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This topic comprises 4 pages: 1 2 3 4
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Author
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Topic: jailed for filming in cinema
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Marcel Birgelen
Film God
Posts: 3357
From: Maastricht, Limburg, Netherlands
Registered: Feb 2012
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posted 08-25-2014 09:51 AM
quote: Mike Blakesley
Like I said, you not stealing something you can hold in your hand, but you ARE stealing the EXPERIENCE. It's intangible, but it's still something that legitimate customers are paying for.
While you probably can, legally, steal something that's intangible, I doubt you can, in the sense of the law, really steal an experience. ![[Wink]](wink.gif)
quote: Steve Guttag
So, if I buy a ticket...get in...and then I sneak into the boxoffice and take the money back...that would be stealing though the final outcome is identical (presuming I stand in the same place either time)...or does the threshold of "stealing" come in if they count the money before I take it back? That is, if they "know" how much money they have first?
That's stealing in the sense of the law. It doesn't even really matter if you take exactly the amount you paid, less or more. Furthermore, you wouldn't be in the theater without buying that ticket and if you were, you were trespassing and not stealing.
quote: Steve Guttag
Recording the performance is even worse because one is then copying the work and now controlling a product they do not own. Showing it to one's friends is now giving that product away and devaluing it for everyone. Selling it, takes it another step further by showing it has value but likely devaluing it by providing a cheaper alternative to the genuine article as well as depriving the copyright holder any value from their product.
It's not that I do not agree with you that copyright infringement, especially the blatant cases should be punishable. But according to logic and the law, it's not stealing... It's potentially depriving others of income. There are other ways to do that too, some are considered legal, like competition for example.
A lot of people regularly copy and paste whole stories from other sources on this forum, according to your theories, they're all naughty thieves. I would watch out for black vans and people wearing sunglasses on cloudy afternoons.
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Leo Enticknap
Film God
Posts: 7474
From: Loma Linda, CA
Registered: Jul 2000
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posted 08-25-2014 12:31 PM
quote: Marcel Birgelen
I'm still wondering why someone would actually do this, if there's no direct financial gain and the potential consequences are dire..
I'd really have to get into politics to explore that one, but Lawrence Lessig's book Free Culture will give you the chapter and verse on what motivates people who believe that current copyright law is fundamentally wrong, that it has "mission crept" egregiously from the original concept of the Statute of Anne and Article 1, Section 8 of the US Constitution (between them, the first modern articulations of what copyright should be and why it is needed), and that it now goes way beyond the intention of those laws, which was to protect the legitimate investment of the creators of intellectual property.
Lessig and his supporters basically argue that civil disobedience towards modern IP law is a justified and necessary way to campaign to restore sanity, and that therefore putting movies on file sharing sites (for example) is morally justified. I'm not saying that I agree with this, but simply stating my understanding of what their point of view is.
For the counterargument, Andrew Keen's The Cult of the Amateur is a very good read.
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Marcel Birgelen
Film God
Posts: 3357
From: Maastricht, Limburg, Netherlands
Registered: Feb 2012
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posted 08-25-2014 04:34 PM
I think I got my point across, and sorry for being a bit of a dick, but my whole point is/was: Copyright is a very complicated thing. The guy from the news story is a clear cut example of copyright infringement combined with either brain damage or an overdose of narcissism (or both). Everybody knew what he was doing, was against the law and rightfully so. But there are many cases where it's not as clearly cut. And therefore, copyright infringement isn't the same as stealing. It's covered by entirely different laws, actually quite recent laws mostly, since this is a problem that mostly manifested itself in the last century and got enormous momentum in the digital age and the advent of the Internet.
Copyright is a difficult balance between the rights of the content creators, the distributors and the public at large.
quote: Leo Enticknap
Copying and pasting a news story specifically is covered by the "fair use" (US) or "fair dealing" (UK) provisions in copyright law. I couldn't quote you the chapter and verse of the American law, but in the UK it's in Section 30 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. That's why there are so many sites out there that simply copy and paste material from news agency sites, adding their own banner ads, etc. Once a news story, clearly published as such, is on a page on the public Internet, you can copy and paste it - as long as you are doing so for the purpose of reporting or discussing the story, and you properly attribute the source - however you like
Different jurisdictions, different laws, different interpretations... Actually, the current situation in the U.S. seem to be vague at best:
quote:
Question: Can I copy an entire news article from a commercial news web site and post the article on my web site?
Answer: The fair use doctrine, as currently interpreted by the courts, probably would not entitle you to do so. Even though news items are factual and facts themselves are not protected by copyright, an entire news article itself is expression protected by copyright.
Google actually got their ass handed to them over this in both France and Belgium. In the Netherlands for example, copying a news article in verbatim, even when quoting the original source, is considered copyright infringement (unless it's being used for private or educational use, which would, again, be covered by fair use...). You are allowed to quote parts of the article and you're allowed to use the facts stated within it. As far as I understood it, this also seems to be best practice for most of the rest of the world where copyright matters at least a bit.
quote: Mike Blakesley
A lot of websites allow you to paste their content as long as it's attributed properly. I think Brad would be fine with just pasting the link to an article, except that a newspaper or magazine article will usually go "dead" after a short time, losing the information and ruining the continuity of the topic.
I totally understand the reasoning behind it. The problem though, is that it's probably not entirely legal (besides from the sites that allow it off course). It's actually a form of copyright infringement (stealing? ![[Smile]](smile.gif) ). I'm not the one to judge about this, I'm merely stating the facts here.
quote: Mike Blakesley
I also am sure that if any content owner had a problem with something posted here, Brad would take it down without a hassle if asked -- as opposed to making a billion copies and forwarding it all over the world.
I sure do understand the difference in scope here. Although, it's not really forwarding, most people that download pirated copies do so out of their own free will . If they're using distributed networks like bittorent, they actually not only engage in downloading, they're also contributing themselves to the spreading.
But in essence, although on a far, far smaller scale, it's largely the same. The damage has been done, almost all the intended audience already read the article off of this site and as such skipped the advertisements on the originating site, thereby depriving the owner of the original site of revenue (or did we all just steal a little bit? ).
quote: Steve Guttag
It is proper practice on this site to post the link AND the text of the story...doing so ensure that the the link can go dead as well as providing the source for the information. It covers all bases.
Yeah, it has been pronounced proper practice on this site. And I'm not advocating to stop this "proper practice". But, unfortunately, Brad isn't above the law (yet), so as far as I understand the current law of the jurisdiction this site is operating in, it is actually a form of copyright infringement...
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Marcel Birgelen
Film God
Posts: 3357
From: Maastricht, Limburg, Netherlands
Registered: Feb 2012
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posted 08-25-2014 05:56 PM
quote: Justin Hamaker
By Marcel's logic, it would not be stealing for someone sneak into a movie they did not pay for and watch the movie. Again, it all comes down to people thinking it is not theft because there is no physical object taken.
Yeah, I know it's difficult... But I will try it one more time then...
No, it doesn't matter if it's physical or not. I could steal, for example, a bunch of Bitcoins from you. Bitcoins are no physical thing, they're virtual currency (although their status as real currency is yet being debated). Yet they can be stolen, although being entirely virtual. If I steal them from you, you cannot use them anymore, but I can.
Stealing, by the very definition of the law is taking something away, without the consent of the owner. After it's been taken away, it cannot be used anymore by the original owner. If you sneak into a movie, you do not take anything away other than the air in the auditorium in the sense of the law. You're depriving the exhibitor and content owners of revenue, but since you didn't pay them to begin with, you didn't steal that money from them either...
Sneaking into a theater without paying isn't allowed, but it's no theft, its trespassing and it's being dealt with by different laws.
quote: Justin Hamaker
And if you are consuming something that would normally require payment without having paid for it, then you are committing an act of theft.
You're not consuming them in the sense that they're gone. Once you "consumed" them, they're still there for you and others to consume.
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Frank Angel
Film God
Posts: 5305
From: Brooklyn NY USA
Registered: Dec 1999
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posted 08-25-2014 07:01 PM
I see your argument, but at least here in the US, the law does specifically address this distinction and refuses to split the hairs you want to split. The law comes down on the side of defining such non-physical "consumption" as theft. In fact it is specifically classified here as "theft of service."
Those who believe that somehow if the copying, i.e., infringement, results in "no profit being made...no monetary gain," that fact somehow removes all criminality would better understand the fallacy of that believe if it is explained this way: a man looked out the window and he realized that his car was missing from the curb where he had parked it. He calls the police and reports the stolen car. Hours later the police call back and tell him they found the car and the college kid who was driving it with five of his buddies. The police also reassure him that the car is not at all damaged. The owner tells the cops that he still wants to press charges but they tell him, not to worry, no crime was committed; the college students were already released. "What do you mean no crime was committed...they stole my car!" fumed the owner. The officers explained -- "You see, sir, the driver didn't charge anyone a fare to ride in the car...he made no profit from the joy ride."
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Marcel Birgelen
Film God
Posts: 3357
From: Maastricht, Limburg, Netherlands
Registered: Feb 2012
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posted 08-25-2014 07:11 PM
quote: Justin Hamaker
Marcel, let me give you another example: Someone who puts slugs in a video game machine to play without putting in quarters. They are consuming plays on a game machine. They are depriving the owner of the machine revenue while still enjoying the experience of playing the game. The key point is taking something which doesn't belong to them and depriving the owner/agent the revenue to which they are entitled. No matter how you defend it, this is theft and always will be theft.
We could go over this for months I guess. In the example above, technically you probably didn't steal anything. Yet, what you did was wrong. Still, those comparisons are flawed, as they're not about Intellectual property anymore.
If you would've taken the time to read my posts you might have noticed that I'm not defending anybody. Sneaking into a theater without paying is wrong. Copying and especially distributing works of others, without consent of the owners, is wrong.
Shooting somebody in the head is wrong, but it's not stealing either...
The whole idea with infringement on intellectual property is that you didn't take it to begin with, you made a copy of it. You didn't take someone else's money, because there was never a transaction with the content owner...
If we would invalidate the whole copyright law tomorrow, everybody would be able to share all the content there ever was without paying someone a dime. The whole content industry would be in ruins shortly afterwards. That's because the laws regarding theft simply do not cover this. Also notice the name: COPYright. It's the law that regulates copies.
quote: Frank Angel
Those who believe that somehow if the copying, i.e., infringement, results in "no profit being made...no monetary gain," that fact somehow removes all criminality would better understand the fallacy of that believe if it is explained this way: a man looked out the window and he realized that his car was missing from the curb where he had parked it. He calls the police and reports the stolen car. Hours later the police call back and tell him they found the car and the college kid who was driving it with five of his buddies. The police also reassure him that the car is not at all damaged. The owner tells the cops that he still wants to press charges but they tell him, not to worry, no crime was committed; the college students were already released. "What do you mean no crime was committed...they stole my car!" fumed the owner. The officers explained -- "You see, sir, the driver didn't charge anyone a fare to ride in the car...he made no profit from the joy ride."
Your comparison, unfortunately, doesn't really work out.
Copyright infrignment often results in monetary loss for the content owners, that's why there are laws regarding intellectual property and how works under this law can be DUPLICATED in the first place.
Secondly, the act of taking this car without the consent of the owner is theft, even if you bring it back later and even if you did not do any damage and even filled up the gas tank afterwards.
There is no fitting car example for Copyright Infringement. The example would be me making a copy of your car and using that for a joyride. But in that case, I wouldn't harm you in any way, I would possibly harm the creators of the car, I copied their design without paying for it...
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Mike Blakesley
Film God
Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99
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posted 08-25-2014 08:38 PM
So really, then, this whole argument is about two definitions.
Let's turn, then, to the ever-popular dictionary. One of the definitions of "steal" is:
quote:
to take or appropriate without right or leave and with intent to keep or make use of wrongfully
Notice it doesn't say what you're taking. Therefore it can be physical property, an idea, an experience, or anything you are SUPPOSED to be paying for. To watch a movie, say, without paying for a ticket is to "make use of wrongfully."
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