Clone Wars Season 3

[FenderBender]

Fender... so we can have money to mess around with George's intellectual property!

Ok.

[Shadar Al'Niende]

really? I wouldn't promote anything illegal here and I'm not. It's a bad idea to do anything illegal at all, but I have to say I'm pretty sure the youth of today is already familar with bittorrent tech, more then "us"... and very aware of the consquences of stealing copy righted material.

I don't think DJ is going to corrupt a generation makeing an offhanded comment.

DJ, prolly a bad idea, edit out the site name prolly a good idea.

My point was not that DJ would alter the next generation, time, and the universe as we know it with one comment....

My comment was in the chance that a minor come here and see the post, get in trouble for pirating software or other material, then tell his parents "I got the idea on TCSS! Some guy there said it was ok!" BAM lawsuit for Tim and possibly others... not cool. Promoting illegal activity of any kind on this forum is not acceptable and could possibly harm what we all enjoy here. DJ understands this and knows better, so i was merely admonishing him for inappropriate behavior. What people do in their personal time is up to them, but don't promote said behaviors here where they could be tied to this forum or Tim...

[Onli-Won Kanomi]

Pirating violates copyright laws and is illegal. Not cool...

Oh really? Now I'M the one as a loooong time Napster/Audiogalaxy etc P2P 'war vet' who's - SEZ WHO? the RIAA? the MPAA?

Note the terminal "A" in those: Recording Industry Association OF AMERICA. Motion Picture Association OF AMERICA

Guess what: AMERICA DOESNT DECIDE WHAT 'IS', and AMERICA DOESNT DECIDE WHAT IS LEGAL. Certainly American INDUSTRY 'interest groups' do not.

In MY country our COURTS have said that MY downloading of 'copyrighted' material from P2P sites is no different from photocopying at the public library and therefore is completely LEGAL.

The RIAA and the MPAA and our analogous representatives of 'the majors' [labels/studios] might not LIKE that any more than a book publisher might not like 'losing a sale' if someone copies a book at the library LEGALLY but guess what something IS NOT ILLEGAL unless and until a COURT says so, and even then only within its JURISDICTION.

COURTS of LAW trump what INDUSTRY ASSOCIATIONS say...when a COURT says something IS LEGAL and Industry Associations make a BLANKET STATEMENT it is ILLEGAL then that industry association is LYING.

An ACCURATE statement Shadar would be: "pirating violates copyright laws and is illegal IN AMERICA FOR AMERICANS."

Everytime we watched the Grammys or Oscars [which have a WORLD wide audience] and heard Hil-LIAR-y Rosen or Jack Valenti or some other INDUSTRY sycophant LIE about "P2P sharing of copyrighted material is ILLEGAL" they NEVER qualified there statement TRUTHFULLY "...IN AMERICA".

Like the stereotypical "Ugly American" of the movie [Jack Valenti is old enough to remember it so should know better] they ASSUMED [and you know what that means] that AMERICAN standards including AMERICAN 'legality' and 'illegality' applies EVERYWHERE.

It does NOT.

I will NOT be told "Pirating violates copyright laws and is illegal." when I OBEYED THE LAW doing so...please don't make those same BLANKET statements that Hillary and Jack did.

edit: BTW in MY country it is not only "legal" as our courts have ajudicated it is also MORAL to do so since we have a tiny surcharge levied on blank recording media which the same 'major labels' lobbied our government for to "compensate artists and rightsholders" for private copying of copyrighted material. This was THEIR CHOICE in how they wanted to be compensated so they can't even claim we are 'immorally' withholding just compensation for their work. Unfortunately for them they were only thinking of people copying cassettes and didnt foresee the P2P Revolution and made a 'bad deal' for 'pennies' that undermined themselves but that is their own fault not ours.

Now that they see they are 'losing money' due to their own shortsightedness our industry reps have been trying to get our copyright laws changed to get around the court rulings by lobbying our ruling pro-industry right-wing political party...eventually they'll probably get an 'Americanized' reform through Parliament but even then like all new laws they will have to be tested to see if a Court upholds - or perhaps doesnt - the new law in an actual case.

[FenderBender]

Ethics are ethics no matter what country your in. You either have them and support those that you like or you don't. Simple as that. American laws may not affect you, and you may have disdain for our culture, whatever. This is really about ethics.

[Skottsaber]

Is this going to start an America/Canada debate?

Guys... it was an offshoot comment. It really doesn't need to snowball like this.

[galen marek]

yeh, but the pirate bay is shweet though.
the way i see it: Lucasfilm=rich. Me=Poor, plus, i'm not gonna watch it on tv or pay for the dvd anyway, effort.

[Skottsaber]

yeh, but the pirate bay is shweet though.

*head falls on keyboard*
Did you not read ANYTHING that was just said? You are entitled to your opinion, but PLEASE don't post it here. It is in the forum rules that you MUST keep content PG.

[galen marek]

I believe it's PG?
it's not only for pirating videos and music, some factual movies like the yes men that powers that be would not like you to view are only available through file sharing sites such as the piratebay.

[jin starkiller]

yes, but you still have to have a code of ethics, don't you think that from everyone that dowloads from sites such as those is illegal .....think about this 50 people dowload less sales equals higher prices for everyone else ....the ethical thing would be just to save your money any buy legit copy and not pirated due to the fact its unethical...thats just my 2 cents

[Onli-Won Kanomi]

Fender let me be clear that I do NOT have "disdain" for American culture, I LOVE AMERICA and think its the best country in the World, it may well be the best country in the entire History of the World and even PREhistory if 'Atlantis' never existed, and its culture is wonderful, mostly [I went to college in America and would love to have been born and to live there] but it's not the ONLY country and its culture is not the only one either despite Hollyweird's success in speading its ideas widely.

So when American industry reps like Rosen and Valenti et al make the same kind of blanket statements as Shadar's to a World-wide audience at the Oscars or Emmys about 'illegality' it is THEY who are showing a "disdain" for NON-American cultures.

Yes I agree that one must have "ethics" and just because you 'can' do something legally doesnt mean you necessarily should which is why I addressed the morality issue in my EDIT. Morals and ethics are not exactly the same but when an industry demands a certain type of "compensation" - blank media levy - for perceived 'grievances' and GETS it - then complains they didn't know they were making a bad deal for themselves and want MORE then really that's just GREED and they don't have a leg to stand on neither legal NOR morally/ethically which is one reason our courts knocked them back and now they have to try for a political side-step around our courts. But you cant FAULT the ethics of people who are FAIRLY playing by the 'rules' that other people made if those other people foolishly chose rules that are disadvantageous to themselves. They can't cry 'foul' now because they suddenly realize they coulda/shoulda/woulda asked for more then and blame it on us.

Btw I do have sympathies with recording artists, one of my cousins is in Blue Rodeo one of the biggest bands in Canadian history and another is a world famous fiddler from Cape Breton named Ashley but I know its harder for most and my sympathy is more for the way the record industry exploits and genuinely 'steals' musical artists rights to their own work. The dirty little secret that Hillary and Jack never tell you in their claims of 'starving artists' is that the 'content' industry exploits artists 'dreams' to lure artists to sign bad contracts that mean recording artists and movie directors etc almost never own the copyright on 'their' work rather it is a BIG CORPORATION like Sony Music or a movie production company or perhaps studio like Fox or Paramount that is the "rightsholder" not the actual artistic CREATORS of the work.

The real reason that RIAA went so ballistic over Napster, AG et al had little to do with actual artists starving lol and everything to do with corporate business-models and bottom-lines dependant on REselling the SAME content on new kinds of physical media every few years [vinyl->cassette->cd/vhs->dvd->bluray] being threatened by a new distribution system - P2P -that could undermine the MIDDLEMEN - THEM - between actual content creators and consumers. And the same reason the MPAA hates BitTorrent and [stupidly and incorrectly named] Pirate Bay et al.

RIAA got so 'rabid' in the 'religious zeal' against P2P they even made obviously absurd claims that somehow if we on Audiogalaxy were allowed to continue file trading then musicians wouldn't make music anymore!

Riiight, and Beethoven and Mozart never made music because there was no copyright at the time. Musicians didn't exist and didn't create and didn't perform for the thousands of years before the recording industry and copyright law existed and therefore would stop making music after the dinosaur-middleman recording INDUSTRY ceased to exist. Puh-lease

And the hyperbolic arguments that were put forward by RIAA and Metallica against Napster, Audiogalaxy et al at the Grammys and elsewhere were utterly fallacious.

NO Lars we are not "stealing from the mouths of [your] children" - please look up the legal and moral and ethical foundation for the concept of 'theft' in every Western civilization since the original Law of Hammurabi: that THEFT must deny the personal use of property to the lawful owner; i.e. if I steal your horse you can't ride it, if I steal your pot you cant cook in it, if I steal bread THEN your children can't eat it etc. Thats WHY "stealing" is considered not only illegal but 'wrong', not only in my country but every Western one AFAIK.

Copying something is not and CANNOT be stealing since the original possessor still has it to use for him/herself. That is why copyright law was created as a separate entity from laws of theft in Western societies when copying became more technologically widespread with the advent of printing presses. It really only became prevalent since the industrial revolution.

And in the 20th Century it became 'broken' because of corporate greed - particularly and specifically because of ONE corporation - Disney - using political lobbying to ALWAYS 'extend' the term of copyright whenever The Mouse was about to become Public Domain - for that reason little has entered Public Domain since the time of Steamboat Willie and you can bet by the 25th century the Mouse That Roars will still be corruptly copyrighted AGAINST the original intent of Copyright to FOSTER creativity by allowing actual creators to make a reasonable living then have their work go Public as is Homer's Shakespeare's, Beethoven's etc artistic work NOT to stifle true artistic creativity by enshrining PERPETUAL 'cash cows' for greedy mega-corporations that can then grow too big and powerful for genuine 'little guy' artists to compete with - which is what is truly "unethical" in the modern world and why P2P is imo MORALLY GOOD not just LEGAL here. Vive le Revolution.

Lets also be clear that even in America there is not and never has been at any time since the Founding Fathers a "Right to PROFIT" - its not in your Bill of Rights or Constitution anywhere and not even in the Declaration [only an oblique reference to "pursuit of happiness" which in 18th century semantics is a reference that includes use of personal property and would include free market commerce as a corollary but does not enshrine profit therefrom]. Free market economics does not prevent folks from making bad deals.

It is somehow apropos imo that here at least the 'labels' are now 'bitten' for having made a 'bad deal' for themselves with the blank media levy that has undermined even their moral/ethical claim against P2P when they have lured artists into signing bad record deals for decades with no mercy and are now hoist on their own petard...almost poetic justice really.

edit: In case you wonder why I take this all personally it may be because I met my 'true love' on the boards at Audiogalaxy back in its heyday and while I can't say I 'lost her' there directly because of RIAA's shenanigans the "day the music died" at AG happened at a time of very 'delicate' events in her life and for us and that bad timing certainly didn't made things easier for us [she is among other things a recording artist who had modest success in Europe] and because I am Faithful to her I will probably be alone for the rest of my life so yeah for me this subject is 'personal' though I 'can't' say any more about that. Vive le Revolution cuz I've paid, HARD, for it.