"Jim Lesurf" wrote in message
...

That is not my understanding, based on having to sign various copyright
agreements, etc, over the years. Here 'literary work' means anything you
write down which isn't a copy of some previous 'work' of someone else's.
It
applies throughout the UK/EU regardless of the nationality of the person.

Also, copyright applies to all kinds of things as well as written works, for
example, photographs, recordings, paintings, music, drawings, clothing
(there's a copyright in the designs on knitted clothing.) I seem to recall
that tartans are copyright ...

That may or not be so. However the person who breaks the law may not be in
a position to judge if what they do is immoral or harmful - and it is not
their position to decide this for everyone else.

Infringing copyright is not breaking the law (unless done as part of
commerce.)

If you have a CD collection, and select tracks to form a sequence of music
you like and copy that sequence to a CD, you are not breaking the law, but
you are infringing copyright.

In theory, you should notify the copyright owners that you have made copies
of their works, and offer to pay the appropriate fee.

In practice, the fee is so small ... I'd guess maybe 50 pence to £1 per
track ... that it would not be economically worthwhile for each of the
copyright owners to reply to you and ask for payment. (And the MCPS and PRS
do not cover the situation where you are copying CD tracks.)

Tim








[Harrison disc]

Thus here the 'harm' that piracy has done is that it has caused the
music company to act in a brainless manner *and prevent me buying the
copy I'd like to listen to - thus also denying the payment to the
copyright owners.*


To say 'piracy is the cause' of substandard media is really missing the
point.

I do not agree. It is one of the elements in the chain that lead to
non-CD's and 'nagging screens' on DVD's. Actions have consequences even
when those who have acted prefer to deny it.

[snip]

Jim - think what would happen if everyone obeyed copyright and music
copying without permission became a thing of the past (either through
technology, a new moral order, and/or certain pain of prosecution). Who
would be in control of music dissemination? Would that be a good thing?
I think not.

Who would "be in control" would be - as now - in the hand of those who
create the work, and want to buy/have it. If musicians don't like big
companies they can set up their own, use the net, etc. Ditto, if you don't
like what is on offer, complain or refuse to buy.

It is the slave who makes slavery possible. This is a harsh dictum, but it
contains a vital point. There are alternatives if you don't like the
current system, but for them to work you have to pursuade enough others to
agree with you and act as you would prefer - not simply pick and choose
what laws to break when it suits you to do so. Your actions affect others
even if that does not occur to you when you take them.

Slainte,

Jim

--
Electronics
http://www.st-and.ac.uk/~www_pa/Scot...o/electron.htm
Audio Misc http://www.st-and.demon.co.uk/AudioMisc/index.html
Armstrong Audio http://www.st-and.demon.co.uk/Audio/armstrong.html
Barbirolli Soc. http://www.st-and.demon.co.uk/JBSoc/JBSoc.html