Repeat after me: YOU CANNOT BE ARRESTED FOR CIVIL TORTS. ARREST IS TOTALLY IRRELEVANT TO THIS ISSUE. Nobody is arguing that personal copies are not covered by Fair Use. They are arguing that the DMCA abridges your ability to do this.
Because they weren't prosecuted for what we are discussing. And because of rulings after the ones you mentioned the Software is now available. See multiple previous links.
There is both a civil and a criminal side to this. The one that keeps being brought up is the FBI criminal one. And the civil cases that have gone to trial have found for the people making fair use personal copies of both analog and digital media.
Well, that does it for me. It's so nice when a legal expert finds the time to explain all this complicated stuff, I think. How about you?
Well if you make that argument, that everyone believes that copies of DVDs are legal under Fair Use, then you have to realize that based on the DMCA "innocent violations" clause, that you can't really use DMCA to punish people for what they think is Fair Use. In other words you claim people think they can do so, like they can do so for all other digital media, and so by definition their copying for personal use is innocent. And yet, after 12 years, there are no court cases supporting that assertion. See above.
You keep bringing up personal copy types of fair use. That is a non-criminal issue. Indeed, there is no dispute that Fair Use allows you to make such copies. But the DMCA prevents you from decrypting media in order to do so. The DMCA doesn't say you can't make a copy. It says you can't bypass the encryption.
The DMCA doesn't punish people for copyright infringement (which is what Fair Use covers). It punishes them for bypassing encryption technologies. Of course it is. The copying isn't the issue. It's the bypassing of encryption. Every commercial entity that has tried to distribute software to allow bypassing of the encryption in question has been either sued out of existence, or sued into ceasing sales and distribution of such. Let's look at the FAQ from the webpage for the software that you keep recommending to everyone (1CLICK DVD COPY http://www.lgsoftwareinnovations.com/faq.asp - bold mine): Q Is it legal to copy a DVD? A In some countries it's still considered illegal to copy a DVD, just as it once was to copy a music CD. Unlike audio CD's, fair use laws don't allow for copies to be made of DVDs because they are encrypted. The laws surrounding the encryption of DVD movies is currently being challenged in U.S. courts. We don't encourage or condone the use of 1Click DVD Copy to make illegal copies of DVD's. Q Can I buy your software in a retail store? A Our applications are only available online. However, if you’d like to have a physical copy of the software, you can purchase a CD with your license when you visit our Purchase page. Q What do I do if I get this message: "This DVD is encrypted..."? A The movie you are trying to copy is encrypted. 1Click DVD Copy can copy personally authored DVDs or movies which are not encrypted. If you wish to copy a movie which is encrypted, you'll also need to install a third party decrypter like 'DVD43' to unlock the DVD."DVD43" is a free program that operates in the background and decrypts the DVD while you copy. "DVD43" is available for free on the internet and can be located using a search engine like Google.com using search terms like: "dvd43 beta news" or "dvd43 software digest". The laws in some countries prohibit the sale and distribution of software that decrypts, so we cannot integrate decryption capability in our software. Decrypting programs are developed by independent third parties and are not distributed by or affiliated with LG Software Innovations. Q What do I do if I get this message: "An encrypted file was encountered..."? A One of the files you are trying to copy is encrypted. You can't copy encrypted files with 1Click DVD Copy. We recommend you launch 1Click DVD Copy AFTER any other program you are using to avoid conflicts that can occur when two programs compete for the same resources (DVD movie files).
Baloney, they were busted for busting CSS, and enabling people to bust CSS to make personal copies. More hooey. As I have stated already, there are two possible alternatives to this explanation. They haven't been caught yet - this explanation gets lent some weight if we give Gustavs comments credence, and they provide us with a possible explanation. Nobody is getting caught, because nobody is complaining, because nobody cares about whether or not CSS gets busted anymore - as to why this should be the case, take a look at BlueRay, and the built in sercurity measures that BlueRay has. The Software that is available, that is not getting busted is LICENSED to decrypt CSS, which means that it is legal under the DMCA because the owner of the intellectual property has given permission for the CSS to be decrypted (by issuing a license). But, it is still illegal to do so without permission (IE without a license), for ANY PURPOSE including (until sometime this year) making a backup copy of legaly purchased media.
There are actually specific exceptions, and they are related to Fair Use - but only the "educational/review purposes" and "archives" clauses, not the personal back-up copy stuff. And you have to go and explicitly request an exception for the copyright board to do this (there is no blanket fair-use exception). Also MPAA lawyers have explicitly argued in court that individuals making a personal back-up copy is infringement.
Yeah, I know - I meant beyond the exemptions contained within the DCMA. I know - I've linked to at least one of their submissions for the triennial reviews arguing precisely that point.
Someone who purchases software to make a personal copy is not making CSS busting software, so no, it's not the same thing. Oh, so you are saying that if I buy a licensed DVD copy program for about $50 I shouldn't use it for making a backup copy because that would be illegal? Thanks. That clears it up.
I made no such recommendation. I'm not selling anything. Those links to available software were for purposes of illustration only.
Would you like some cheese with your straw? That's a disingenuos hack-job at my argument at best. Nothing I have said even remotely implies your statements, any more than it implies that watching a DVD is illegal.
They have successfully made it illegal to distribute the software required to make such a copy. I.e., we have all been pre-emptively punished, as we are deprived of such a legal ability. Instead, we'd have to break the law just to acquire the software required to make such copies. The relevant cases have already been listed repeatedly in this thread. You are simply being argumentative here. The fact that the MPAA hasn't seen fit to sue individuals making personal back-ups is just that. It would be a PR nightmare, it would be difficult to gather the requisite evidence to begin with, and it would put them squarely at odds with well-established Fair Use issues. It's more effective for them to crack down on anyone who'd distribute the requisite software - the PR issues are greatly reduced, cases are much easier to make, criminal penalties are available, the target has deeper pockets to dig into, and the total effect on copying is probably greater. The fact remains that the DMCA says what it says, and it says that bypassing copy protection to make a personal back-up is illegal.
If they were buying software capable of busting CSS, they and the company selling it would be breaking the law. But nobody sells such software, for exactly that reason. The licensed programs are all playback-only systems (like, y'know, DVD players). You can't buy a legal DVD copying system that is capable of bypassing CSS. Instead, you buy a legal DVD copying system without any decryption abilities, and then you download an illegal third-party decryption program to use with it.
And the point they "illustrate" - that CSS busting software can be legally purchased and used - is incorrect. As made explicit on the actual webpage of the software recommended there, it does not work on encrypted DVDs, exactly because of DMCA concerns, and so you have to acquire an (illegal) third-party program to do the decryption if you want to use it to copy encrypted DVDs. By all means, though: you've stated repeatedly in this thread that you make copies of your encrypted DVDs. Please point us to the legal software that you use for this purpose.
