Is it illegal to watch movies online?

mr_fishbulb

Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998:

107 Criminal liability for making or dealing with infringing articles, &c

(1) A person commits an offence who, without the licence of the copyright owner— (a) makes for sale or hire, or
(b) imports into the United Kingdom otherwise than for his private and domestic use, or
(c) possesses in the course of a business with a view to committing any act infringing the copyright, or
(d) in the course of a business —
(i) sells or lets for hire, or
(ii) offers or exposes for sale or hire, or
(iii) exhibits in public, or
(iv) distributes, or
(e) distributes otherwise than in the course of a business to such an extent as to affect prejudicially the owner of the copyright,


an article which is, and which he knows or has reason to believe is, an infringing copy of a copyright work.


(2) A person commits an offence who—
(a) makes an article specifically designed or adapted for making copies of a particular copyright work, or
(b) has such an article in his possession,
knowing or having reason to believe that it is to be used to make infringing copies for sale or hire or for use in the course of a business.


(3) Where copyright is infringed (otherwise than by reception of a broadcast or cable programme)—
(a) by the public performance of a literary, dramatic or musical work, or
(b) by the playing or showing in public of a sound recording or film,
any person who caused the work to be so performed, played or shown is guilty of an offence if he knew or had reason to believe that copyright would be infringed.

Streaming doesn't seem to be an offence as you are not selling, hiring, exhibiting or distributing.


§107 (1) (e) would apply to people uploading as part of using P2P software.


It looks like the act of downloading a perfect DVD copy from binary newsgroups is also not an offence, as no uploading is taking place.


Intellectual Property Crime offences showing both Copyright, Designs and Patent Act 1988 and Video Recordings Act 1984 also doesn't specify only downloading (without selling, hiring, exhibiting or distributing) as an offence - http://www.ipo.gov.uk/crime/crime-resources/crime-offenceguide.htm

Soubrette

Marty_J wrote: »

I think a copy is a copy; I'm not aware that it has to be usable multiple times.

The Oxford English Dictionary gives:

Let's take the first point as I believe it to be the only relevant one to the discussion:

1 a thing made to be similar or identical to another.

How can a temporary file in the cache be similar or identical to a film or even the stream that you watched? You can't open it, you can't use it, you can't amend it in any way. To make it a copy again you have to move and rename it so it becomes watchable - then you get to watch a copy. I think we're both agreed that this bit is illegal.

I am not talking about watching the stream, I am talking about what is on your computer - is that a copy in the form that it is in? If you believe it to be a copy then could you explain how?

Sou

[Deleted User]

Soubrette wrote: »

How can a temporary file in the cache be similar or identical to a film or even the stream that you watched? You can't open it, you can't use it, you can't amend it in any way.

You can't do that with a file you're downloading via Bittorrent either, but you can still be pursued regardless as soon as you start to..

Soubrette

Mr_Falling_Star wrote: »

What a great thread! I am of the opinion that its OK to watch streams (such as sports) but not to broadcast or distribute them.

Why?

I mean what has given cause to you to believe that to be the case

I'm fascinated by the bias and influence that we all experience in our world views:o

Take the lovely Marty - when he feels on strong grounds he is quite prolific and informative in his posting. If however a point is made that he has no answer to, rather than admit that it is a good point, he goes very quiet

And just so you don't feel left out Marty - my modus operandi is to get very enthusiastic about something then get a bit bored - a bit of a post and run poster :o

mr_fishbulb - thanks for that information - my virgin link earlier certainly seemed to agree with you although that was regarding copying streams. However, we know for sure that some instances of copying, even if not for personal gain, is illegal. Such as copying your own bought and paid for CD as an MP3 file - or is that urban myth?

Sou

Soubrette

anewhope wrote: »

You can't do that with a file you're downloading via Bittorrent either, but you can still be pursued regardless as soon as you start to..

Really? I'm not a great downloader myself - in what form is the file - is it zipped or something and you need extra software to unzip it?

Is it exactly the same as a temporary cache? Inaccessible, unusable and will be automatically deleted at some point?

Of course the fact that the music/film industry is open about the fact that downloading is illegal is the deciding factor for me. I wonder why they are so quiet about watching a stream? Any ideas?

Sou

vaporate

Esqui wrote: »

I hope you're not being serious.

Oh I am very serious. The government loses no sleep while taxing us to death, in the UK that is. e.g taking home 1800 and losing 400 of that.

Which is for what? a lousy national health that I do not intend to use, a police force that victimise men in a sadistic manner, public education system that has gone to the dogs?

Apart from the fire service and maintenance of roads ect....yeh real worth 1/5 or more of wages.

[Deleted User]

Soubrette wrote: »

Really? I'm not a great downloader myself - in what form is the file - is it zipped or something and you need extra software to unzip it?

Is it exactly the same as a temporary cache? Inaccessible, unusable and will be automatically deleted at some point?

Of course the fact that the music/film industry is open about the fact that downloading is illegal is the deciding factor for me. I wonder why they are so quiet about watching a stream? Any ideas?

Sou

I'll be corrected if I'm not quite right on this, but when you initiate a torrent file through whatever Bit-torrent program you, the file structure will be created locally in the directory specified and the files will be compiled with random data to create each file at the exact size it should be. The program will then download the data and overwrite the files with the correct data so upon completion the file is an exact replica.

Soubrette

anewhope wrote: »

I'll be corrected if I'm not quite right on this, but when you initiate a torrent file through whatever Bit-torrent program you, the file structure will be created locally in the directory specified and the files will be compiled with random data to create each file at the exact size it should be. The program will then download the data and overwrite the files with the correct data so upon completion the file is an exact replica.

So once the download is complete - you open the file and watch it?

Sou

Marty_J

Soubrette wrote: »

LHow can a temporary file in the cache be similar or identical to a film or even the stream that you watched? You can't open it, you can't use it, you can't amend it in any way. To make it a copy again you have to move and rename it so it becomes watchable - then you get to watch a copy. I think we're both agreed that this bit is illegal.

I am not talking about watching the stream, I am talking about what is on your computer - is that a copy in the form that it is in? If you believe it to be a copy then could you explain how?

When you are watching the movie, you're watching the copy of it that is on your computer. They have a copy of it on their servers, which is then downloaded to your computer and watched in your browser using whatever plugin is necessary to play it. "The stream" is a file on your computer. The movie you're streaming and the temporary copy in your cache are the same thing.

If no copy of it existed on your computer, you wouldn't be able to watch it.

mr_fishbulb

Soubrette wrote: »

mr_fishbulb - thanks for that information - my virgin link earlier certainly seemed to agree with you although that was regarding copying streams. However, we know for sure that some instances of copying, even if not for personal gain, is illegal. Such as copying your own bought and paid for CD as an MP3 file - or is that urban myth?

My understanding that copies of music for personal use is still illegal in the UK, although I don't see that when looking through the part of the act I posted. Can't find what act it is contravening.

This suggests it may change - http://www.ipo.gov.uk/press/press-release/press-release-2008/press-release-20080108.htm

Soubrette wrote: »

Of course the fact that the music/film industry is open about the fact that downloading is illegal is the deciding factor for me. I wonder why they are so quiet about watching a stream? Any ideas?

I think you may be getting too caught up with the technology of "streaming". The law doesn't need to have an individual clarification for downloading via P2P, streaming, newsgroups, etc. It just covers the act of "copying".

I think it would be very difficult to argue that a digital representation of material which exists on a server somewhere and then (albeit temporarily) a copy of that digital data also exists on your machine is anything other than copying.

However as no uploading has taken place on your part, I think it would be very difficult for copyright holders of the information to prove you have violated the Copyright, Designs and Patent Act 1988 or Video Recordings Act 1984.

I also think we need to appreciate that different laws apply in different countries:

Wikipedia wrote:

Sharing copied music is legal in many countries, such as Canada (downloading only),[8][9]

8^ "Your Interview: Michael Geist
". Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. 2008-04-07. http://www.cbc.ca/news/yourinterview/2008/04/michael_geist.html

9^ "In depth: Downloading music
". Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. 2006-05-01. http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/internet/downloading_music.html