Breaking Ruddock's new copyright laws can result in jail for 5 years, a $65,000 fine, or both. Luckily, if didn't know you were breaking the laws when you broke them, you only go to jail for 2 years.
The laws are bloody ridiculous. They have recently included exceptions to allow people to record shows on video to watch later. However, each individual can only watch the program once and are not allowed to keep the recording to watch the show over and over. However, rewinding a portion of the program to watch a short section is permitted. They cannot keep it on video for too long before watching it. They can lend the recording to other members of the family or household, but not outside the household. This seriously came from the revised and apparently less draconian legislation.
The one good thing is that once you have bought something, you can make copies of it in different formats. So it will be legal to put it onto iTunes and onto a MP3 player. You can have multiple "main copies" but they must all be in different formats. If there are multiple "main copies" in the same format then all copies become infringing copies. However, if the software that converts your CDs into MP3 has to make an extra copy before it converts it you won't be arrested. But you must destroy the intermediate copies immediately.
The stupid thing is that copies of music have no identity. The police would have no idea if you copied it from a CD or bought the MP3 directly or downloaded it illegally. Are they seriously going to arrest you for having MP3s and not having the matching CDs in your collection to prove you bought them? They must be mad. Don't our legislators have something better to do than decide which of our family members and friends are permitted to sit next to us while we watch a video?
Maybe music should be like software where the authors decide what the copyright conditions will be. People like Radiohead like us to illegally copy their music and bootleg it. What right does Ruddock have to prevent them? The software community has developed 10 or so basic licenses ranging from the totally flexible to totally not. People used to invent their own, but they've basically stopped because an existing one nearly always does the trick. There will be plenty of pressure on record companies not to pick weird sorts of licenses, and if they pick a license that is too strict people might just stop buying the music. The new Zune player lets you share music with another Zune which can be played for 3 days. Is every country in the world going to put that into their legislation? "You can't give music to your friend unless it is on a Zune and your friend promises to only listen to it for 3 days." Is every country going to change their legislation every time a company comes up with a new technically-copyright-violating way of selling music? Dumb and dumb.
I think the new laws are good.
It has always been illegal to record tv but there hasnt been anything to enforce it, so i have no problem casue its alwayts been illegal so if peple do it they are breaking the law so now there is penalties
howie / 11:38am / 21 November 2006
I think the content of the laws is better than the previous ones But I don’t really like the idea of sending someone to jail for 5 tears for a crime that doesn’t cause anyone any hardship. There’s the hypothetical hardship I guess, but you’d have to prove that the person would have spent money on it otherwise. I think there should be strong penalties for people who make money from copying music, and it should still be illegal for the rest of us, but not 5 years illegal.
It’s a bit silly that you can spend $1.69 for a song on iTunes and give it away to four other people. But you spend $5 on a CD single, and you can get a $65,000 fine for giving a copy away. They say they’re not going to enforce it on individuals very rigorously, but I don’t like giving anyone the option to inflict those sorts of penalties for random stuff.
You can imagine it being used to imprison some Muslim the government doesn’t like. We might all be breaking the law, but the police get to decide who goes to jail for it.
But in some ways I think they’re definitely a step in the right direction. They’ve decriminalised a lot of stuff that almost everyone has been doing for years.
Ryan / 3:45pm / 21 November 2006