Life's Not Fair

Marybeth Peters is the Register of Copyrights at the U.S. Copyright office. She’s held the post since 1994 so she has seen a lot in terms of the current copyright issues. She recently talked to Ars Technica about the issue of fair use. Consumer groups are always citing fair use and the Sony Betamax case as reasoning for wanting to be able to copy DVDs. Particularly, every three years when there is a review hearing for the DMCA to examine if any exemptions should be allowed. Every three years it’s the same story, too. The EFF asks for the exemption, and the panel says no. Their reasoning is that based on the “true meaning” of fair use, an exemption is not required for DVD copying. They say that since the content is available through other means (such as VHS tapes) that there is not a legitimate reason for ripping a DVD. Also, they say that the Sony case was limited to time-shifting content from free broadcasts. She says that ripping DVDs is place-shifting, and that it is done for a convenience factor. Neither of those is covered under fair use.All of this means that consumer rights groups are going to need a different strategy when trying to get the right to rip DVDs. I’d love to see them use the argument of being fair and nice to the consumer is in the best interests of the media companies. That is not likely to happen, though. Mostly because the media companies don’t see it that way. After all, there is a reason that you have to sit through those stupid anti-piracy ads at the beginning of DVDs you legally bought. The reality of the situation is that if they made it legal for you to rip DVDs piracy would not suddenly flourish. All it takes is one person to break the encryption, rip something, and then upload it. Now that one thing has just rendered all copy protection on discs useless. I can assure you that there is at least one person that rips just about every movie out there and uploads it. On top of this, ripping something isn’t exactly hard. I can find and download programs that allow me to do so in less than five minutes. All that the media companies are doing is making it an inconvenience. If I download a ripping program, rip my DVD, and stick that on my media server to watch throughout my house, how does that hurt them? Why is it that I technically have to break the law to do that? Why is it that having a copy on my hard drive so I don’t have to go find the disc so scary to them? They say that it is to combat piracy, but piracy is rampant already. If piracy is already so widespread, do they seriously think that it will be more so if they allow ripping?