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Supreme Court Sides with Cox in Copyright Fight over Pirated Music

nytimes.com

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Re: Supreme Court Sides with Cox in Copyright Fight over Pirated Music

#251

Post by jeffgreco »

AlexCoventry wrote: post #182
WarmWash wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that that judgement was made in 1981, it's possible that the judges (who were likely a bunch of depression era old dudes) had zero knowledge or exposure, and had never even thought much about, personal video recording before a bunch of lawyers tried to explain it to them during the case. We have see this happen repeatedly with modern tech cases.

Even complete legal novices like me know about the Sony/Betamax case, FWIW. It would shock me if a judge ruling on copyright implications of a technology didn't know about it.

They’re talking about the judges on the Sony/Betamax case, not the new one.

Re: Supreme Court Sides with Cox in Copyright Fight over Pirated Music

#252

Post by rimunroe »

RustyRoss wrote: post #215
rimunroe wrote: post #97

Funnily enough the only time I ever got in trouble for torrenting anything was when Cox was my ISP circa 2009. I'd been torrenting some PSP game and my connection went down. When I called the helpline they explained what happened and said they'd restore access once I confirmed I'd deleted the downloaded file.

Lol. Did they force you to pinky swear that you'd deleted it?

They waited on the line until I said I'd deleted it and then immediately reactivated my connection.

Re: Supreme Court Sides with Cox in Copyright Fight over Pirated Music

#253

Post by IG_Semmelweiss »

autoexec wrote: post #247
chipdale wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's zero benefit to society Wouldn't it result in additional tax revenue while preventing Disney's movies from proliferating throughout society unimpeded? In all honesty, I really think you should think this idea through. Compared to the status quo, where we get zero tax revenue from intellectual property, this system would guarantee an expiration based on commercial viability. It couldn't sustain forever becau…

> Wouldn't it result in additional tax revenue while preventing Disney's movies from proliferating throughout society unimpeded? I mean they already pay taxes (allegedly). When artists create good works that become popular the state also gets sales taxes from the consumer side as money changes hands in exchange for the work. If we just wanted money we'd be better served by getting rid of the loopholes and tax games t…

i understand your logic , but there's a problem with that assertion.

the thought is that the copyright value accrued out of some accident and thus, the owner does not deserve its value . That thinking is flawed. If anything, the copyright owner contributed to the equity accrued to the copyright. They should be able to pay the high price to keep adding value to it. This does not discriminate. IN fact, i would say the opposite, what you are proposing, feels like stealing.

If i dump millions into developing a copyrighted work, why could any random artist with nothing to lose be able to exploit the work by paying a small/no fee? This seems incredibly unfair. Do you agree?

Re: Supreme Court Sides with Cox in Copyright Fight over Pirated Music

#254

Post by indymike »

bombcar wrote: post #192
pavon wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Ninth Circuit court of appeals understood correctly what the primary use of Betamax would be, but they believed that personal home recording was not fair use, and was thus copyright infringement. They interpreted the law as only allowing libraries to record TV or radio broadcasts. The Supreme Court ruling for this case found that time-shifting was fair use, but only by a narrow 5-4 margin. Fair use could have gon…

We have to remember that at the time of the decision, there really wasn't any source of things to copy with a Betamax recording device besides commercial broadcast TV and other copyrighted materials. Camcorders and such devices where you could make your own content were very rare, if available at all.

Camcorders were not, but cameras and portable battery powered tape decks were.

Re: Supreme Court Sides with Cox in Copyright Fight over Pirated Music

#255

Post by jonny_eh »

djoldman wrote: post #110

For those like myself who wanted context: > Cox Communications v. Sony Music, 607 U.S.___ (2026), was a United States Supreme Court case regarding the liability of an internet service provider for its subscribers engaging in copyright infringement. > Cox Communications was sued by multiple music labels for lax enforcement of its users engaged in sharing the labels' copyrighted music, arging Cox finacially benefitted…

I wouldn't normally side with a cable company, but they're up against Sony Music, so I'll allow it. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootk...

Re: Supreme Court Sides with Cox in Copyright Fight over Pirated Music

#256

Post by foltik »

amadeuspagel wrote: post #51
strogonoff wrote: post #26

It’s interesting to see how as soon as intellectual property theft starts to be critical for powerful interests the legal system magically gets more lenient about copyright enforcement. The balance between public good and protecting IP ownership of the creatives (which is, paradoxically, also part of the public good) has to be struck and enforced consistently.

It's interesting to see how people look for powerful interests to explain simple and correct supreme court decisions.

Not really if you look at the prior context. It’s ruling after ruling in the favor of powerful interests (aka rights holders) when it comes to copyright enforcement. A simple correct ruling feels like a miracle.

Re: Supreme Court Sides with Cox in Copyright Fight over Pirated Music

#257

Post by jojobas »

Henchman21 wrote: post #249
bahmboo wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This speaks to first principles. I don't want judges making law - and any good judge doesn't want to make law. Laws are from elected legislatures. Of course this is all wishful thinking.

Isn't "judges making law" a key feature of common law systems? IANAL, obviously, I would know the answer to such a basic question if I were. But this is my understanding, and given that this case is in the US and the US is based on common law, I'm genuinely curious if you're advocating the US change to civil law?

Special interest groups throwing their money at suitable cases of random people to further their interests is not a key feature of common law, it's a very unfortunate side effect.

Re: Supreme Court Sides with Cox in Copyright Fight over Pirated Music

#259

Post by robhlt »

MoonWalk wrote: post #153
thot_experiment wrote: post #9

A tiny victory. Copyright should not be more than a decade. This intellectual property system is one of the worst things to happen in modern society is what I would have said a few years ago, now I got bigger problems but I'm still mad.

Disagree on the decade. There are plenty of examples of great movies or other works that took longer than a decade to bring to the public. Those projects would have been completely non-viable if their content could have been stolen after creators put a decade into their development. I think 25 or even 50 years is more defensible. But 100? Nah. But the crushing problem today for many of us here is SOFTWARE PATENTS. Th…

The timer on copyright starts once a work is published, not when the work is first started. So works that spend a decade or more in development would be unaffected by this.
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