Online piracy

[Kaufies]

Heres an idea. Why don't you run off to your nearest police station, and tell them that your illegal activity is OK. While all piracy advocates immediately default to telling you that "the law doesn't define it as theft", they all seem to overlook the fact that it is still illegal.

Lol, my buddy's dad (a policeman) actually asked me for an invite to Bitfarm once. He said he was thinking about canceling his Axxess uncapped 'cause money was thing. So yeah, I'd take my chances at the station

 

[Balstrome]

Intellectual property.

True, the owner of the copyright may not have lost something physical, but by downloading that content without paying for it, you have robbed the artist of an opportunity to trade.

Always wondered about the stuff that I never downloaded and never bought, the artist lost out on that as well. So not downloading cause more losses than downloading....

 

[LazyLion]

.... they all seem to overlook the fact that it is still illegal.

Please post which law in South Africa says that "downloading is illegal". Any relevant court judgments will also help to prove your definition.

I believe that road traffic rules are outdated. I can speed whenever I want, and ignore traffic lights and stop signs, because when I get home, nobody has lost anything. Thats ok right? I'm sticking it to the man. How revolutionary of me.

Sounds about right for 90% of South Africans

 

[sin_x]

Please post which law in South Africa says that "downloading is illegal". Any relevant court judgments will also help to prove your definition.

http://www.saiipl.org.za/introductio-copyright.htm

 

[LazyLion]

http://www.saiipl.org.za/introductio-copyright.htm

I don't see anything in there about downloading. But I do see that I have the right to "import into South Africa for my own personal use".

Got anything else? Any case law?

 

[sin_x]

I don't see anything in there about downloading. But I do see that I have the right to "import into South Africa for my own personal use".

Got anything else? Any case law?

Perhaps you didn't read the whole page.

Copyright in a work is infringed by any person who, without the authorisation of the owner, does any of the acts reserved for the owner, eg makes a reproduction of the work.

You got any more excuses?

 

[LazyLion]

Perhaps you didn't read the whole page.

You got any more excuses?

Let me enlighten you a bit here seeing that you obviously have no clue how the law works. The SA Institute of Intellectual Property Law is a lobby group. A member interest group. Very similar to the MAFIAA organisations in the USA. They are not a law-making body. They can only interpret the existing law and hope that any court judgments might be ruled in their favour.

Your link above does not point to any legislation, only their web page. It is the same thing as somebody posting a link to the Automobile Association when asked for legislation concerning traffic laws in South Africa.

It would have been better for you to post a direct link to the copyright act, but I gave you the benefit of the doubt anyway. But I can only cut you so much slack before you end up looking a bit ignorant on the subject.

Other than the copyright act (which is extremely vague), there is currently no case law in South Africa which has ruled that downloading is a violation of copyright law. In fact in many other countries in the world downloading is a protected activity (see the Netherlands for example).

So until we actually have a ruling, let's not hatch all our chickens yet... k?

 

[Kaufies]

...
Other than the copyright act (which is extremely vague),
...

And outdated I might add.

I agree. We gonna have to wait for a precedent to be set before this subject can be properly argued

 

[Drunkard #1]

So I'm either a coward (leonb) hiding behind the anonymity of the forum, or a tough guy (JoSorc and sin_x). Make up your mind people, I can't be both!

Perhaps you didn't read the whole page.



You got any more excuses?

We want to see an Act, and a few cases. The opinion of some random internet attorney is about as relevant as my gardener's opinion. It took all of 10 seconds to see that your link was biased and incomplete. Try again.

 

[sin_x]

We want to see an Act, and a few cases. The opinion of some random internet attorney is about as relevant as my gardener's opinion. It took all of 10 seconds to see that your link was biased and incomplete. Try again.

It does not matter who posted the information, it is still accurate.
Perhaps if you spent more than 10 seconds on the site, you may have realised that.
Perhaps do a search for South African Copyright Act (No. 98 of 1978). You might notice that the information in the act, and the information on the biased website are the same.

Just because the act has not (yet) been tried in court does not mean you can flagrantly ignore the law.

 

[Drunkard #1]

It does not matter who posted the information, it is still accurate.
Perhaps if you spent more than 10 seconds on the site, you may have realised that.
Perhaps do a search for South African Copyright Act (No. 98 of 1978). You might notice that the information in the act, and the information on the biased website are the same.

Just because the act has not (yet) been tried in court does not mean you can flagrantly ignore the law.

The website presents a gross simplification of part of the act, while it omits huge sections pertaining to the rights of consumers. Unlike some people *cough* You *cough*, I've actually read the act, and it therefore doesn't take me long to sniff out a biased website.

And if there haven't been any cases tried yet, based on a 32 year old act, I doubt there ever will be.

 

[LazyLion]

It does not matter who posted the information, it is still accurate.
Perhaps if you spent more than 10 seconds on the site, you may have realised that.
Perhaps do a search for South African Copyright Act (No. 98 of 1978). You might notice that the information in the act, and the information on the biased website are the same.

Just because the act has not (yet) been tried in court does not mean you can flagrantly ignore the law.

Of course it matters. Those are a bunch of lawyers who work for companies who have an interest in IP. Of course they are going to be biased towards copyright and do whatever they can to protect their clients interests even if that means interpreting the law their own way and warning people about copyright. They are getting paid heaps of money to do that. Surely you are not that naive to realise that?

And yes it also matters who the courts interpret the act. We know that sooner or later somebody is going to be tried under that legislation in SA regarding downloading... but until then we have no way of knowing how the court will interpret it. And it only matters how the court interprets it... not you or me.

Nobody is flagrantly ignoring the law. Until the law is clarified we are quite within our rights to exercise our freedoms. That is how it has been for thousands of years. Just cos you don't like it doesn't mean it has to be any other way. You have no right to force your opinions of the law on others... and that is all that they are ... opinions (and pretty poor opinions at that).

sorry, but you can bleat and cry and whine as much as you want... but until Judge so and so of the such and such High Court rules on the matter, your opinion is worth as much as the mosquito I squashed last night.

 

[sin_x]

The website presents a gross simplification of part of the act, while it omits huge sections pertaining to the rights of consumers. Unlike some people *cough* You *cough*, I've actually read the act, and it therefore doesn't take me long to sniff out a biased website.

And if there haven't been any cases tried yet, based on a 32 year old act, I doubt there ever will be.

Fine, ignore the "biased" website then. Seeing as you have read the act, please tell me which part states that copyright infringement is OK.

Again, it does not matter whether the act has been tried or not, it is still current law. Your argument has become exceptionally thin. Instead of using smoke and mirrors, why don't you directly address the facts?

 

[LazyLion]

Fine, ignore the "biased" website then. Seeing as you have read the act, please tell me which part states that copyright infringement is OK.

It all depends on the courts interpretation of the word "import". The act permits you to import into South Africa a copy of any existing work for your own personal use. Until they clarify that loophole people will continue to exploit it.

 

[sin_x]

Of course it matters. Those are a bunch of lawyers who work for companies who have an interest in IP. Of course they are going to be biased towards copyright and do whatever they can to protect their clients interests even if that means interpreting the law their own way and warning people about copyright. They are getting paid heaps of money to do that. Surely you are not that naive to realise that?

And yes it also matters who the courts interpret the act. We know that sooner or later somebody is going to be tried under that legislation in SA regarding downloading... but until then we have no way of knowing how the court will interpret it. And it only matters how the court interprets it... not you or me.

Nobody is flagrantly ignoring the law. Until the law is clarified we are quite within our rights to exercise our freedoms. That is how it has been for thousands of years. Just cos you don't like it doesn't mean it has to be any other way. You have no right to force your opinions of the law on others... and that is all that they are ... opinions (and pretty poor opinions at that).

sorry, but you can bleat and cry and whine as much as you want... but until Judge so and so of the such and such High Court rules on the matter, your opinion is worth as much as the mosquito I squashed last night.

So then what is the point of the act? Is it not clarification?
How convenient that it has not been tried yet.
No matter how you spin it, it is still flagrant disregard of the law. As I said, ignore the biased website (It has unfortunately become a convenient cover argument), and focus on the act itself.

 

[sin_x]

It all depends on the courts interpretation of the word "import". The act permits you to import into South Africa a copy of any existing work for your own personal use. Until they clarify that loophole people will continue to exploit it.

I think you may have misread the act, or I have misunderstood the act.

It clearly states:

Without derogating from the generality of subsection (1)

Meaning, subsection 1 overrides the part about importing for personal use.

 

[LazyLion]

So then what is the point of the act? Is it not clarification?
How convenient that it has not been tried yet.
No matter how you spin it, it is still flagrant disregard of the law. As I said, ignore the biased website (It has unfortunately become a convenient cover argument), and focus on the act itself.

Sure, it is for clarification, but the rise of internet downloading has only come about in the last 10 or 15 years. The act never really saw that phenomenon arising.

And yes, there have been convictions under the act, but only for specific acts of distribution (profit making) from copyright infringements. eg. the DVD pirates who sell at the flea markets and street corners. But those are clear cases of intent to profit from an infringement. Where there is no intent to profit the law becomes a bit more cloudy. Can someone be prosecuted for copyright violation where there is no intent to profit? Not likely. The copyright holder still has a civil right to claim a loss from such a person, but it extremely unlikely that they will seek redress for R150 when hiring a lawyer is going to cost them R10,500.00.

So the copyright holders are going from country to country and lobbying the governments with obscene amounts of money to change the law and to introduce fines or penalties for downloaders. They just have not made it to South Africa yet. But we know they are coming and will try it soon enough. They want to redefine the law in their favour.... and in the process they will remove some of our civil rights.

Let me ask you a straight question? Have you ever saved a picture to your hard drive that you saw on the internet? Or a web page? Have you ever saved an entire web page? You are just as guilty of copyright infringment as the guy who downloaded a movie. You are also still violating their IP. So you ask what is the difference? Money.... they can make more money out of you by changing the law regarding movies and music. Maybe one day they will go to pictures and web pages as well... but it is all about money.

 

[sin_x]

And yes, there have been convictions under the act, but only for specific acts of distribution (profit making) from copyright infringements......

Distribution does not imply (financial) profit.
Hard drive swapping can be seen as distribution and trade, even though money has not changed hands.

 

[LazyLion]

I think you may have misread the act, or I have misunderstood the act.

It clearly states:

Meaning, subsection 1 overrides the part about importing for personal use.

no, you are correct. But section 27, under penalties conveniently ignores that sub-section.

27. Penalties and proceedings in respect of dealings which infringe copyright

(1) Any person who at a time when copyright subsists in a work, without the authority of the owner of the copyright-

(a) makes for sale or hire;

(b) sells or lets for hire or by way of trade offers or exposes for sale or hire;

(c) by way of trade exhibits in public;

(d) imports into the Republic otherwise than for his private or domestic use;

(e) distributes for purposes of trade; or

(f) distributes for any other purposes to such an extent that the owner of the copyright is prejudicially affected,

articles which he knows to be infringing copies of the work, shall be guilty of an offence.

So he knows the work infringes, but he imports it only for his own personal or private use. He has no intent to distribute, so he takes advantage of the loophole in the penalties section. Section 27 gives him a loophole to import AS LONG AS IT IS FOR HIS OWN PRIVATE OR DOMESTIC USE. That is the loophole we are talking about. There is no penalty mentioned for such use, EVEN IF HE KNOWS THE WORK TO BE INFRINGING.

 

[LazyLion]

Distribution does not imply (financial) profit.
Hard drive swapping can be seen as distribution and trade, even though money has not changed hands.

again, that is your interpretation. The courts may look on that completely differently. It is extremely difficult to prove criminal intent where there is no intention to profit. That much has been proved over and over again time and again. Which only leaves a civil claim on the part of the owners. And as I said, they are not likely to sue where the damages are miniscule.