Steve,

In message chiSf.4256$Vb.3613@trndny01 on Thu, 16 Mar 2006 18:39:04
GMT, "Steve Foley" wrote:


This is a question, not an argument.

I thought I heard that at some point, 'they' (whoever they are) managed to
get a law passed making it illegal to copy DVDs.

Was I misinformed? (likely)
Did I hallucinate it? (also likely)
or
Was this imaginary law repealed?

First of all, I'm not a lawyer. My information is only based on
publical sources research into this subject.

The United States Code section on Copyrights allows "Fair Use".

That's the law.

Copies of audio and video tapes for personal use were ruled
to fall under Fair Use by the Copyright Office decades ago.

CD's and DvD's are not functionally different from tapes,
but the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA)
and Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) have long
been campaigning to get the Copyright Office to declare
personal use copies of these infringements of their copyrights.

RIAA and MPAA are your "they" here, whom have so far failed
and have instead resorted to trying to buy a new law changing
the Copyright Act to forbid personal use copying. Each attempt
made so far has been by the slimey tactic of getting this provision
added to a totally unrelated bill and hoping nobody would notice
before it got passed into law.

So far "they" have failed, AFAIK.

I strongly urge everyone to monitor the Electronic Frontier Foundation
(EFF) website (http://www.eff.org) , wherein Action Alerts on this
issues are posted from time to time, along with extensive
plain-english explanations of the laws being applied to online
communications.

EFF majorly defends Freedom of Speech on the Internet and
greatly deserves your support.

Jay Random User