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Pirates in the Suburbs

I was recently at a dinner party with some friends, and the question of copying DVDs came up. One of the guests asked if any of us knew of a way to that he could copy his DVD collection to his home computer. He wanted to be able to store and play back his movies from his computer to his home entertainment system, and all of his attempts to do so had ended in failure.

An innocent enough question, certainly, and it was interesting to listen to the responses he received from the other guests. I have to say I was surprised by the depth of knowledge that was being shared about the technical aspects of "ripping" a DVD. It was obvious that most of them had first hand experience ripping their own DVDs, and it occurred to me, while I listened to them describe in detail the different processes they used, that I was having dinner with a bunch of content pirates. They didn't fit the mold of what I considered to be a "typical" pirate. They weren't in it for money, as there would be no commercial gain from their enterprise. Their intent was to fairly use content, which they had legally purchased, for their own personal benefit. Most of them had advanced college degrees and enjoyed very successful professional careers. Clearly their end goal wasn't the redistribution of copyrighted content, but just the same, they were infringing on patented technologies and copyrights.

Bringing up this fact quickly soured the conversation. "How could it be an infringement", they asked. They had legally purchased their DVDs, and they only wanted to make back-up copies. Certainly it was their right to do so. What if a DVD got scratched or damaged... would they have to pay for another copy? They seemed incredulous. So much so that I began to question my own position. Maybe it was okay to make backup copies or to repurpose the content to play back from a hard drive. It was time for me to brush up on what I thought was gospel about copying or repurposing DVD content.

Before I continue, I should make it clear that I am by no means an expert on copyright law, nor do I offer any legal advice as such. With that out of the way, here are the basics. In 1998, Congress passed a law called the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, or DMCA. The relevance of this particular law isn't that it makes it illegal to make a copy of DVD content for private, non-commercial use; but instead, that it makes it illegal to circumvent the technological measures used to prevent DVD copying; foremost, Macrovision and CSS. In other words, it's illegal to circumvent the copy protection in order to make a copy of the content.

Specifically, the law prohibits devices and or services that would be used in the circumvention of access-control (copy protection) measures. The fact that the law prohibits the circumvention of copy management and access-control is both genius and evil.

Opponents to the law suggest that the nature of prohibiting the circumvention of the copy protection technology is actually an infringement on Fair Use and consumer rights. Currently, there are several bills in Congress that would amend DMCA to clarify fair use. There is precedence for such clauses. In 1992, Congress passed the Audio Home Recording Act, which offered consumers a blanket protection against infringement actions for private, non-commercial audio copying. Thus, the advent of the "mixed tape".

The AHRA should have been the stepping stone for DMCA as it relates to consumer protection and Fair Use. Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to have been the case. Hopefully, the new laws currently under consideration by Congress will add more balance to the current state of things, and my friends will one day be able to make their back-up copies without fear of infringement actions.

Chris Lamb, President, Paragon Media

Download a copy of the DMCA from copyright.gov.

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