What Is The Federal Digital Millennium Copyright Act?
Posted by Copyright Law Enquirer on July 9th, 2009 at 10:23pm
im going to be living on campus next year, and i love my limewire,but theres this note on my schools computing page that says that any file-sharing that is prohibited in the Federal Digital Millennium Copyright Act is prohibted. I dont know what that copyright act is, does it mean I wont be able to use limewire when I get to campus, or like if i get caught i’ll be in trouble?
also before you download limewire, they ask if you if your going to be use it do things illegally, and i’m thinking they only reason i use it is to download music and movies, so i guess what im trying to say is, if I’m mainly using lime to download entertainment is it really illegal?, and if it is why are they asking me if i’m going to use it for something illegal when they know their program is for file sharing.
cuz ive always thought of file sharing as like somebody lending me a cd or dvd letting me copy it and give them back the orginal, and they dont charge me, i thoguht it was only bad if they charge u
Tags: Copyright, Digital, Federal, Millennium, What
Under copyright act
2 Comments for What Is The Federal Digital Millennium Copyright Act?
1. Funny Animation Videos | July 9th, 2009 at 10:45 pm
file sharing of copyrighted material is illegal. I would not suggest using the program on any school networks because there has been a lot of recent crackdowns on school networks. really, the only legal way to use the program is to share non-copyrighted material, and the stuff you want to get is undoubtedly copyrighted.
just because you don’t have to pay doesn’t mean that it is legal, i promise you that.
2. Anon28 | July 10th, 2009 at 1:32 am
“Digital Millennium Copyright Act
§ 1201. Circumvention of copyright protection systems
(a) Violations regarding circumvention of technological measures. –
(1)(A) No person shall circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title.
(2) No person shall manufacturer, import, offer to the public, provide, or otherwise traffic in any technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof, that –
(A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title;
(B) has only limited commercially significant purpose or use other than to circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title; or
(C) is marketed by that person or another acting in concert with that person with that person’s knowledge for use in circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title.
(3) As used in this subsection –
(A) to “circumvent a technological measure” means to descramble a scrambled work, to decrypt an encrypted, work, or otherwise to avoid, bypass, remove, deactivate, or impair a technological measure, without the authority of the copyright owner;
(B) a technological measure “effectively controls access to a work” if the measure, in the ordinary course of its operation, requires the application of information, or a process or a treatment, with the authority of the copyright owner, to gain access to the work.
(b) Additional violations –
(1) No person shall manufacture, import, offer to the public, provide, or otherwise traffic in any technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof, that –
(A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing protection afforded by a technological measure that effectively protects a right of a copyright owner under this title in a work or a portion thereof;
(B) has only limited commercially significant purpose or use other than to circumvent protection afforded by a technological measure that effectively protects a right of a copyright owner under this title in a work or a portion thereof; or
(C) is marketed by that person or another acting in concert with that person with that person’s knowledge for use in circumventing protection afforded by a technological measure that effectively protects a right of a copyright owner under this title in a work or a portion thereof.
(2) As used in this subsection –
(A) to “circumvent protection afforded by a technological measure” means avoiding, bypassing, removing, deactivating, or otherwise impairing a technological measure; and
(B) a technological measure “effectively protects a right of a copyright owner under this title” if the measure, in the ordinary course of its operation, prevents, restricts, or otherwise limits the exercise of a right of a copyright owner under this title.
(c) Other rights, etc., not affected.
(1) Nothing in this section shall affect rights, remedies, limitations, or defenses to copyright infringement, including fair use, under this title.
(2) Nothing in this section shall enlarge or diminish vicarious or contributory liability for copyright infringement in connection with any technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof.
§ 1203. Civil Remedies
(a) Civil actions. – Any person injured by a violation of section 1201 or 1202 may bring a civil action in an appropriate US district court for such violation.
§ 1204. Criminal Offenses and Penalties
(a) In general. – Any person who violates section 1201 or 1202 willfully and for purposes of commercial advantages or private financial gain –
(1) shall be fined not more than $500,000 or imprisoned for not more than 5 years or both, for the first offense; and
(2) shall be fined not more than $1,000,000 or imprisoned for not more than 10 years, or both, for any subsequent offense.”
It mostly a law directed at the people who MAKE Limewire, etc. than people who use it (though arguably, you would be using technology to circumvent the copyright. Nonetheless, the school rule clearly means to includeLimewire users.
Hate to tell you this, but file sharing is exactly like someone letting you copy their CD. Both are equally illegal.
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