
Considering ESRB is a US and Canad thing, what is Vista doing when used outside of those countries? Is that feature turned off and thus ignored? If not, why should someone in, say another country, making a game not targeted for US or Canada have to bother with ESRB?
>Did it come with an End User Licence Agreement which stated >that if you did not agree to the licence you could return it >for a refund?
If you do not agree to the contract, what is said in it is irellevant and no one would be bound by it, so why would it matter what is said in it if you do NOT agree to it?
The important would be what the laws says and who it agrees with. Laws on theft are very different from laws on copyright infringement. They have very little to do with each other.
>However I do see the illegal copying of copyrighted material unethical and criminal.
Ehh, yes, so? What does that have to do with anything? That doesn't makes one illegal activity the equal of another, so why not try to use proper terminology, especially when you want to you it to justify some action of being illegal or legal?
There are still (at least a few month ago when I was there) many places that uses the "units" system, including major hotels like the one we stayed at.
One new thing the DMCA and many similar laws introduced was a new "right" for the copyright holder, that of access. It is not really given as a new right, instead they are given the right to control the access but that is for the most part quite similar since it dissallows others the right to access. The right to access a work has not existed in most copyright laws before.
>Personal use of copyrighted works is legal in some cases, still. Distributing >copyrighted work isn't, and that's the catch of this lawsuit: By default, >Kazaa shares the files you've downloaded, so mere users unwittingly become distributors.
So any makers of software should have its program detect in what country it is, what laws currently applies and then in this case, place a warning for any user were such downloading would be legal while the sharing would be illegal?
>They were brewing the coffee at something like 200 degrees
Personally I use boiling water when I make my own coffe. Coffee is supposed to be hot. If it is hot or a little bit hotter than normal, it is still hot. It is natural that one is carefull with hot stuff and that one ca burn oneself with it. Or do you claim that resturants should make coffee (and any other dring/food) so cold that it is perfectly possible to pour it on yourself without any problem? That would just be silly. The complain I would have is that coffee normally is too cold when served.
>Setting aside that everyone would just use exclusive licenses as >a condition of employment, achieving exactly the same result as >assignments or works made for hire,
That is how it works in many countries in the world which has no "for hire" conditions in their copyright laws (software would often be an exception though).
>If you still say it isn't stealing, then perhaps "freeloader" or "leech" would be more >appropriate.
How about calling it copyright infringement which would be the correct thing. Copyright infringement also happens to be illegal by the way. No idea why you would insist in calling it something erroeous. What would be the point in using the terminology "stealing" instead of "copyright infringement"? If for no other reason you end up with the wrong conclusions about how it works, like your "if you did not pay it is not OK" which is quite wrong since there are many ways of not paying, yet seeing a movie and none is copyright infringement or illegal. SO what is the point in using the terminology "stealing"?
No i don't stop at it, but at least you can start there.
>there is far more to intellectual property law than copyright,
Sure, but that was what we discussed. If you like to discuss some other laws, like patents or trademark, fine. Then say so, instead of using the meaning less and confusing "intellectual property", makes it so much easier to discuss.
>and far more to copyright law than you've bothered to explore. You're not paying attention >to the nuances being played out in case law.
I admit to not know every single copyright law of the world in detail, but most of it is the same. many countries does not have the "case law" system that for example USA has and this particular article was about UK.
>Ownership has nothing to do with copyright law.
Ehh, yes, which is what I have tried to explain all the time and stated multiple times in about every post.
>The point which has zoomed past your head at light speed is that the author of a work owns the work.
No, "work" in its intangible form (and I assume you talk about copyright no? If not say so, so we know) is not owned at all. One hold or own copyrights on the work though, which is not the same thing. On top of that copies of the work have a separate ownership to them that is not tied to copyright. This is basic copyright law.
>If I create something, it's mine in its entirety and I may or may not choose to share it with the world.
If you create an intangible work it is not "yours" in the sense that you own it. You hold the copyright to it though. If it is a material object, you do become the owner of it though. In either case, you can of course do whatever you want with it as long as you don't own the copyright to it.
>If I choose to share it, copyright law gives me a set of exclusive rights,
Yes, specifically listed in copyright law. You have all the time said that it includes ALL possyble rights, which is wrong and which is what I have tried to explain. You have claimed someone else does not have ANY rights, which is the wrong part since only the exclusive rights the copyright law gives to the copyright holder is removed from others.
>which I transfer to a customer by way of a license
Here we agree I think... But only those rights given to the copyright holder to start with can be licensed, nothing else. In addition, there are exceptions to the exclusivness, meaning people can many times do those things without a license. The exact nature and content of those exceptions vary quite a bit by country though.
>So long as the terms are not expressly forbidden by any statute in my jurisdiction, >I'm free to delegate whichever rights I choose.
Yes, but only those given to you as a copyright holder to start with. You have no other rights to delegate.
>By doing so, I grant you a right to use my creation, but do not grant >you a right to assert control over said creation for redistribution or modification.
"use" is not an exclusive right to the copyright holder. Copying is though. Distribution is as well (although it is a right consumed in many ways after the initial distribution meaning that in many cases redistribution is allowed without license.
So only if such use is one of the exclusive rights of the copyright holder, otherwise, any other use does not require any license at all. Most uses of copies of a work does not require any of the rights of a copyright holder and hence needs no licnese.
>17 USC 2 does not say what you're trying to construct in its meaning. It says that ownership >of the CD does not imply ownership of the copyrighted material contained therein--which is >exactly what I've been saying this whole time.
That is the exact thing I have said all the time. If you have meant the same thing, we do agree. You have claimed from what I can read, that the mere selling transfer rights of the copyright hold
Were did I claim so? However, once stored on a hard disc for example, it is a copy which is a material object. That is why, for example, installing software is regarded as creating a copy by copyright laws in most countries.
>You technically own the bits of that copy,yes, but you don't own the arrangement of them.
The "arangement" is basically the work, as I said, I have not claimed someone owns them. The copyright holder holds or owns the COPYRIGHT to it. The specific copy were they are fixated can be owned by anyone and that ownership is not tied to the copyright. That is what I am trying to say all the time. There are several different "ownerships", not one general "owning the music". There is the owning of the copyright to the music, there is an ownership of the copies of the music and there is a non existing ownership of the intangible music itself.
>GP was talking about digital downloads in particular.
No, that post had the following text and nothing else: "In a purely technical point of view, what's the difference between being allowed to break the lock on your cell phone to enjoy its use to the fullest extent, and say, breaking the lock on your music to use it to its fullest extent? After all, you still paid for both."
>Most importantly, the disntinction is that you don't have any rights to the content at all >until you pay for it
If by content you mean the "work", this is completely wrong. You have any "right" not specifically taken away . Copyright takes away a few types of rights and gives them exclusively to the copyright holder. Anything else is unaffected. Hence, your statement that one does not have "any rights" is wrong. In addition, they are not even tied to copyright since copyright deals with those specific rights given to the copyright holder only. And even then, there are exceptions so that you you can do certain copying (for example) despite not holding the copyright or having a licnese to make copies.
>all uses of music or other IP belongs to someone else until you acquire partial use.
Have you EVER read a copyright law? Why not start with the following link which is the the US copyright law (picked since it is in english, almost any copyright in the world will be similar though):
It covers most relevant rights that belonmg to the copyright holder. ANything else is NOT covered by copyright and thus "belongs" to anyone. You can do any such other use (or whatever else that is not use asl well) as you see fit (from a copyright point of view) without any need for a permission.
>ALL music/video purchases are partial transfers of rights,
No, purchases are transfers of OWNERSHIP of copies in most cases. There is no transfer of any of the copyright rights. Did you read ANY of the links I provided you with in my other post? Here it is again, specifically dealing with the differences and how one does not imply anything about the other:
>No, you don't. Purchase of intellectual property is a partial transfer of rights from the owner to the licensee.
No it is not. Copyright of a work has nothing to do with ownership of copies of the work. You buy and own copies of a work. It is seperated and not tied in anyway to the copyright. Changing of ownership of a copy doesn't in any way transwer ANY of the rights of a copyright holder. Do note that there is only a limited set of rights a copyright holder has, none of which you really need to, for exmaple listen to music from a CD you bought. Depending on what country you live in, you might have to look at different law, here is one link to the US copyright law dealing with the differences between the ownership of copies (the material object) and ownership of the copyright: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/us c_sec_17_00000202----000-.html
>If this were a book, you'd own the paper the book was printed on, but you wouldn't own the contents of the book.
The "content" if you refer to the non tangible work is in fact not owned by anyone and is not ownable. The creator typically holds copyright to it, that is not the same as owning the work although one typically use that terminology. The work is then fixated into some media and creates a copy, the material work which is hwta you buy when you buy a music CD for example. The ownership of individual copies has nothing to do with the copyright and one is not tied to the other nor does one imply the other. So if it was a book, you would own the copy, which is the work in this case printed onto paper. That you would own (had you buyght the book). The copyright holder would own the copyright to the work and that has nothing to do with the ownership of the specific copy, the book. So "owning" or holdeing the copyright to the content has nothing to do with owning the actual book (including a copy of the work), they are separated and both exist and not tied.
>Ownership may only derive from tangible objects or from exhaustive control of intellectual property, neither of which is true >of digital downloads.
After a download, a copy (a material object) is created and owned by whoever created it (which again has nothing to do with who holds the copyright to it). Note that the original posts talked about music in general, not necessarilly downloaded music.
>Actually, it does. Take a closer look at intellectual property law.
I gave you a link detailing the difference above. Ownership of copies is distict from ownership of the copyright itself.
>Ownership of a phone and a music CD are purchases of objects.
>Purchase of a CD does not give you ownership over the contents of that CD,
The content in its intangible form is not owned at all. The creator holds the copyright to it though, which gives him certain excuslive rights, it deos not give ownership, and especially it does not give ownership to any and all copies of it.
>nor does purchase of the phone give you ownership over the design or engineering of that device
If by owning the design you refer to things such as copyright, patent and so on, of course not, that is nothng I have claimed. We were talking about owning COPIES of the work.
>A digital download confers no ownership beyond the license.
It gives an ownership of a COPY of the music which you create on your hard disc. Again, it does of course not give you any copyright or rights that are tied to the cop
Yes you do, you own a copy of the music just as you own a copy of the phone.
>you didn't pay for the rights to use it "to the fullest extent."
You ojnly need to pay for rights you don't have to start with. Those are, if we talk music, typically copyright which covers a few specific rights as, almost, exclusive to the copyright holder. Other actions or things you do are not restricted or illegal and you don't need to pay for doing them.
>You paid for a license granting you specific rights, rights which do not include ownership >in any consequential form.
The ownership of a phone or a music CD and so on are regulated through sales and sales laws, it has nothing to do with copyright or licenses at all. A licens would cover certain uses that is forbidden to start with, which can be the specific rights covered in copyright law. In addition, many uses, for example listening to something, does not in any way require ownership to start with.
Do you refer to the "intangible" software? That is not owned by anyone. Microsoft do hold (or own) the copyright to it though. That is quite different. The media with the software fixated on it is a copy of the work, a material object, whos ownership is not tied or related to the ownership oif any copyright to the work. SO if one enters a store any buys "Windows", what you buy and own is a copy of Windows (which is basically the work in a material form). The copyright of the work is still owned by Microsoft and the work itself is not really owned by anyone. So don't mix up owning copies of a work with owning the copyright to a work (and for that matter owning a work). They are all different.
>You paid money for a licence, to use the software in the way MS allow you to within that >licence.
Or in the way the law allows you to. Or rather, in whatever way the law doesn't specifically dissalows.
>This is usually as simple as saying (or clicking) "okay".
Not nessecarilly, that does not mean your acknowledgement has reached or come to the party that made the offer. It needs, as it certainly do in WoW, also be sent or otherwise notified to the one making the offer of a contract. In addition, for most countries there is further rules on how you might tie that acceptance to other ativities. You can't make a proposal and claim that if the pther person (for example) leave his hous, it shows acceptance. That is, you can't in many cases decided HOW the acceptance should be made if it is tied to other activities.
>The trick is, as soon as a contract stipulates something unlawful, it is null and void.
That depends a lot on country and type of contract. In many cases only the term itself is void, not the rest of the contract.
As others have said, a contract is also only affecting the ones that have agreed to it. It can never bind someone else.
>The only true violation is DMCA violations as they are >breaking the CSS copy protection clauses.
The encryption would be an access protection though, not copy protection since encryption doesn't prevent copying. In some countries (USA?) access is also protected in some ways under copyright, while in many others it is not and there, the difference between access protection and copy protection is quite important since copying is a aright of the copyright holder while access is not.
>The lyrics (not the tune) were copyrighted in 1935. >and like Mickey Mouse, Congress's continual extension >of copyright term has kept the copyright valid (It's >currently set to expire in 2030).
But when does it expires in Australia? Not nessecarilly at the same time.
12 is the one making exceptions for copies made for private use. It was also changed last year to tighten what was allowed and what was not. The two changes made was first that the ammount of copies allowed under this was reduced. It is currently "några få" which probably is best translated as "a few". If you read the documents of the passing of the law, this should be read quite narrowly, like perhaps 2 or 3 copies at most. Previously, in part by precedence in the high court, it was a bit more. The other part was the narrowing to "private" use from "personal". Again, one should go to the documentation of the law makers to get the understanding how to interpret it. In the past, again through decisions in the high court of Sweden, it was basically that such copies that could be made and given away to family and closed friends in fact also included people in your class at school and also at work. One wanted to especially limit the work part so that such copies could not be used at work which is the main difference in the going from "personal" to private use. If you do know Swedish, I could give you a link to the 200+ pages document from the law makers that discuss the law in detial, including analysis of the EU directive. It should also be known that those documents, which is basically part of the proposal for the law passed to the "riksdagen", the govermental body elected by the people which passes laws, should be takes as part part, or rather as a guidance, to interpret the law. Courts will look at that doceumntation to understand the reasoning of the law makers.
So no, the law has not removed that possibility, it still exists, you can make a few copies for private use and it includes giving it away to family and close friends (not at work though). There are are some exceptions to this, for example software that is not allowed to copy at all. In addition, one removed a loop hole that basically allowed downloading on P2P networks (since the copy made was in fact for personal use) by adding a requirement that the original of the copies made under this paragraph could not have been made available to the public, or created in violation of 2, which is basically the one giving the copyright holder the excusive right to do so. This makes downloading and making a copy in most cases infringement. ONe could at least not use the "copy for private use" as a valid reason.
>These directives permit a variety of protected uses but none >of them include giving physical copies of protected works to your friends.
Giving a copy to a family member or a close friend doens't fall under the distribution to the public and hence is not otherwise regulated by the copyright law. If the creation is OK, as it is explaned above, the giving of such a copy to a friend or family is OK which has been decided by the high court (not sure if that is the correct English translation but it is the highest court in Sweden) in Sweden.
>In any case, my impression was that even prior to legislation >enforcing this directive, the apparent legality of online file >sharing in certain Scandinavian countries did not extend to >physical copies of entire protected works.
I think I explained most of it above. The loop hole was that creation of a copy for personal use was allowed. There were no actual requirement on the legalness of the original or in how it was made available to the public. This was added in the latest revision of the copyright law. It is worth notising that there was never any case taken to court actually sayig it was legal to make such personal copies but even the media industry was of the opinion that it would most likely be allowed. This is quite irellevant now with the newly add
>Irrelevent, since the OP was looking in the EULA for >something, so we quoted the EULA.
?? I was commenting on what YOU said, which is why my reply is to you, not what the original poster said. Just as you find it interesting how people forget about a part of an EULA, I noted I find it interesting how people who appearantly remember it, instead forgets that in addition, laws might affect its meaning or validity.
>Besides, in the majority (not all) of countries >where customer protection prevents something like >that from being true for a sold product, it is rarely >so for services (There aren't many countries where >an hotel doesn't have the right to kick you out...)
Even if some countries might have different laws for services than for goods, that is not true for others. In Europe, the directive against unfair terms in user contracts (and hence in most European countries law's) treat the sale of services the same as goods (or whatever else you might want to sell). The exact same laws would apply. So no, in many countries a hotel can't just kick you out for no reason. They would need a valid reason and it won't matter what type of contract they want you to agree to, they can't make it possible to kick you out "at any time for any reason or no reason".
>What happens to the GPL when the copyright on open source software expires?
When copyright expires on a work, there is no longer any need to get the permissions GPL gives under certain conditions. So there is no need to agree to the GPL to, for example change and/or redistribute the work with or without the source. The same applies to any other work were copyright expires. The GPL is needed when there IS a copyright to be able to do some of the things that, during the copyright, is exclusive to the copyright holder.
>Most people don't care if Microsoft checks to make >sure their music file or movie is legal before it >plays as long as they don't see it.
So Microsoft would become the new world police deciding what is legal and what is not? How can they decide the legalness based on the laws in different countries of whatever you do? That is the problem which will cause false positives for sure and why it won't work. I just can't see how such a system would work out without at the very least give each country the exact same law and making the laws in such a way that it is very simple for a computer to decide on any action if it violates the law or not. I am sure anyone managing to create such a system would become quite rich/famous/whatever.
Slashdot Mirror
>And yes, they may actually need to give serious consideration to getting ESRB ratings.
Considering ESRB is a US and Canad thing, what is Vista doing when used outside of those countries? Is that feature turned off and thus ignored? If not, why should someone in, say another country, making a game not targeted for US or Canada have to bother with ESRB?
>Did it come with an End User Licence Agreement which stated
>that if you did not agree to the licence you could return it
>for a refund?
If you do not agree to the contract, what is said in it is irellevant and no one would be bound by it, so why would it matter what is said in it if you do NOT agree to it?
>As a musician, I don't agree with you.
The important would be what the laws says and who it agrees with. Laws on theft are very different from laws on copyright infringement. They have very little to do with each other.
>However I do see the illegal copying of copyrighted material unethical and criminal.
Ehh, yes, so? What does that have to do with anything? That doesn't makes one illegal activity the equal of another, so why not try to use proper terminology, especially when you want to you it to justify some action of being illegal or legal?
There are still (at least a few month ago when I was there) many places that uses the "units" system, including major hotels like the one we stayed at.
>Why is the DMCA inherently evil?
One new thing the DMCA and many similar laws introduced was a new "right" for the copyright holder, that of access. It is not really given as a new right, instead they are given the right to control the access but that is for the most part quite similar since it dissallows others the right to access. The right to access a work has not existed in most copyright laws before.
>Personal use of copyrighted works is legal in some cases, still. Distributing
>copyrighted work isn't, and that's the catch of this lawsuit: By default,
>Kazaa shares the files you've downloaded, so mere users unwittingly become distributors.
So any makers of software should have its program detect in what country it is, what laws currently applies and then in this case, place a warning for any user were such downloading would be legal while the sharing would be illegal?
>They were brewing the coffee at something like 200 degrees
Personally I use boiling water when I make my own coffe. Coffee is supposed to be hot. If it is hot or a little bit hotter than normal, it is still hot. It is natural that one is carefull with hot stuff and that one ca burn oneself with it. Or do you claim that resturants should make coffee (and any other dring/food) so cold that it is perfectly possible to pour it on yourself without any problem? That would just be silly. The complain I would have is that coffee normally is too cold when served.
>Setting aside that everyone would just use exclusive licenses as
>a condition of employment, achieving exactly the same result as
>assignments or works made for hire,
That is how it works in many countries in the world which has no "for hire" conditions in their copyright laws (software would often be an exception though).
>If you still say it isn't stealing, then perhaps "freeloader" or "leech" would be more
>appropriate.
How about calling it copyright infringement which would be the correct thing. Copyright infringement also happens to be illegal by the way. No idea why you would insist in calling it something erroeous. What would be the point in using the terminology "stealing" instead of "copyright infringement"? If for no other reason you end up with the wrong conclusions about how it works, like your "if you did not pay it is not OK" which is quite wrong since there are many ways of not paying, yet seeing a movie and none is copyright infringement or illegal. SO what is the point in using the terminology "stealing"?
>many countries does not have the "case law" system that for example USA
>has and this particular article was about UK.
Ooops, the actual article is of course not at all about UK, was mixing that up with another discussion. Sorry about that.
>Your problem is that you stopped with that link
No i don't stop at it, but at least you can start there.
>there is far more to intellectual property law than copyright,
Sure, but that was what we discussed. If you like to discuss some other laws, like patents or trademark, fine. Then say so, instead of using the meaning less and confusing "intellectual property", makes it so much easier to discuss.
>and far more to copyright law than you've bothered to explore. You're not paying attention
>to the nuances being played out in case law.
I admit to not know every single copyright law of the world in detail, but most of it is the same. many countries does not have the "case law" system that for example USA has and this particular article was about UK.
>Ownership has nothing to do with copyright law.
Ehh, yes, which is what I have tried to explain all the time and stated multiple times in about every post.
>The point which has zoomed past your head at light speed is that the author of a work owns the work.
No, "work" in its intangible form (and I assume you talk about copyright no? If not say so, so we know) is not owned at all. One hold or own copyrights on the work though, which is not the same thing. On top of that copies of the work have a separate ownership to them that is not tied to copyright. This is basic copyright law.
>If I create something, it's mine in its entirety and I may or may not choose to share it with the world.
If you create an intangible work it is not "yours" in the sense that you own it. You hold the copyright to it though. If it is a material object, you do become the owner of it though. In either case, you can of course do whatever you want with it as long as you don't own the copyright to it.
>If I choose to share it, copyright law gives me a set of exclusive rights,
Yes, specifically listed in copyright law. You have all the time said that it includes ALL possyble rights, which is wrong and which is what I have tried to explain. You have claimed someone else does not have ANY rights, which is the wrong part since only the exclusive rights the copyright law gives to the copyright holder is removed from others.
>which I transfer to a customer by way of a license
Here we agree I think... But only those rights given to the copyright holder to start with can be licensed, nothing else. In addition, there are exceptions to the exclusivness, meaning people can many times do those things without a license. The exact nature and content of those exceptions vary quite a bit by country though.
>So long as the terms are not expressly forbidden by any statute in my jurisdiction,
>I'm free to delegate whichever rights I choose.
Yes, but only those given to you as a copyright holder to start with. You have no other rights to delegate.
>By doing so, I grant you a right to use my creation, but do not grant
>you a right to assert control over said creation for redistribution or modification.
"use" is not an exclusive right to the copyright holder. Copying is though. Distribution is as well (although it is a right consumed in many ways after the initial distribution meaning that in many cases redistribution is allowed without license.
So only if such use is one of the exclusive rights of the copyright holder, otherwise, any other use does not require any license at all. Most uses of copies of a work does not require any of the rights of a copyright holder and hence needs no licnese.
>17 USC 2 does not say what you're trying to construct in its meaning. It says that ownership
>of the CD does not imply ownership of the copyrighted material contained therein--which is
>exactly what I've been saying this whole time.
That is the exact thing I have said all the time. If you have meant the same thing, we do agree. You have claimed from what I can read, that the mere selling transfer rights of the copyright hold
>False. Data is not a material object.
s c_sec_17_00000106----000-.html
s c_sec_17_00000202----000-.html
Were did I claim so? However, once stored on a hard disc for example, it is a copy which is a material object. That is why, for example, installing software is regarded as creating a copy by copyright laws in most countries.
>You technically own the bits of that copy,yes, but you don't own the arrangement of them.
The "arangement" is basically the work, as I said, I have not claimed someone owns them. The copyright holder holds or owns the COPYRIGHT to it. The specific copy were they are fixated can be owned by anyone and that ownership is not tied to the copyright. That is what I am trying to say all the time. There are several different "ownerships", not one general "owning the music". There is the owning of the copyright to the music, there is an ownership of the copies of the music and there is a non existing ownership of the intangible music itself.
>GP was talking about digital downloads in particular.
No, that post had the following text and nothing else:
"In a purely technical point of view, what's the difference between being allowed to break the lock on your cell phone to enjoy its use to the fullest extent, and say, breaking the lock on your music to use it to its fullest extent? After all, you still paid for both."
>Most importantly, the disntinction is that you don't have any rights to the content at all
>until you pay for it
If by content you mean the "work", this is completely wrong. You have any "right" not specifically taken away . Copyright takes away a few types of rights and gives them exclusively to the copyright holder. Anything else is unaffected. Hence, your statement that one does not have "any rights" is wrong. In addition, they are not even tied to copyright since copyright deals with those specific rights given to the copyright holder only. And even then, there are exceptions so that you you can do certain copying (for example) despite not holding the copyright or having a licnese to make copies.
>all uses of music or other IP belongs to someone else until you acquire partial use.
Have you EVER read a copyright law? Why not start with the following link which is the the US copyright law (picked since it is in english, almost any copyright in the world will be similar though):
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/u
It covers most relevant rights that belonmg to the copyright holder. ANything else is NOT covered by copyright and thus "belongs" to anyone. You can do any such other use (or whatever else that is not use asl well) as you see fit (from a copyright point of view) without any need for a permission.
>ALL music/video purchases are partial transfers of rights,
No, purchases are transfers of OWNERSHIP of copies in most cases. There is no transfer of any of the copyright rights. Did you read ANY of the links I provided you with in my other post? Here it is again, specifically dealing with the differences and how one does not imply anything about the other:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/u
>No, you don't. Purchase of intellectual property is a partial transfer of rights from the owner to the licensee.
No it is not. Copyright of a work has nothing to do with ownership of copies of the work. You buy and own copies of a work. It is seperated and not tied in anyway to the copyright. Changing of ownership of a copy doesn't in any way transwer ANY of the rights of a copyright holder. Do note that there is only a limited set of rights a copyright holder has, none of which you really need to, for exmaple listen to music from a CD you bought. Depending on what country you live in, you might have to look at different law, here is one link to the US copyright law dealing with the differences between the ownership of copies (the material object) and ownership of the copyright: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/us c_sec_17_00000202----000-.html
>If this were a book, you'd own the paper the book was printed on, but you wouldn't own the contents of the book.
The "content" if you refer to the non tangible work is in fact not owned by anyone and is not ownable. The creator typically holds copyright to it, that is not the same as owning the work although one typically use that terminology. The work is then fixated into some media and creates a copy, the material work which is hwta you buy when you buy a music CD for example. The ownership of individual copies has nothing to do with the copyright and one is not tied to the other nor does one imply the other. So if it was a book, you would own the copy, which is the work in this case printed onto paper. That you would own (had you buyght the book). The copyright holder would own the copyright to the work and that has nothing to do with the ownership of the specific copy, the book. So "owning" or holdeing the copyright to the content has nothing to do with owning the actual book (including a copy of the work), they are separated and both exist and not tied.
>Ownership may only derive from tangible objects or from exhaustive control of intellectual property, neither of which is true
>of digital downloads.
After a download, a copy (a material object) is created and owned by whoever created it (which again has nothing to do with who holds the copyright to it). Note that the original posts talked about music in general, not necessarilly downloaded music.
>Actually, it does. Take a closer look at intellectual property law.
I gave you a link detailing the difference above. Ownership of copies is distict from ownership of the copyright itself.
>Ownership of a phone and a music CD are purchases of objects.
Exactly (although purchase is not the only way to get ownership of course, one can give away or create a new as well and so on). When you buy a CD you buy a copy, which is a material objects see http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/us c_sec_17_00000101----000-.html, of the work (music in this case).
>Purchase of a CD does not give you ownership over the contents of that CD,
The content in its intangible form is not owned at all. The creator holds the copyright to it though, which gives him certain excuslive rights, it deos not give ownership, and especially it does not give ownership to any and all copies of it.
>nor does purchase of the phone give you ownership over the design or engineering of that device
If by owning the design you refer to things such as copyright, patent and so on, of course not, that is nothng I have claimed. We were talking about owning COPIES of the work.
>A digital download confers no ownership beyond the license.
It gives an ownership of a COPY of the music which you create on your hard disc. Again, it does of course not give you any copyright or rights that are tied to the cop
> You don't own the music you bought
Yes you do, you own a copy of the music just as you own a copy of the phone.
>you didn't pay for the rights to use it "to the fullest extent."
You ojnly need to pay for rights you don't have to start with. Those are, if we talk music, typically copyright which covers a few specific rights as, almost, exclusive to the copyright holder. Other actions or things you do are not restricted or illegal and you don't need to pay for doing them.
>You paid for a license granting you specific rights, rights which do not include ownership
>in any consequential form.
The ownership of a phone or a music CD and so on are regulated through sales and sales laws, it has nothing to do with copyright or licenses at all. A licens would cover certain uses that is forbidden to start with, which can be the specific rights covered in copyright law. In addition, many uses, for example listening to something, does not in any way require ownership to start with.
>The software is owned by Microsoft
Do you refer to the "intangible" software? That is not owned by anyone. Microsoft do hold (or own) the copyright to it though. That is quite different. The media with the software fixated on it is a copy of the work, a material object, whos ownership is not tied or related to the ownership oif any copyright to the work. SO if one enters a store any buys "Windows", what you buy and own is a copy of Windows (which is basically the work in a material form). The copyright of the work is still owned by Microsoft and the work itself is not really owned by anyone. So don't mix up owning copies of a work with owning the copyright to a work (and for that matter owning a work). They are all different.
>You paid money for a licence, to use the software in the way MS allow you to within that
>licence.
Or in the way the law allows you to. Or rather, in whatever way the law doesn't specifically dissalows.
>No...I'm claiming that what's being stored at memory
>address 0x0F45CD is "a work protected under this title."
And were do you find any "technological measure that effectively CONTROLS access" to it?
>This is usually as simple as saying (or clicking) "okay".
Not nessecarilly, that does not mean your acknowledgement has reached or come to the party that made the offer. It needs, as it certainly do in WoW, also be sent or otherwise notified to the one making the offer of a contract. In addition, for most countries there is further rules on how you might tie that acceptance to other ativities. You can't make a proposal and claim that if the pther person (for example) leave his hous, it shows acceptance. That is, you can't in many cases decided HOW the acceptance should be made if it is tied to other activities.
>The trick is, as soon as a contract stipulates something unlawful, it is null and void.
That depends a lot on country and type of contract. In many cases only the term itself is void, not the rest of the contract.
As others have said, a contract is also only affecting the ones that have agreed to it. It can never bind someone else.
>The only true violation is DMCA violations as they are
>breaking the CSS copy protection clauses.
The encryption would be an access protection though, not copy protection since encryption doesn't prevent copying. In some countries (USA?) access is also protected in some ways under copyright, while in many others it is not and there, the difference between access protection and copy protection is quite important since copying is a aright of the copyright holder while access is not.
>The lyrics (not the tune) were copyrighted in 1935.
>and like Mickey Mouse, Congress's continual extension
>of copyright term has kept the copyright valid (It's
>currently set to expire in 2030).
But when does it expires in Australia? Not nessecarilly at the same time.
>I'm hardly an expert, but a little research suggests that you are wrong.
Then you should read the Swedish copyright law (unless you know Swedish it would be hard though):
http://www.notisum.se/rnp/sls/lag/19600729.HTM
12 is the one making exceptions for copies made for private use. It was also changed last year to tighten what was allowed and what was not. The two changes made was first that the ammount of copies allowed under this was reduced. It is currently "några få" which probably is best translated as "a few". If you read the documents of the passing of the law, this should be read quite narrowly, like perhaps 2 or 3 copies at most. Previously, in part by precedence in the high court, it was a bit more. The other part was the narrowing to "private" use from "personal". Again, one should go to the documentation of the law makers to get the understanding how to interpret it. In the past, again through decisions in the high court of Sweden, it was basically that such copies that could be made and given away to family and closed friends in fact also included people in your class at school and also at work. One wanted to especially limit the work part so that such copies could not be used at work which is the main difference in the going from "personal" to private use. If you do know Swedish, I could give you a link to the 200+ pages document from the law makers that discuss the law in detial, including analysis of the EU directive. It should also be known that those documents, which is basically part of the proposal for the law passed to the "riksdagen", the govermental body elected by the people which passes laws, should be takes as part part, or rather as a guidance, to interpret the law. Courts will look at that doceumntation to understand the reasoning of the law makers.
So no, the law has not removed that possibility, it still exists, you can make a few copies for private use and it includes giving it away to family and close friends (not at work though). There are are some exceptions to this, for example software that is not allowed to copy at all. In addition, one removed a loop hole that basically allowed downloading on P2P networks (since the copy made was in fact for personal use) by adding a requirement that the original of the copies made under this paragraph could not have been made available to the public, or created in violation of 2, which is basically the one giving the copyright holder the excusive right to do so. This makes downloading and making a copy in most cases infringement. ONe could at least not use the "copy for private use" as a valid reason.
>These directives permit a variety of protected uses but none
>of them include giving physical copies of protected works to your friends.
Giving a copy to a family member or a close friend doens't fall under the distribution to the public and hence is not otherwise regulated by the copyright law. If the creation is OK, as it is explaned above, the giving of such a copy to a friend or family is OK which has been decided by the high court (not sure if that is the correct English translation but it is the highest court in Sweden) in Sweden.
>In any case, my impression was that even prior to legislation
>enforcing this directive, the apparent legality of online file
>sharing in certain Scandinavian countries did not extend to
>physical copies of entire protected works.
I think I explained most of it above. The loop hole was that creation of a copy for personal use was allowed. There were no actual requirement on the legalness of the original or in how it was made available to the public. This was added in the latest revision of the copyright law. It is worth notising that there was never any case taken to court actually sayig it was legal to make such personal copies but even the media industry was of the opinion that it would most likely be allowed. This is quite irellevant now with the newly add
>You actually think you 'bought' the game?
Yes, he would have bought a copy of the game.
>They can close your account for any reason whatsoever.
No, they can close it for reasons that the law allows. You can't terminate a service you have sold to a conusmer just because you felt like it.
>Irrelevent, since the OP was looking in the EULA for
>something, so we quoted the EULA.
?? I was commenting on what YOU said, which is why my reply is to you, not what the original poster said. Just as you find it interesting how people forget about a part of an EULA, I noted I find it interesting how people who appearantly remember it, instead forgets that in addition, laws might affect its meaning or validity.
>Besides, in the majority (not all) of countries
>where customer protection prevents something like
>that from being true for a sold product, it is rarely
>so for services (There aren't many countries where
>an hotel doesn't have the right to kick you out...)
Even if some countries might have different laws for services than for goods, that is not true for others. In Europe, the directive against unfair terms in user contracts (and hence in most European countries law's) treat the sale of services the same as goods (or whatever else you might want to sell). The exact same laws would apply. So no, in many countries a hotel can't just kick you out for no reason. They would need a valid reason and it won't matter what type of contract they want you to agree to, they can't make it possible to kick you out "at any time for any reason or no reason".
>What happens to the GPL when the copyright on open source software expires?
When copyright expires on a work, there is no longer any need to get the permissions GPL gives under certain conditions. So there is no need to agree to the GPL to, for example change and/or redistribute the work with or without the source. The same applies to any other work were copyright expires. The GPL is needed when there IS a copyright to be able to do some of the things that, during the copyright, is exclusive to the copyright holder.
>OK, I'll bite. Where?
One example: Sweden.
>Most people don't care if Microsoft checks to make
>sure their music file or movie is legal before it
>plays as long as they don't see it.
So Microsoft would become the new world police deciding what is legal and what is not? How can they decide the legalness based on the laws in different countries of whatever you do? That is the problem which will cause false positives for sure and why it won't work. I just can't see how such a system would work out without at the very least give each country the exact same law and making the laws in such a way that it is very simple for a computer to decide on any action if it violates the law or not. I am sure anyone managing to create such a system would become quite rich/famous/whatever.