Is it illegal to watch movies online?

isofa

This isn't aimed at anyone in particular, just a general theft and morals post!

I do love these threads, how some people think it's ok, presumably because it's easy and it's digital. Streaming a pirated film is no different to downloading, it's essentially the same, as many of the informed responses above have indicated. Some browsers will end up caching much more than a snippet.

If you wouldn't be ok in walking into a shop and stealing a DVD of a film, (you wouldn't I presume...) then why would you think it any different to steal it "online" / digitally? The only defence you perhaps would use is that it's "easy" and thousands of people do it. That doesn't make it right.

Thousands of people do all manner of things, but following the herd doesn't make it right.

As someone who creates a enormous amount of digital media, from software to photography / images for clients, I'd be livid if anyone was stealing and re-using my hard work without payment and I'd go to every effort to pursue them.

Just because a studio or company is worth millions, doesn't mean it's ok that you can steal from them. That argument is akin to stealing food from Tescos on your weekly shop, because they make millions in profit.

I also love the ill informed who naively believe using a bit of cloaking software can hide their tracks online. You cannot effectively hide online, someone at some point, somewhere will have the IP information which can be tracked back to you, be it proxy or otherwise. You may argue that these "services" don't store records, but depending on the country they operate in, they may well, have to store data, by law. Still someone at some point can see all your efforts. And in most cases, if you are trying to hide online, it's likely you are doing something nefarious.

ay_5000

It has to be explicitilly illegal and currently it is not. Temporarily having a movie cached on the hard drive does in no way contribute to sharing the movie in the manner p2p shares it - also once the movie has been watched the browser at some point will expunge the cache, not to mention that the "copy" in cache is often in a format not usable for any other purpose other than playback on the Flash applet on the website.

It is ridiculous to equate this to stealing a DVD from a shop. When a DVD is stolen the studios still benefit financially, it is the retail outlet that has lost a physical unit of stock which was purchased from their distributor. The closest thing watching a movie streaming online comes to is copying somebody's artwork or something, looking at it for a couple of hours, then throwing your copy away.

With p2p you are downloading and SHARING the movie back to others, so the arguement of piracy has some ground to stand on. But seriously, watching movies streamed online has to be CLEARLY illegal or else it simply is not illegal. All of the focus and attention of the movie studios and corporations is going after p2p file sharers, perhaps they should focus on toppling the streaming sites too if it's pinching their pockets.

Marty_J

ay_5000 wrote: »

It has to be explicitilly illegal and currently it is not. Temporarily having a movie cached on the hard drive does in no way contribute to sharing the movie in the manner p2p shares it - also once the movie has been watched the browser at some point will expunge the cache, not to mention that the "copy" in cache is often in a format not usable for any other purpose other than playback on the Flash applet on the website.

When you stream a movie, what you have on your computer is an infringing copy of a copyrighted work.

That it's in your browser's cache is immaterial.

You can look at plenty of illegal things online without having to download and cherish them forever.

Jaffa.

wazza wrote: »

Have seen my daughter watching a movie online on youtube or other websites. Some of the movies she watched are showing on cinemas at present and you can tell some movies are taken using a camcorder in the cinema etc.

Is it illegal just to watch it?

Yes, your encouraging organized crime. Will you get caught for it, probably not.

DCFC79

Why is this question being asked, yes of course its illegal to watch movies, listen to music or play games downloaded illegaly. Your taking the money away from the film industry or music artist/ band or game developers

Soubrette

Marty_J wrote: »

When you stream a movie, what you have on your computer is an infringing copy of a copyrighted work.

That it's in your browser's cache is immaterial.

You can look at plenty of illegal things online without having to download and cherish them forever.

If this is the case then why is it not clear and obvious that watching an illegal stream is in itself illegal? I have spent all yesterday afternoon researching this and I cannot find the words illegal stream together with either music or film. I can only find the words illegal stream together with regards to football and even then the football association admits it will not be going after the viewer and in fact makes no comment on whether it is illegal or not to actually watch an illegal stream.

I am not convinced that having small parts of say a film in a very temporary and basically inaccessable part of a computer will count as a copy - any more than a memory in my mind would count as one.

I would expect big business interests to be coming down hard on watching illegal streaming in the same way they do with illegal downloads - lots of media publicity on how illegal it is for example. On the other hand maybe it isn't seen as much of a problem at the moment.

However, although I am still not convinced that it is illegal, I am also less sure of it's legality than I was previously, for the same basic reason - I can find nowhere that states categorically that streaming is legal.

I suspect we will only know for certain when a test case appears or if there is lobbying behind the scenes and it suddenly does become illegal (implying it is legal at the moment).

Sou

Marty_J

Soubrette wrote: »

I am not convinced that having small parts of say a film in a very temporary and basically inaccessable part of a computer will count as a copy - any more than a memory in my mind would count as one.

The memory in your mind is not tangible. The government haven't quite got to the point where they pass laws concerning what we can think.

I would expect big business interests to be coming down hard on watching illegal streaming in the same way they do with illegal downloads - lots of media publicity on how illegal it is for example. On the other hand maybe it isn't seen as much of a problem at the moment.

They have been. The MPAA successfully sued a company for $23.8 million way back in 2004 because they were streaming copyrighted material without consent, and they sued PeekVid and YouTVPC a couple of years ago.

However, although I am still not convinced that it is illegal, I am also less sure of it's legality than I was previously, for the same basic reason - I can find nowhere that states categorically that streaming is legal.

Well the people doing the streaming are certainly breaking the law. At the very least, if someone watched it with the knowledge that it was an infringed work, I don't see why they wouldn't be culpable.

Soubrette

Marty_J wrote: »

The memory in your mind is not tangible. The government haven't quite got to the point where they pass laws concerning what we can think.

Not quite - I'm sure they're working on it though I'm still not convinced that what is stored in cache could legally be called a copy of 'whatever', I await the inevitable court case on it with interest though.

Well the people doing the streaming are certainly breaking the law. At the very least, if someone watched it with the knowledge that it was an infringed work, I don't see why they wouldn't be culpable.

I agree that streaming illegal material is illegal. I am still not convinced that watching it even with knowledge is illegal - sorry did not make that clear in my original post - when I said streaming, I meant watching a stream.

For example other countries have different laws to us - uploading copyright material is always illegal but downloading anything is legal in Canada (according to a Canadian friend) and isn't it legal in Italy as long as it is not for personal gain?

So, just because making something available is illegal, it is does not logically follow that taking advantage of that is automatically illegal, so that argument alone does not convince me.

Sou

Jaffa.

Soubrette wrote: »

I agree that streaming illegal material is illegal. I am still not convinced that watching it even with knowledge is illegal - sorry did not make that clear in my original post - when I said streaming, I meant watching a stream.

You mean like sneaking into a cinema and watching the movie for free? Or going over to a friends house and watching/lending their film?

Because they are both examples of watching a stream without paying or holding any copy of the media, the latter seems more expectable to me but it's the same thing as the first really.

Soubrette

Jaffa. wrote: »

You mean like sneaking into a cinema and watching the movie for free? Or going over to a friends house and watching/lending their film?

Because they are both examples of watching a stream without paying or holding any copy of the media, the latter seems more expectable to me but it's the same thing as the first really.

The former does not come under copyright laws, it is against the terms and conditions of using the cinema.

Watching a friend's film at their house is not against copyright - in fact if anything it supports the argument that watching a stream is not illegal. The same goes for the argument of lending someone your film, this also perfectly acceptable and not against any law that I'm aware of (unless you are lending it to someone for a public performance) - it is the copying of the film that is illegal, neither of which are done in this latter part of your argument.

Sou