this contradiction always confused me. either way the official company is “losing a sale” and not getting the money, right?
Pretty sure they tried to prevent the sharing and reselling of CDs at one point.
Look up the history of DIVX DVDs. Not to be confused with the DivX video codec.
Because they somehow don’t consider that someone could have copied the books or discs before reselling them, but it immediately comes to their mind with digital copies riddled with DRMs
Because 🤡
(there is no actual reason)
Ahem actually it’s because 🤑 💰 💸
Usually, when the question is “why is copyright restrictive in these evil and/or dumb ways” the safe bet is that the the answer is “Disney.”
This may be a dumb question, but why can’t crypto something or an NFT be imprinted on my copy of the album/picture/whatever so I could sell it and lose my access? It’s this a function of no standardized marketplace for digital goods and services?
Because crypto is a joke and NFTs are vaporware. The concept is honestly laughable. Perfect example for NFTs, my company wanted to advertise that our service could help with the production of NFTs and my boss had put together the ad for it. I advised against it considering the BS and controversy associated with it. It became doubly apparent when I looked at the ad and saw that he had included several of the (in)famous NFTs that had been sold. I point blankly asked him if he had gotten permission to use them. He said no. Then I pointed out that the fact he was able to put them in the ad without asking and paying for the right to to the person who had spent millions on the NFT was exactly my point. NFTs are a scam. Thankfully he saw the light and dropped the whole nonsense.
As for the blockchain in general, it is unsustainable. It requires enormous amounts of power and computing cycles to maintain which gives it a massive eco-footprint and sucks resources needed by actual industries and individuals to support. If you started attributing it to all digital purchases, including resales, it would expand exponentially. It is fine in concept, and if it could function in a passive state somehow it might see usefulness as a purchase and resale history for digital media, but it can’t. It requires many computers maintaining identical records in active communication with each other.
Very enlightening. Thanks! So there’s still some big hurdle of what would be standardized to make resale of digital goods make sense otherwise it’s impossible to police who does and doesn’t have legit copies or who made a copy of the file, etc.
Physical media doesn’t have the luxury of endlessly replicating itself via a simple copy and paste.
Distributing data to everybody is the only communism that works.
Endless replication, creates endless intelectual and creative wealth and diminishes financial wealth to zero.
It won’t even diminish it to zero. Some people will still pay. Ya I could download games for free and play them but I want to support the teams that made them so they keep making them. I only get games for free if that is the only way of getting them.
If a copy isn’t kept after sale, it should be legal. It’s my understanding it is legal in the EU.
That is if you can sell a game you bought on Steam. Steam makes sure to copies aren’t played at the same time so you can’t keep your copy after selling it.
Since when, you can do a perfect rip of a CD and burn an exact image of the disk loslessly thousands of times. Same for DVD and Blu-rays. If you are talking about a physical book, then yes, making lossless copies is more involved, but still technically possible with the proper equipment and knowledge.
In theory, sharing a digital file can have a much greater impact than sharing a CD physically. Plus, you lose access to your copy of the CD if you give it to someone else. You can think of it like transferring a license for one user to a different user. There is no simultaneous usage.
I don’t personally agree with this view, but I believe that’s the argument.
I buy disc.
I rip contents of CD to computer.
I sell disc.
When I used to use CD’s if I had a rare CD I’d copy it and listen to the copy. That kept the original from getting scratched.
STOP RIGHT THERE, CRIMINAL SCUM
Eh, technically it is only criminal if he distributed it. US (and I think international) copyright laws has provisions for “personal backups” of media you have purchased. There is nothing illegal about ripping a copy of a CD to your computer or burning an image of a game disc, only if you allow the copy to leave your personal possession. It is so you can keep a copy in a fireproof safe and not lose access to your property in the event of a disaster.
Not that you needed to be told and I get the sarcasm; I am just a habitual pedant and felt the need to utilize the opportunity for a PSA.
The amount of people who will duplicate their tapes and CDs would be lower than the amount of people who will duplicate their digital files.
Most of the time when a law sounds silly for banning something when alternatives exist, it’s because people themselves are silly and don’t actually go for the alternatives at the same rate as they would the banned thing. Ie gun accessory bans, ninja star bans.
Where were you in the early 2000s? Lol
I don’t know anyone who didn’t do this.
Anecdotal evidence isn’t evidence.
Anecdotal evidence is literally evidence of one (which disproves “zero” claims). Collections of anecdotal evidences make statistics making your dismissive statement dumb.
I’m adding to the pile. I can name literally over a dozen people in my childhood who copied Discs.
Start naming. Organize the names. And their experiences, and start collecting over time, if you wanna go that route. Because otherwise, you’re just some random words in the ether.
nuh-uh
Burning CDs. That’s how I know most people didn’t know how to do it, or want to put in the effort. You had to go buy a stack of CDs, hope your computer supported burning, had to make sure players could support the burned disc (depending on if you made a music disc or data disc, if it was rewritable), and spend the time to burn the disc.
Contrast that to ctrl+c ctrl+v.
There’s more people who can ‘duplicate’ digital files than there were people burning CDs.
DON’T COPY THAT FLOPPY!!
This argument is only a “gotcha” if it was permissible use, but it wasn’t, even before CDs.
Not very fun fact: The developer from that video got arrested for cp possession
You’re totally right, that’s not fun at all!
You rather had them walk free? /S
I think you are referring to rules in the USA. In Canada, we have ‘fair dealing’ laws that would allow you to rip your CD and sell it. In part, this is already funded by a levy on blank CDs here.
I’m back, it’s me DP
Netflix’s mail service was great for data hoarders.
Of those three steps, step 2 is the illegal one. (Assuming we’re talking about music and not software.) Even if you never do step 3.
(Not saying things should be that way. Nor that it’s not difficult to enforce. Only that as the laws are today, even ripping a music CD to your hard drive without any intention to share the audio files or resell the CD, even if you never listen to the tracks from your computer, the act of making that “copy” infringes copyright.)
Edit: Oh, and I should mention this is the case for U.S. copyright. No idea about any other countries.
Technically Step 2 should be legal, as covered by the old VCR case law (I think it involved Sony). Making a backup of a VHS tape or audio casette was legal, thus it should be legal for other formats, also.
However the sneaky bastards then went and lobbied for a law that makes it illegal to circumvent DRM. So, there shouldn’t be anything wrong with writing the raw files to a drive, but if you have to crack the DRM to get the files to play then you’re definitely doing something unlawful.
Disclaimer: “should” is doing a lot of heavy lifting in my comment lol what I say is not in any way legal advice. Also, it could be that the VHS law was more about “time-shifting”, ie recording live TV so that you could watch it at a more convenient time.
Copyright also used to only be a civil offense, meaning law enforcement wouldn’t come after you, but a rightsholder might. However, they lobbied over that as well and ended up with a relatively low bar - if the value is over something like $1,000 then it’s automatically considered commercial and “criminal” copyright infringement.
Regular audio CDs don’t have any DRM. (Unless it’s a data CD filled with audio files that have DRM or some such. But regular standard audio CDs that work in any CD player, there’s no DRM. The standard just doesn’t allow for any DRM.) And so the DMCA’s anticircumvention provisions wouldn’t apply to CDs.
But as for the Sony case you’re referencing, I’m not familiar with it, so I’ll have to do more research on that.
Pretty sure it was this one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_Corp._of_America_v._Universal_City_Studios,_Inc. Sony were actually the defendant, with their Betamax format. It does seem to focus primarily on time-shifting, ie recording live to watch later, however the reason for this was that the content was already available to the viewer and thus the copying should be permitted fair use. The Supreme Court also quoted Mr Rogers’ testimony in their ruling.
“Some public stations, as well as commercial stations, program the ‘Neighborhood’ at hours when some children cannot use it. I think that it’s a real service to families to be able to record such programs and show them at appropriate times. I have always felt that, with the advent of all of this new technology that allows people to tape the ‘Neighborhood’ off the air, and I’m speaking for the ‘Neighborhood’ because that’s what I produce, that they then become much more active in the programming of their family’s television life. Very frankly, I am opposed to people being programmed by others. My whole approach in broadcasting has always been ‘You are an important person just the way you are. You can make healthy decisions.’ Maybe I’m going on too long, but I just feel that anything that allows a person to be more active in the control of his or her life, in a healthy way, is important.”
Applying this reasoning to new technologies has since been debated back and forth through the decades with little clear resolution. Subsequent cases have sided with the rightsholders (eg against Grokster and Limewire), but the reasoning behind them was all over the place. They addressed the purpose of file sharing technology and concluded that those services existed primarily to facilitate copyright infringement, rather than addressing the matter of personal backups.
In the US, if you don’t proceed to step 3, step 2 is legal (so long as the CD lacks DRM). You’re permitted a single backup under fair use; you’re also permitted to rip the music for personal use, like loading it onto a music player. You’re not supposed to burn it to a regular CD-R (is it illegal? Idk), but burning it to an Audio CD-R (where there is a tax that is distributed to rights holders like royalties) is endorsed by the RIAA.
Can’t you transfer a game to other people on Steam? They treat it like a physical item where after giving it away you loose access IIRC.
Not if you already activated it.
It used to be possible to buy games as gifts and and them to your inventory to give to somebody ( or activate it yourself ) later.
Now, when you want to gift a game. You have to immediately select the person you want to send it to.
That’s too bad… I guess I can’t think of a digital example that’s an analogue of the physical one after all
You USED to be able to stock up on games on Steam as gift games… I bought eight copies of Fallout: New Vegas for 2.5USD at one point.
They stopped that. I understand why but fuck, I miss it. Most of those copies were traded for one buds hahaha
Maybe this should be enforced by law. At least for digital purchases which are basically a license.
The only things you can easily give to others are DRM free things, like the games you can buy from GOG. But in that case it’s also easy to copy.
And that’s why you don’t own digital media but only a “usage license”, because the original owner still has the original? Isn’t it then fraudulent if the shops sell you the media, despite it being only a license? And shouldn’t that be cheaper then?
Well, anyway, harr harr.
There are companies out there that do allow this for digital licenses. Arturia, an audio software and hardware company, lets you de-register and sell a license key to someone else, who can re-register it. They don’t charge any fees for it at all either, like some companies do. It’s not hard, most companies just don’t care about you as a customer
which is eyactly why piracy isn’t theft.
it can still be a crime, just don’t call it what it obviously isn’t.
It never used to be a crime. Bastard lobbyists!
It isn’t piracy, either. It’s filesharing.
See Richard Stallman, “Ending the War on Sharing”:
When record companies make a fuss about the danger of “piracy”, they’re not talking about violent attacks on shipping. What they complain about is the sharing of copies of music, an activity in which millions of people participate in a spirit of cooperation. The term “piracy” is used by record companies to demonize sharing and cooperation by equating them to kidnaping, murder and theft.
One thing to keep in mind that may be relevant: copies of non-digital things are different than digital copies.
Digital (meant here as bit-for-bit) copies are effectively impossible with analog media. If I copy a book (the whole book, its layout, etc., and not just the linguistic content), it will ultimately look like a copy, and each successive copy from that copy will look worse. This is of course true with forms of tape media and a lot of others. But it isn’t true of digital media, where I could share a bit-for-bit copy of data that is absolutely identical to the original.
If it sounds like an infinite money glitch on the digital side, that’s because it is. The only catch is that people have to own equipment to interpret the bits. Realistically, any form of digital media is just a record of how to set the bits on their own hardware.
Crucially: if people could resell those perfect digital copies, then there would be no market for the company which created it originally. It all comes down to the fact that companies no longer have to worry about generational differences between copies, and as a result, they’re already using this “infinite money glitch” and just paying for distribution. That market goes away if people can resell digital copies, because they can also just make new copies on their own.
You cannot endlessly duplicate digital data without some loss.
This assumes a conversion on each copy. That’s not how digital copying works. We CAN share the same file indefinitely by copying the data without loss indefinitely. It’s when you transcode/reencode the data that you introduce loss.
it will ultimately look like a copy, and each successive copy from that copy will look worse. This is of course true with forms of tape media and a lot of others. But it isn’t true of digital media, where I could share a bit-for-bit copy of data that is absolutely identical to the original.
There is one exception: reposted memes, they are losing pixels more and more. /s
Only because of incompetent people using lossy reproduction methods out of ignorance
And also just websites compressing images without the user getting any input. A meme that goes from Facebook to Twitter to Reddit to Twitter to Tumblr to Reddit to here will likely be compressed every time it gets reuploaded. Most social media sites use some form of image compression.
And it obviously doesn’t help that artefacts from compression are multiplicative.
This is why you use PNG or GIF formats. Lossless compression on the PNG side and a LUT on the GIF side. Nothing to get compressed since it is literally just a grid of numbers and a table with the hex codes.
I really wish the social media companies and phone manufacturers would switch to PNG. So much better than JPG.
Lemmy compresses uploads to jpg without asking too
I know, is sad. Would love to see them converting the JPG to PNG. I do see a lot of images coming off here as GIF though, which Facebook doesn’t let me send to people because fuck Facebook.
The storage demands between small compressed JPEG’s and decent quality PNG’s is massive. That’s a lot to ask of people who are self hosting this without any of us paying for it. Especially since 99% of the images loaded up here are one off jokes that are compressed versions from somewhere else already. Pretty clear example of “the juice isn’t worth the squeeze” IMO
What about physical media containing digital data, e.g. a CD?
It’s technically illegal to make a copy of that data for yourself and then to sell the original (while keeping the copy). That obviously doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen, but…
It’s not that straightforward. Copyright is different in that infringement is only enforced by rightsholders through litigation. That means they hato find you, sue you, and make a convincing argument that your backup is harming their market viability.
On that last point, some personal backup is unlikely to be found to be infringing. It’s more problematic if it’s something shared or done in a significant scale.
If they could, they would. Laws aren’t passed because it makes sense, but because they benefit the rich.
“The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets and steal loaves of bread.”
-Anatole France
bourgeoisie lobby in the State
There is no difference, they just want you to believe there is a difference.
Cos if you believe it then they can make more money.
The point: GREED that’s the difference.
Dude, of course there is a difference. If you sell a physical good you do not have that physical good anymore. If you sell a digital copy you can keep selling that digital copy because you do not necessarily give it away or delete it.
Saying that there is no difference at all between the two is silly.
To be clear, I am not saying this justifies anything regarding copyright, but it is a difference if you can sell something over and over again or just once.
There were lots of book copying back in the day, and disc copying too ofc.
Thats why copying of an immaterial gpod is not stealing because the other person still has the full ownership over their copy.
If you sell a digital copy you can keep selling that digital copy because you do not necessarily give it away or delete it.
Steam and other DRM systems ensure that copies cannot be played. Yet you can’t sell your Steam games. It is my understanding that in the EU, you can sell your Steam games. So there is no legitimate reason you can’t sell digital goods.
Under US law (I see someone else posted about EU law):
Physical property has a long tradition of legal rights that are a part of ownership. There’s a thing called “right of first sale” that means you have the right to sell an object that you own. This legal framework falls under property law, even if the media on the disc is also governed by copyright law. In this case, property law is inviolate - it trumps copyright law.
Digital files are instead governed only by copyright law. Further, media companies could not modify copyright law fast enough to keep up with the digital revolution, so more than copyright, digital files are controlled by digital rights management (DRM) code, and contract law (the long TOS when you access a service or site).
The contract law in the TOS, and code in the DRM, do two things: they force a digital file owner to treat it as a “license,” and give media company the ability to severely restrict use after the purchase.
So basically, when you buy a disc, you are simply getting a lot more rights to use that content. You literally own the copy.
This is why media companies are doing everything that they can to switch customers over to streaming services and stop selling physical content. It’s also why it’s a literal lie when you are told you can “buy” digital copies that have DRM, because those companies will simultaneously charge you the higher “purchase” price and deny you ownership rights as if you bought a disc.
Both require a license and that license is revocable in both cases. It’s pretty much impossible to enforce the legal use of physical media, so they don’t. Rather, they go after those making copies.
If you ever want to REALLY own your media, make sure it is physical.
“Reasons”
There’s a few things about this
- Many times you don’t own the digital good, you subscribe to it. No I’m not joking, that’s why services can usually take it away at any time. You normally own “a licence to play it on a single PC” or similar.
- This isnt apples to oranges per se. Selling digital goods is fine, it’s copying it. Similar to how photocopying a book and selling it would not be okay.
- It’s important to note there is a narrative push by companies too. They spend lots of money putting videos on every DVD saying “downloading is stealing” because if society thinks piracy and stealing is the same, it helps them litigate and make more money.
- Your idea of a lost sale is a hard one, from a media company point of view, it’s about making money. So if you can make people believe “a download is a lost sale” or “sharing a digital file is a lot sale” etc, then you can use that to sue individuals, isps, sharing sites, search engines etc and make more and more money while also having more power over your product.
if you live in the EU you own your digital purchases.
It’s kind of not tested though.
If you’ve never been given the option to download it and save it and use it from there, how would you “own” it if the streaming service takes it offline?
If you can’t transfer ownership of something, or have it past the lifespan of the shop you bought it from, do you really own it? I would say not.
It is tested. In court. https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2012-07/cp120094en.pdf
That’s software, and frankly until you can transfer a played game to somebody else in Steam, it’s not something that is enforced.
They cannot “oppose it” according to that, but you cannot do it.
But buying a digital movie from Amazon or Sony? They can take that away. Haven’t heard a peep from the EU on it.
That’s not the ownership though, that’s a subscription to a service. Ownership is something like buying songs on iTunes not listening to them on Apple music.
You can buy individual movies on Amazon without a subscription. This doesn’t mean you own it. If they stop hosting it, it’s gone.
But that is where the difference is, that’s not streaming or at least not as the term is used. That was a purchase of a specific title.
streaming
noun
a method of transmitting or receiving data (especially video and audio material) over a computer network as a steady, continuous flow, allowing playback to start while the rest of the data is still being received.
Whether it’s subscribed, “purchased” or free, if you don’t have the full file to copy and do what you want with it, it’s streaming.
You do not. Or we have a different definition for owning.
